Honoring Gold Star Mothers, a sisterhood forged by loss of military children

Eight years after the death of her only child, Brandywine Hundred resident Sheila Flocco said the pain remains.

“There are times when it really bothers me,” she said of losing Matthew, 21, a Navy officer killed at the Pentagon in the September 11 attacks. “I know we’ll never see him again.”

Flocco still remembers the last time she saw him alive. They were waiting in the Wilmington station for his train back to Washington, D.C. As he boarded, she said she would see him next weekend.

After his death, she was wracked by grief, but found comfort in the American Gold Star Mothers, an organization for women who have lost a child in combat. Being able to talk with others feeling the same pain was of immeasurable help as she coped with the loss of her son, Flocco said. Gold Star Mothers will be honored at this year's Memorial Day Service at Del Vets Post #1 in Wilmington.

The organization began during World War II and take their name from the stars hung in the house windows of families who had children in the military, explained Gold Star Chairwoman Judy Campbell.

When a family’s child joined the military, a blue star was hung in the window and if their child was killed, a gold star was hung overtop of the blue star.

The stars are a way to honor the memory of fallen soldiers and remind people who see them of those soldiers’ sacrifices, she said.

“When you forget and you don’t pay any honor, it’s like they never existed,” she said. “There’s always an empty place at their table, an empty place in their heart, and having people remember helps them bear the loss.”

Campbell, of Brandywine Hundred, is an associate member of the Gold Star Mothers whose brother, Keith, was killed in action nearly 40 years ago during the Vietnam War.

Some families of fallen soldiers may want to forget how their loved one was killed to ease their pain, she said, but for Campbell, peace came only after she learned her brother’s story.

Keith, a 19-year-old Army medic, left the safety of his unit to help a company of soldiers with no medic, she said. He found a soldier bleeding on the ground, patched his wounds and dragged him behind a tree away from the gunfire filling the air. Using his own body to shield the injured soldier, he was fatally shot.

Keith is a hero, she said, and talking about his sacrifice keeps his memory alive.

Most Gold Star Mothers love to talk about their children, yet it is far from a club of mourners, said Judy Thompson, of Millington, Md. It’s more like a family with a common thread and a unified goal.

“Every time I hear of a new one, my heart just squeezes because I know what they are going through,” she said.

Thompson’s son, Jarrett, was killed in Iraq in September, 2003 at the age of 27. The loss was hard to deal with, but she knows he went to war for the right reason – to keep his family safe.

Jarrett left behind two sons, now 12 and 7, and Thompson said it is especially important that they understand both the sacrifice their father made and how proud he would be of them.

As Memorial Day approaches and her son’s sacrifice is thrown into sharper relief, Thompson said she knows he’s a hero and she’s proud of him, but the pain of losing a son never completely goes away.

“There’s a hole that will be there for the rest of my life,” she said.