I have met all of my grandfather Carl's brothers, with exception of one. I never met my great uncle Archie in person; I know him only from letters and stories, expressions on faces, and a framed military portrait displayed in my grandfather's house.
Archie was the oldest of six boys. His story, along with that of the other five, began a while before in Manhattan, KS, where my great grandfather and his brother attended Kansas State Agriculture College in the early 1900's. (A photo of Merrill [L], my great grandfather, and his brother, Byron [R], in Manhattan. C 1916.)
College was an uncommon achievement in those times. My great grandfather would have told you, likely, that he considers the crowning glory of his time in Manhattan rather to be a run-in with a lovely, dark-haired girl named Erma. So began the story of the boys.
Backing up a bit, my great grandfather Merrill and his brother deployed for World War I shortly after their college days. It was a dark time -- the world at war, and rumors of a mysterious Summer flu spreading with indiscriminant lethality across military and civilian populations. (We now know that Summer "bug", The Great Pandemic of 1918, was a virulent strain of H1N1 hypothesized to have originated at an Army Camp that is now part of present-day Fort Riley, outside of Manhattan, KS.) Merrill and Byron both survived their deployments and were among those fortunate enough to return home to families who had survived the Pandemic.
Although the art of agriculture in practice was a relentlessly difficult endeavor, the family grew and prospered in life, love, and (with six little boys in one house) what has become a legendary sense of humor and carefully planned misadventures. (Photo of the boys: [Back] John, Archie, Carl, [Front] Herman, Lloyd, and Ray. C mid to late 1930's.)
But, despite the ferocity with which it is defended, peace is a most fragile state. In the early 1940's, Archie and John deployed for yet another World War. The remaining four brothers would follow in service to Korea and other assignments, quite literally spanning the globe. Their stories and commitment are celebrated throughout the family's collective memory to present day.
Archie's story is celebrated differently; woven as tightly into the fabric of treasured memory as the other five, his story of honor and rare courage came to us in fragments over decades, priceless but frayed threads of hope from a father's unwavering search.
Our family learned what we can only cling to as being the account of Archie's last engagement from a letter written to Merrill and Erma in 1968 -- 23 years after Archie was determined unrecovered. The letter was sent by a comrade who had been in Archie's Company and, knowing that Archie was officially recorded among those "Missing In Action", was compelled to bear witness to the last hours. The report was overwhelming in both the depth of depravity and courage it described -- Archie was considered a hero who exchanged his own safety to cover a friend in the final moments of a merciless firefight in the Phillippines. Being left without cover, he himself was hit. Another friend was seriously wounded trying to retrieve his body. The occupation was too entrenched, and further recovery efforts could not be made for a number of weeks.
For over 40 years, it was presumed by the family that the letter came somewhat randomly -- a fellow soldier honoring the memory of a friend and hero lost. It was only this Summer, 42 years after the letter arrived, that artifacts indicating a different origination emerged. When sorting through old photos with my grandmother, we found the rest: a record in great grandfather Merrill's own handwriting of efforts to contact anyone who knew anybody who may have been with Archie. Writings received about Archie's courage and character, and ultimately the last battle were there, all dated along with a brief log and notes great grandfather Merrill had added. It was a decades-long testament of a son's honor and a father's love, largely unknown to the rest of us.
Perhaps the most heartrending entry in the documents was the last inscription. Written on the original copy of the letter describing Archie's last engagement are these words: "1984 - Ray visited the cemetary in the Spring of 1984. Archie was listed there among the missing." The entry was made only a few short years before Merrill died at the age of 92. He was still looking.
Despite the question of Archie's whereabouts most certainly lingering, my great grandfather Merrill was remembered as an unusually funny guy who loved life and found a story to tell the grandkids about almost anything. I have my own faint memories of him, although frail then, as a very kind and contemplative man whose sharp mind seemed to have more life left than his body. Even those closest to him wouldn't have guessed the daily burden he carried for his last 44 years. Although, long before the other documents were found, a clue to his unfailing love and commitment to a son lost was uncovered in a most unusual place. In one of his outbuildings, written on the very walls in charcoal, chalk, rock, and whatever else... were poems about the soldiers who never returned, the monuments never made, the despair unrequited by a place of remembrance. We never really figured out why he wrote them on a building and not paper --mostly for privacy, we assumed. No one else had gone into that old shop for years. But now, after reading "the rest of the story", I think it was a fitting tribute. He wrote them on something too big to ever be lost, too permanent-seeming to be forgotten. They were his monument to Archie in the solitary places of the soul, on the sacred grounds of a father's heart.
Sometimes artifacts have new meaning when we can see "from the end back to the beginning" -- recognizing the sanctity of a time when wholeness existed in our treasured other's presence, their safety, their closeness to us. We look at those artifacts not only seeing them, but seeing an "us" that solely existed in between and will never come again until eternity is unveiled. In honor of this, I share a final photo -- one I formerly never took much notice of. It has, however, become my favorite to see "from the end" backwards. In this photo are my great grandparents with Archie on their first homestead. It is the smallest house in any of the pictures, but the value in the moment can never be summed.
For Great Grandfather Merrill, Byron, Archie, John, Grampy Carl, Herman, Lloyd, Ray & Uncle Richard -- thank you for being "a watchman on the wall" (Ezekiel). With love and celebration for you always.
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