Laid to rest...at last
David O'connor
As family and friends look on, local soldier is buried at Arlington 57 years after he disappeared during the Korean War.
ARLINGTON, Va. - Kathy Reifsnyder was here Tuesday remembering a big brother with a big heart, someone who liked to hunt and fish and sometimes go to the movies.
"But the movies were probably just a nickel back then!" she said.
She also recalled his kindness, like the time the 18-year-old sent his pay from Korea back home for her twin sister Cecilia's eye surgery.
On Tuesday, on a sloping hillside among the hundreds of thousands of small white headstones here, America said thank you to Reifsnyder's older brother.
A month short of 57 years after he disappeared in action in Korea, Army Cpl. Samuel Wirrick was laid to rest with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery.
Tuesday's service came 11 days after Wirrick would have been 75, seven years after his remains were found in Korea, and six months after they were positively identified.
It was an emotional day, but one that brought a tremendous sense of closure and pride, several family members said.
For Reifsnyder, now of Pequea, who was 6 when her brother was reported missing, it was "a moving day, a day that really made me proud."
It also was a moving day for the three dozen or so family members who made the trip here for Tuesday's burial service.
Some 60 people attended both a funeral service at Arlington's Post Chapel and subsequent graveside ceremony.
At the grave, the hush of the wooded surroundings was broken only occasionally by gun volleys from other ceremonies elsewhere inside the 612-acre national cemetery.
A military officer approached Wirrick's oldest living brother, Arthur Kast, also of Pequea, who was seated with other family members.
Holding the U.S. flag that an honor guard had just folded with quiet military precision, the officer presented it to Kast.
The officer then said, "This flag is presented on behalf of a grateful nation, as a token of our appreciation" for Wirrick's service and sacrifice.
The sound of planes taking off from nearby Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport had become silent, and three rifle volleys were fired in quick succession in Wirrick's honor.
Then an unseen bugler played "Taps," slowly and mournfully.
Reifsnyder recalled how, along with her siblings, she grew up, got married, worked and went about life wondering about the fate of Wirrick, who would have been 75 on Oct. 13.
The third eldest of 13 children, he had disappeared near the Chongchon River in North Korea in late November 1950.
The young corporal, who had blue eyes and brown hair, was a slender 5-foot-9-inch warrior.
Allies led by the United States, which had jumped in quickly to defend democratic South Korea in the summer of 1950 from an attack by communist North Korea, had seized the advantage and had taken the battle to the communist North when the newly communist Chinese surprisingly entered the war.
Wirrick, a member of the 2nd Battalion, 38th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, was reported missing in action as his unit withdrew under the Chinese onslaught.
Along with seeing her brother receive full military honors with his burial at America's most hallowed burial grounds, Tuesday also brought peace of mind on another front for Reifsnyder, who's now 63 and a grandmother.
She said she had "always wanted to meet someone who was there" with her brother as his unit fought bravely in Korea.
And at Arlington on Tuesday was Lt. Col. Donald Byers of Woodbridge, Va., who's now 75 but in late 1950 was an 18-year-old private in the 23rd Infantry, serving with Wirrick.
"He told me he remembers how scared they were, that he was just a young pup, too," Reifsnyder recalled.
After the service Byers recalled that in late 1950, the military action happened in weather that "was so cold ... 38 degrees below zero."
As the family and others gathered outside in the unusual late- October warmth Tuesday for the graveside service, a cousin of Wirrick recalled a quiet young man who would ride "an old rickety merry-go-round" with her when their families visited together.
"He was a nice boy ... but we didn't get to have him long enough to really get to know him," said cousin Betty Heisey, now of Manheim Township. She will be 80 next month.
Heisey, the former Betty Wallace, remembers how Wirrick's family traveled from Lancaster to visit her family in Gap.
Wirrick's family, living in Lancaster's Cabbage Hill section when they got word in early 1951 that he was missing in action, continued to hold out hope for a miracle.
This summer, after the Army notified Wirrick's family that he had in fact died, Reifsnyder said that "you always have that teeny, teeny hope. We always did, until we found out different."
Wirrick had been listed as missing in action since the Korean War ended in 1953.
His funeral service was one of 27 funerals conducted at Arlington on Tuesday. More than 300,000 people are buried there.
Intelligencer Journal (Lancaster, PA)