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| Cameron Soldier Among Those Who Returned Home Friday |
Another batch of men and women from Illinois serving their country have been coming home in the last several days.
National Guard units from a number of communities were welcomed home by friends and family alike Thursday and Friday, including yet another batch of Guard soldiers who were greeted at the National Guard Armory in Galva. About a dozen soldiers from a couple different units received a hero's welcome and a special "Thank you." The troops were about two hours late on their trek home, but they and the family alike didn't seem to mind.
One of the soldiers coming home was from this area -- Specialist Joshua Atwell, who was with the 634th Support Battalion, who combined with other groups to do humanitarian missions in Afghanistan among other tasks.
Tammy Atwell is Joshua's mother, and tells WGIL her son's time away for almost a year was made a lot easier by frequent communication.
"He had his cell phone over there, so I got to communicate with him almost every other day," Atwell said. "Talked to him on the computer -- they had internet, so I got to talk to him on that. It's kind of hard, because there was a time difference. So I had to wait. And I worked days, but he was on there during the day when I could talk to him. So, then, I would call him on the phone on the way to work."
We talked with Atwell as she and her family awaited her son's arrival. She said she was still nervous about her son coming home, even though she knew he was already in the states.
Atwell said she hoped to keep her emotions in check, but she knew that would be next to impossible. |
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| 09 11 09 by Newsroom |
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