Funeral for fallen
soldier set today
Funeral services were to be held this morning for Army Spc. Joseph F. Herndon II in his hometown of Derby, Kan.
Herndon is the sixth 25th Infantry Division soldier to be killed in Iraq this year.
He was born in Hutchinson, Kan. He is survived by wife Melanie, mother and stepfather Virginia and Gerald Evans, sister Cynthia Ambeau, stepsisters Chesiree Kregg and Chelsea Evans, and grandparents Everett and Betty Barber and Kenneth Sr. and Betty Herndon.
The service was to be held in the football stadium at Derby High School, where Herndon graduated in 2001. Burial was to follow at Lakeview Cemetery in Wichita.
Herndon was on patrol with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry on July 29 when he was shot and killed in Hawija, east of Kirkuk.
He had just returned from 15 days of leave in Hawaii. Herndon was promoted posthumously to corporal and awarded the Bronze Star and a Purple Heart medal with two devices to indicate that he had already been wounded twice.
www.25idl.army.mil
