Several hundred line streets for Bristol Veterans Day parade

Retired Air Force Capt. Wiley Webb Jr., now real estate broker in Bristol, said he was impressed with the crowed before him at the Bristol War Memorial, because of the presence of so many high school ROTC units—and the old veterans who can still get into their Class A uniforms.
Speaking as part of the Veterans Day celebration in Bristol on Saturday, Warfare addressed a crowd at the War Memorial following the parade.
Wars has changed a lot with the development of new weapons, he said. But “one thing that has not changed is the heart and motivation of the soldier, airman and sailor.”
He closed by asking those present to pray for the soldiers and families affected by the Fort Hood shooting, but also offered up the kind of inspiring anecdote he said was not reported by the news media: the story of a man named Ed Freeman, who in Vietnam flew dozens of his wounded comrades – trapped by machine gun fire – to safety, returning 13 times.
Freeman received the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest honor for a combat serviceman, and died in August 2008.
The sun and the celebratory atmosphere seemed to defy the pall cast over the nation by Thursday’s tragedy at a U.S. Army base in Fort Hood, Texas, where a psychiatrist is accused of shooting to death 13 soldiers and wounding more than 30. Not that the tragic event wasn’t on the mind of veterans.
“The military has got to come together a little closer and be more vigilant,” Larry Murray, a Marine Corps veteran of Vietnam and member of the Disabled American Veterans Chapter 40, said as the procession from Bob Morrison Boulevard swung onto State Street. “Just because we’re marching down this street in freedom, it doesn’t mean we don’t need to be on the alert.”
Marching alongside Murray, Army Veteran James Keeling concurred. “You ain’t safe anymore,” he said.
Sgt. John Hawthorne, of the Elizabethton-based 776th Maintenance Co., rode toward the front of the parade in a Ford GT coupe. Three weeks ago, Hawthorne finished a tour in Iraq, where he has been for the past three years.
The parade’s grand marshal, Hawthorne, 44, has been in the Army since he was 20.
“It does my heart good to be back,” he told the crowd that gathered to honor veterans at the Bristol War Memorial.

For more on this story, see Sunday’s Bristol Herald Courier.