Local News
Dalton soldier dies in Iraq
Pvt. Thomas “Tommy” Lee returned home to Dalton from his Army duty in Iraq about a month ago. While his schedule was full of activities with family and friends during those seven days, Lee’s mind stayed fixed on his brothers a world away.
“Me and him went out and went fishing one day,” his grandfather Billy Hobbs said Monday. “He spent a lot of time with his friends and his mother and stuff, then he was ready to go back. He wanted to go back and be with the rest of his buddies.”
Lee, 20, was killed in Mosul, Iraq, on Friday after an explosive device struck his vehicle. Hobbs said military officials haven’t divulged the circumstances behind his grandson’s death, but he said he heard that five other soldiers died in the attack.
“I’m in the blind right now, I really don’t know,” Hobbs said.
Lee, who grew up in Dalton and attended Southeast High School, is the fifth soldier or Marine who graduated high school in Whitfield County to be killed in Iraq since Operation Iraqi Freedom began in 2003. Four other local graduates — Army Spc. Michael Alleman (Southeast), Army Sgt. Marshall Edgerton (Northwest), Marine Lance Cpl. James Michael Gluff (Northwest) and Marine Lance Cpl. Juan Lopez (Southeast) — died while in service with the military.
Hobbs said Lee’s mother, Shirley, returned late Sunday night from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware where she received her son’s body. Lee leaves behind two sisters. Hobbs said Lee’s father, Thomas Lee Jr., is in prison and has “been out of the picture” for several years.
Shirley Lee and her son were “extremely close” and “she just wants to be with her and her two kids these next few days,” he said. The family hasn’t made funeral arrangements.
“It’s a shame,” Hobbs said. “Our hearts are broken and I’m mad, too. I’m just mad at him having to be over there like that. There’s already over 4,000 been killed and they added his name to the list. I think we oughta just come home. He told me the last time he came home he didn’t understand why we were over there. He said, ‘Them people over there, they hate us.’ And evidently they do.”
Lee joined the military in February 2008 as an infantryman and was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division since July 2008. He deployed to Iraq in December 2008. Hobbs said Lee spent most of his time on patrol in Iraq. Lee planned to make a career out of the Army, Hobbs said.
“He loved the military,” Hobbs said. “He liked the excitement, guns, tanks, everything like that. It’s just the type of person he was. He was such a good, loving person. He was kind, never cussed, never smoked, never drank, never took no dope, nothing. Just a good person.”
Hobbs recalled how far back his grandson’s interest in the military went.
“When he was little, he would watch Army pictures over and over and over and he always wanted to be in the military,” Hobbs said. “And he finally got old enough to get in there.”
Lee’s military awards and decorations include the National Defense Service Medal, Iraq Campaign Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Army Service Ribbon and Overseas Service Ribbon.
John Paul Bledsoe, a member of American Legion Post 112 in Dalton, said he knows the Lee family. He said the local Legion will probably hold a ceremony for Lee.
“It just chokes me up,” Bledsoe said.
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