Promote & Preserve stories of U.S. fallen soldiers/sailors
Merax C. Dockery, age 23, from Pottawatomie County Oklahoma.
Service era: Post Afghanistan
Military history: Camp Lejeune
Date of death: Sunday, July 23, 2023
Death details: Among three Marines who were found dead in a vehicle at a gas station in Hampstead, North Carolina. They died of carbon monoxide poisoning.
Source: NBC News
Eric D. Warren, age 26, from Shawnee, Oklahoma, Pottawatomie county.
Service era: Afghanistan
Military history: 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, Regimental Combat Team 6, 1st Marine Division (Forward), I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward), Camp Lejeune.
Date of death: Saturday, May 26, 2012
Death details: Died of wounds received in action due to an improvised explosive device blast in Sangin District, Helman Province, Afghanistan.
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Aaron Dean White, age 27, from Shawnee, Oklahoma, Pottawatomie county.
Parents: Darrell and Karen White
Spouse: Michele
Children: Brianna Nicole, 1
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Hmm-364, Mag-39, 3D Maw, Camp Pendleton, California
Date of death: Monday, May 19, 2003
Death details: Killed in a CH-46 Sea Knight helicopter crash in the Shatt al Hillah Canal in Iraq
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
John Jr. Hembree, age 19, from Pottawatomie County Shawnee, Oklahoma .
Spouse: Linda Lee Hembree
Service era: Korea
Date of death: Friday, December 1, 1950
Death details: By mid-November 1950, U.S. and Allied forces had advanced to within approximately sixty miles of the Yalu River, the border between North Korea and China. On November 25, approximately 300,000 Chinese Communist Forces (CCF) “volunteers” suddenly and fiercely counterattacked after crossing the Yalu. The 2nd Infantry Division, located the farthest north of units at the Chongchon River, could not halt the CCF advance and was ordered to withdraw to defensive positions at Sunchon in the South Pyongan province of North Korea. As the division pulled back from Kunu-ri toward Sunchon, it conducted an intense rearguard action while fighting to break through well-defended roadblocks set up by CCF infiltrators. The withdrawal was not complete until December 1, and the 2nd Infantry Division suffered extremely heavy casualties in the process. Corporal John Hembree Jr. joined the U.S. Army from Oklahoma and served with the Headquarters Battery, 82nd Anti-Aircraft Artillery Automatic Weapons Battalion, 2nd Infantry Division. He went missing in action on December 1, 1950, as his unit provided direct fire support to 2nd Infantry Division troops withdrawing from Kunu-ri south to Sunchon, North Korea. No one saw him fall, and he was not reported to be a prisoner of war. The area where he went missing never reverted to Allied control, which precluded searches for his body during the war, and his remains were not identified among those returned to U.S. custody after the war. Corporal Hembree is memorialized on the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. His name is also inscribed on the Korean War Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, DC, which was updated in 2022 to include the names of the fallen.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Tulsa World (1954)
Howard L. Finley from Wanette, Oklahoma, Pottawatomie county.
Service era: World War I
Date of death: Saturday, September 14, 1918
Death details: Died of disease
Cemetery: Arlington National
Source: Soldiers of the Great War, findagrave.com
George Collins from Oklahoma, Pottawatomie county.
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Unknown
Death details: Killed in action
Source: National Archives