Army Staff Sgt. Delmar White

Died September 2, 2007 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

---

37, of Wallins, Ky.; assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery, Kentucky Army National Guard, Carrollton, Ky.; died Sept. 2 in Baghdad of wounds sustained from an improvised explosive device.

---

Kentucky guardsman killed by roadside bomb in Iraq

The Associated Press

FRANKFORT, Ky. — A Kentucky National Guardsman from Lexington was killed and three others were injured when a roadside bomb exploded while they were escorting a convoy in Iraq, the military said Sept. 3.

Staff Sgt. Delmar White, 37, of Lexington died Sept. 2 during the mission in Baghdad, said Maj. Gen. Donald C. Storm, adjutant general for Kentucky.

“The death of Staff Sergeant White is a terrible loss for the entire Kentucky National Guard family,” Storm said in a statement. “Words cannot describe the grief that we all feel at this time.”

White died doing what he loved, said his wife, Michelle.

“He went out a hero,” she told the Lexington Herald-Leader on Sept. 3. “He was a hero before he went to Iraq, in my book.”

The names of the three injured soldiers were not released, but a statement said two had been taken to a hospital in Germany and one had returned to duty. All three injured soldiers had been in touch with family members, Kentucky National Guard spokesman Phil Miller said.

White, who had previously served in the Marines, was a veteran of Operation Desert Storm, Miller said.

It was the second death of a Kentucky National Guardsman in a one-week period. Staff Sgt. Nicholas R. Carnes, 25, of Ludlow in northern Kentucky, died Aug. 26 in Afghanistan of wounds from small-arms fire. Carnes was assigned to Battery A, 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery, based in Carrollton.

White, who deployed less than a month ago, was assigned to Battery B, 2nd Battalion, 138th Field Artillery, based in Carlisle.

“I pain for any soldier who dies in combat,” said battalion commander Lt. Col. Mike Gilkey. “Having two of them in your command in one week, it hits hard.”

Funeral services for Carnes were to be held Sept. 4 in northern Kentucky.

White, a graduate of Cawood High School in Harlan, moved to central Kentucky in January 1999 and soon met his wife.

She said his support for the war never wavered.

“He was 100 percent military,” she said. “If somebody started bad-talking the war in front of him, he would get upset. Whether he felt we should be there or not, he was all for what the military did. He never bad-talked the military or President Bush. He was behind it 100 percent, always.”

Michelle White said her husband would do anything for anybody. Her best friend’s son thought of him as a second dad.

“He was a fantastic person that everybody loved,” Michelle White said.

White’s commander in Iraq said he was a first-class joker who never passed up a chance to play cards.

“There is a line that we are familiar with that says we will ‘cheerfully obey the orders.’ That was Delmar White for certain,” Capt. Robert Mattingly told the newspaper. “He was an excellent NCO, who led by example and never asked anything of his soldiers he wasn’t willing to do himself.

“Delmar White was loved by everyone in the battery and will be terribly missed by all,” Mattingly said.

White had been a corrections officer with Lexington Fayette Urban County Government, but left in 2005 to help recruit for the National Guard.

“He loved the Guard,” Gilkey said. “That’s how much he believed in what we do.”

White is survived by his wife and their two children; his stepmother, Hazel White; and a brother, Robbie Christopher.

Funeral arrangements were pending.

Gov. Ernie Fletcher directed that flags at all state office buildings remain at half-staff in White’s honor until the day of his funeral. The flags currently are at half-staff to honor Carnes.

---

Hundreds attend funeral for Kentucky guardsman killed in Iraq

The Associated Press

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Hundreds paid their respects Sept. 14 at the funeral of Staff Sgt. Delmar White, a Kentucky National Guard soldier killed in Iraq earlier this month.

White, who lived in Lexington and was previously from Harlan, was remembered as “a soldier of his Lord and a soldier of his country,” the Lexington Herald-Leader reported on its Web site.

White, 37, was killed Sept. 2 by a roadside bomb while escorting a convoy in Baghdad. Three others were injured.

Krista Hampton, the minister who gave the eulogy, recalled how White wore his uniform at a Cincinnati Labor Day activity some years ago. A slightly inebriated man asked White, “Why would you lay down your life for people you don’t even know?”

Before White could answer, a small boy asked to shake White’s hand. White told the man “that’s why I fill this uniform.”

During the funeral procession, several people stopped their daily activities to salute White. A man alongside a road put his hand over his heart as the cortege passed. Several groups gathered to wave American flags, including several students outside the Jessamine County’s Career and Technology Center.

White’s survivors include his wife and their two children. Maj. Gen. Donald Storm, Kentucky’s adjutant general, presented his wife, Michelle, with the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart and other medals.

White, a Marine veteran of the Persian Gulf War, was a former corrections officer with the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government. He deployed with his Guard unit to Iraq in August.

Corrections officer William Davis, who worked with White, said “You could talk to him about anything. Anything you wanted to talk about, he would sit there and listen to you.”

Bagpipes played Amazing Grace during the military funeral, which also included a 21-gun salute and the plays of taps. Three helicopters flew overhead as the American flag that draped White’s casket was folded and given to his wife.