R.I.P. Army Private First Class Ross McGinnis
Bookworm on Jun 02 2008 at 9:32 pm | Filed under: Military
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with our English dead!
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.
Shakespeare, “Henry V” (5.3.44-51)
I thought of a soldier’s willingness to throw himself into the breach, to “imitate the action of the tiger,” when I read about Army Private First Class Ross McGinnis:
In the gunner’s hatch of a Humvee driving through Baghdad on December 4, 2006, Private McGinnis saw a grenade fly through the hatch, rolling to where it could have injured the four other soldiers inside. In easy position to leap and save himself, McGinnis instead jumped to cover the grenade with his body to shield his comrades.
The four men he saved were all at the White House yesterday to pay their respects. They and his parents, Thomas and Romayne McGinnis, knew Ross as one who, at 137 pounds and six feet tall, had barely outgrown his boyhood when he joined the Army on his 17th birthday, the first day he was eligible to enlist. The Knox, Pennsylvania native was known not to take things too seriously, the soldiers said – and yet in an instant he displayed the self-sacrifice that defines heroism in battle across generations. Although he didn’t grow while he was in the Army, “he seemed to stand a lot taller,” his father said. “He was a man.”
President Bush just awarded McGinnis a posthumous Medal of Honor.
For more on my thoughts about those who willingly face certain death to save their comrades, go here.
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2 Responses to “R.I.P. Army Private First Class Ross McGinnis”
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When you contemplate what Ross McGinnis did you can only marvel. And wonder— what would I do?.
I thought his parents were marvelous during the ceremony. Such dignity.
Great people.
The one thing I would say is that a situation like that reaches below the level of “thinking about it,” or “making a decision,” or even doing what your training directed you to do.
There isn’t time in those sorts of situations, or room; for logical thought. There is only time to react, which puts you instantly face to face with your inmost self; the “flight or fight” reaction is in full flush, and you find out who you really, really, really, are. How you were raised, what you believe, what you value – it’s all right there in such moments.
Ross McGinnis – and those around him in that Humvee – found out that his inmost self was not oriented toward the “flight” side of the personality organization equation.
And so we lose – with no real clear idea of what we’ve lost – another of our best.