Cpl. Jessica Ellis died in Iraq helping others. Her father remembers his daughter and the “ultimate sacrifices” military women make on Memorial Day.

The knock on the door got here at nighttime on Mom’s Day 2008 in Oregon, the place Jessica Ellis’ mother and father lived. It was round 9:20 p.m. and his spouse, Linda, was already in mattress; her father Steve Ellis advised CBS Information, that he thought somebody let their animals out — however two troopers in Class A uniforms have been standing on the door.  

“You already know why they’re there. I imply, they do not should say a factor,” Steve Ellis stated.  

Ellis, a fight medic assigned to the 2nd Brigade Particular Troops Battalion, 2nd Brigade Fight Crew, a hundred and first Airborne Division in Iraq, had volunteered a second time for a mission to clear a route. It was her second deployment to the area. She primarily accompanied fight engineers on clearance missions to search for roadside bombs, however this time, their automobile was hit by three projectiles. Everybody needed to exit via a again door. Ellis did not make it.  She was 24 years outdated. 

“Neither one in every of us envisioned dropping a daughter in fight,” her father stated. “Life isn’t actually the identical after that.”

Rising numbers of girls within the navy, rising fatalities

Ladies make up about 16% of the nation’s navy – the most important proportion in America’s historical past, partly fueled by the chance to serve in all positions together with fight. However because the variety of girls serving within the navy has grown, so have fatalities. 

Because the world conflict on terror started in 2001, 179 feminine navy members have been killed in motion – surpassing different U.S. wars or engagements. Eight navy girls have been killed in Vietnam. 

“The Division of Protection is happy with the bravery and sacrifice made by all service members who’ve given their lives in protection of our nation,” a spokesperson advised CBS Information.

Nonetheless, stated Marilla J. Cushman, the president’s senior adviser at Navy Ladies’s Memorial, a D.C.-based group that tells the collective story of girls’s service, girls have made nice strides and at the moment are serving at each degree within the navy. 

She stated girls are “driving tanks, commanding hundreds of individuals, and flying fighter planes,” one thing that wasn’t attainable when she served within the Military for 25 years. 

“I’d be proud to face beside any of those girls,” Cushman stated. 

The last word sacrifice

Ellis’ mother and father met their daughter’s colleagues at Fort Campbell in Kentucky so they might study extra about what occurred that evening. 

“She was such a cheerful baby, she had a heat character and she or he lifted her unit up – we bought met by a whole lot of women and men there,” stated Steve. 

Her father stated they gave her the nickname “Doc Ellis.” He stated her buddies advised them that even after she was gone “she saved saving lives.” They defined to her mother and father that she educated all of them to cease bleeding and so they used her method typically after she was gone. 

Only a few weeks earlier than she was killed in motion, her father stated she had gone out on the same mission. Her automobile bought hit and she or he known as her mother and father to them, her father recalled.

“She stated her automobile burned and her help bag burned,” Steve stated. “We advised her to watch out. However that was the final time we ever talked to her… about three weeks later she was killed.”

Her colleagues helped them piece collectively what occurred. Ellis borrowed an help bag and volunteered to return out once more. Final April, one in every of her feminine medic buddies advised her mother and father that Ellis’ accidents from the primary blast have been worse than they knew. Considered one of her legs bought contaminated from the burn, he stated the buddy advised them. However she did not wish to let her buddies down, Ellis stated. 

“Speak about braveness she went again on the market, she volunteered to return to our on the mission. There have been 21 guys and her, she volunteered to exit once more with burns on her leg,” stated Steve.

Ellis was emblematic of a fight navy that’s sacrificing a lot to safeguard our freedoms, he stated. These girls, he stated, have been devoted of their service, their sacrifice, and for some “the final word sacrifice for his or her nation.”

Extra from CBS Information