Soldier

Ethel Bohle was in the attic of her Severn home Friday morning, retrieving photos of her grandson, Brad, from more than five dozen albums and recalling memories of the 29-year-old soldier who was killed this week in Afghanistan. One of her favorite memories involved her husband, Edward, who died three years ago. "They would do woodworking together, and Brad even had a lathe in his house," she said. "After they were done working, Pop would make him a milkshake and shave the ice for it. When Brad's father came to tell me the bad news, he said, 'I guess Brad and Pop are having a milkshake.

It was the soldier's smile that struck mourners who viewed images of Spc. Ari D. Brown-Weeks yesterday as they filed into Mountain Christian Church in Harford County. The video montage of family photos spanned Brown-Weeks' 23 years of life, from beaming infant to proud uniformed soldier whose first name means "lion." "That smile stands out in all the pictures," said the Rev. Victor Harner, pastor of the church on Mountain Road in Joppa. "It is the key to his inner spirit. And that name is fitting for a warrior and hero."

Erika Slack, a homemaker and volunteer who escaped Russian-occupied post-World War II Europe, died of Alzheimer's disease complications Thursday at the Blakehurst Retirement Community in Towson. The former Guilford resident was 87. Born Erika Muehlen near Neumunster, Germany, she spent her youth on a family farm where she developed a love for gardening and horses. While in high school, she learned to speak English. In an autobiographical narrative, I, Her Story, which was written many years ago, Mrs. Slack described her experience in what is now the Czech Republic in the spring of 1945.

BUSINESS DOW -15.54 12,487.02 NASDAQ +1.25 2,435.49 S&P -1.72 1,422.18 SUN INDEX +0.13 365.30 NATIONAL Officer faces court-martial The highest-ranking American soldier - and only officer - charged with a crime in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal will be court-martialed on eight charges, including cruelty and maltreatment of prisoners, his lawyer confirmed yesterday. pg 3a WORLD Bush defends Iraq strategy President Bush defended his Iraq strategy yesterday in a closed-door meeting with House Republicans and told reporters that he is the "decision maker" on troop deployments even if Congress opposes his plans.

An Army private was sentenced yesterday to three years in a military prison after pleading guilty to aggravated assault and other charges for engaging in unprotected sex despite being ordered by the Army to tell sexual partners that she was HIV positive.Pfc. Gerland Squires, a soldier at Aberdeen Proving Ground, will receive a bad conduct discharge, have her rank reduced from private first class to private and forfeit all pay and benefits."I'm sorry, so sorry," the 21-year-old private said, sobbing, just before a seven-member panel sentenced her on charges of aggravated assault, disobeying a superior and making a false statement to investigators.

A few days before Christmas 1945, a little girl in cardboard shoes stood amid the rubble of a ruined German village, her sobs drifting in frosty plumes on crystal air. She was headed for school -- but her makeshift shoes had suddenly come apart.Her mother had wrapped the child's feet in salvaged cardboard, securing it with twine. But when the twine unraveled, Christa Geuer stumbled. Barely of school age, she did not know how to retie the knots.The war was over, but the sight of American troops was common that Christmas season in occupied Zweibrucken, near the French border.

For Susan Carl, the mystery of the missing soldier began 20 years ago with a single clue -- a yellowed newspaper obituary from October 1862, pasted into a family Bible.It ended yesterday in a sea of white tombstones on a grassy hill in the sun, where Carl and her cousin, Elaine Wescott, paid last respects to the fallen Union infantryman they'd finally tracked down.He was their great-great-great uncle, William Henry Burns, and he'd died of a leg wound suffered on the bloodiest day of the Civil War, the Battle of Antietam.

After six weeks as an intern at the U.S. Embassy in Kenya last summer, U.S. Military Academy cadet Alison M. Jones of Towson reluctantly cleaned out her desk and said goodbye to her embassy friends. She had walked just two blocks when a blast nearly knocked her over.A bomb had detonated August 7, crumbling the embassy in Nairobi and killing 213 people. As thousands, screaming in panic, ran from the building, Jones' first thought was, "I have to get back in there to help."She did.In the hours after the blast, Jones rescued people buried in debris, helped recover bodies, and, with no prompting, roped off the building to keep others safe.

Last July, more than 30,000 fully uniformed Civil War re-enactors gathered in Gettysburg, Pa., to travel back in time and "see the elephant," which in 19th-century parlance meant experiencing combat.They came to restage the fateful, three-day battle fought there in 1863. Among them was a 68-year-old retired dentist from Topeka, Kan., Herschel L. Stroud.Seeing the elephant and not actually getting shot at is a wondrous experience, said Stroud, a wiry, goateed, hyper-energetic man who scuba dives, plays trumpet in a swing band, sings in a barbershop quartet and races sailboats on Lake Shawnee.

