{"id":347312,"date":"2010-02-21T20:13:51","date_gmt":"2010-02-22T01:13:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chicagopressrelease.com\/press-releases\/nw-ind-town-mourns-marine-killed-in-afghanistan"},"modified":"2010-02-21T20:13:51","modified_gmt":"2010-02-22T01:13:51","slug":"nw-ind-town-mourns-marine-killed-in-afghanistan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/347312","title":{"rendered":"NW Ind. town mourns marine killed in Afghanistan"},"content":{"rendered":"

WESTVILLE, Ind.\u00a0(STMW)\u00a0 — The town was coping this weekend with the loss of one of its own. On Main Street, the Blackhawk Inn was a place to reminisce over beers about Marine Lance Cpl. <\/span>Joshua Birchfield, 24, of Westville, who was killed Friday in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

\nJonn Elkin, 49, remembered Birchfield on Saturday as “an awesome human being” who was “a lot of fun.”<\/p>\n

\nA sign reading “We Will Miss You Birch — God Bless” hung outside the Blackhawk, which Birchfield had visited in the past.<\/p>\n

\n“He went and fought for our country,” Elkin, a Westville resident, said. “He wanted to be a Marine.”<\/p>\n

\nMike Siddall of Westville recalled Birchfield’s generous side.<\/p>\n

\n“He’s a good ol’ country boy — take the shirt right off his back for you,” said Siddall, who fought back tears. “He will never be forgotten.”<\/p>\n

\nRick Gillespie of Chesterton painted the 2004 graduate of Westville High School as an unassuming young man.<\/p>\n

\n“He was down to earth,” Gillespie said at the Blackhawk Inn. “He just did good for our country. He died for our country.”<\/p>\n

\nAcross the street from the Blackhawk, Steve Bachman of Michigan City recalled his “very personable” buddy while socializing at Karla’s Pub & Grill.<\/p>\n

\n“He was funny — funniest guy I ever met in my life,” Bachman, 33, said. “He should have been a stand-up comedian.”<\/p>\n

\nCalling Birchfield the “best guy I ever met,” Bachman said his pal entered military service for the right reasons.<\/p>\n

\n“He didn’t go because he didn’t have a job. … He went because he felt it was the right thing to do,” Bachman said.<\/p>\n

\nA canister for monetary donations for the Birchfield family was placed in the Blackhawk bar.<\/p>\n

\nAt the Westville American Legion Post 21, a sign read “LCPL JOSH BIRCHFIELD YOU ARE NOT FORGOTTEN — WE LOVE YOU.”<\/p>\n

\nThose who knew Birchfield remembered him as a baseball fan from LaPorte County who was approachable and likable, and “just knew everybody.”<\/p>\n

\nDetails as to how Birchfield died in Afghanistan were not available. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Read the original article from WBBM News Radio<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Distributed via Chicago Press Release Services<\/a><\/p>\n

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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WESTVILLE, Ind.\u00a0(STMW)\u00a0 — The town was coping this weekend with the loss of one of its own. On Main Street, the Blackhawk Inn was a place to reminisce over beers about Marine Lance Cpl. Joshua Birchfield, 24, of Westville, who was killed Friday in Afghanistan. Jonn Elkin, 49, remembered Birchfield on Saturday as “an awesome […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-347312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347312"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347312\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}