Bryan Spry

Chestertown, Maryland

February 13, 2004

While on patrol in the Al Rashid District of Baghdad during hours of limited visibility, the vehicle he was driving went off a narrow bridge crossing a canal. By the time I got there, they had pulled him from under the vehicle and the platoon medic was reviving him. We all breathed a sigh of relief when he spit up the water, and started fighting us. The medic had been riding with the crew on patrol. Unfortunately, he was submerged without oxygen for too long and died of organ failure a couple days later 13 February 2004, at the CASH in Baghdad. The edge of the earthen bridge had collapsed under the weight of his vehicle causing the vehicle to topple over the canal upside down. 

The attached picture is of Spry’s shadow box; on the box is a picture of him in civilian clothes and a baseball from his brother which he carried with him to Iraq. His brother played semi-pro baseball and is very well known in his home town. Below is a small picture of him after graduating Jump School, I had the pleasure to meet his mother when she came to Fort Bragg to see our unit return from Iraq. She is one of the most loving and caring mothers I’ve ever the pleasure to meet, and she continued to support our unit long after our return home. She will always be a part of our task force, and a part of our heart.