" I wonder about the future. I fancy no peace will be of a very lasting value. Europe an armed camp for years isn't a cheerful picture. But love seems for the moment to have fled the world." -- Charles Lister, a young English soldier on the eve of World War I.Call the 20th century advanced if you like, but it also has been bloody. The bloodiest. Ever. A century of organized death.The human toll of wars, armed conflicts and genocides far surpasses previous centuries in its methodical, often government-sponsored killing.

Ethel Bohle was in the attic of her Severn home Friday morning, retrieving photos of her grandson, Brad, from more than five dozen albums and recalling memories of the 29-year-old soldier who was killed this week in Afghanistan. One of her favorite memories involved her husband, Edward, who died three years ago. "They would do woodworking together, and Brad even had a lathe in his house," she said. "After they were done working, Pop would make him a milkshake and shave the ice for it. When Brad's father came to tell me the bad news, he said, 'I guess Brad and Pop are having a milkshake.

After withdrawing its offer of a new home in Pasadena to an Iraq war veteran and triple-amputee who was found to own several other properties, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit is poised to hand the keys to another wounded soldier on the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The search for a more needy candidate did not go very far. Homes for Our Troops found Sgt. Luis Rosa-Valentin, who like the previous candidate, Sgt. David Battle, was a triple amputee undergoing rehabilitation at Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington.

The summer's best American movie, The Hurt Locker, opens in Baltimore one week from today. It's the culmination of a four-year process that began when journalist-screenwriter Mark Boal told director Kathryn Bigelow that he had an assignment from Playboy to be embedded with an Army bomb-defusing squad in Iraq. Bigelow thought, "There's a movie there. I didn't know what he would come back with, I didn't know any of the details, but I was certain it was a film." They went on to revive the once red-hot tradition of journalistic moviemaking.

We Who Are Alive and Remain: Untold Stories From the Band of Brothers by Marcus Brotherton (Berkley, $24.95, 320 pages) On D-Day, Easy Company parachuted into Normandy and the Germans in a series of uphill battles. Twenty members of Easy Company recall their victories and defeats. Easy Company Soldier by Sgt. Don Malarkey (with Bob Welch; St. Martin's, $14.95, 304 pages) The paratrooper recalls the battles he and his fellow soldiers fought after landing in Normandy. Iwo Jima: World War II Veterans Remember the Greatest Battle of the Pacific by Larry Smith (W.W.

Families sue over fatal Bay Bridge crash 2 The families of three men killed in a 2007 crash on the Bay Bridge are suing a Maryland agency and several drivers over the accident. James Hewitt Ingle and Randall and Jonathan Orff died and five people were injured in May 2007 when a trailer being hauled behind a sport utility vehicle came loose and caused a multiple-vehicle crash. The Ingle and Orff families are suing the Maryland Transportation Authority, the driver of the SUV, the owner of the trailer and two truck drivers and their employers for $19 million.

Soldier from Potomac killed in Afghanistan A soldier from Potomac was killed Tuesday in Kandahar, Afghanistan, after an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle, the Department of Defense said. Army Capt. Brian M. Bunting, 29, a member of the Individual Ready Reserve, was assigned to the 27th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of Syracuse, N.Y., Pentagon officials said. A 27th Infantry Brigade spokesman said Bunting stayed in Afghanistan with the 33rd Combat Team based out of St. Louis after his unit was called home.

Those who served with Brian Norman agree that he was an exceptional soldier - capable, meticulous and brave. He had two combat tours, one in Afghanistan, the other in Iraq, and was awarded two Bronze Stars. He was also known as a singular teacher, one who demanded a great deal from students but also inspired and encouraged them. He helped with college applications, went to school football games, and even took students drag racing. But this fall, his life unraveled. On Nov. 12, he was arrested for allegedly slapping the buttocks of a 16-year-old girl, a junior in one of his classes at North Harford High School in Pylesville.

Gary Steele didn't attribute much significance to the pass he'd just caught. He was merely doing his job as the sophomore tight end for Army's football team. But in the stands at Michie Stadium, two older men gently knocked knees. It was a subtle gesture between friends, both of whom had spent time at West Point as Buffalo Soldiers in the 1940s. One of the men was Steele's father, the other his godfather. They had never dreamed they'd see a black cadet, much less a member of the family, catch a pass on that field.

OXFORD, Miss. - Each presidential campaign roared out of here yesterday morning in a pitched fight to make the case that the other candidate had lost the first presidential debate of the general election. At the crack of dawn, the campaign of Sen. Barack Obama released a new advertisement criticizing Sen. John McCain for failing to utter the words "middle class" in the 90-minute debate, held Friday at the University of Mississippi here. By then, McCain had already produced and released an Internet video citing several instances in which Obama had said he agreed with his rival's positions.

Miracle at St. Anna : By James McBride: Riverhead / 307 pages / $15 James McBride's story of a Buffalo Soldier who befriends a 6-year-old Italian boy during World War II will hit the big screen next month under the direction of filmmaker Spike Lee. But until then, you can read the story in paperback. Inspired by real people and real events, the story tells of a group of black soldiers, cut off from their company, who find their humanity in a small Italian village.