Joshua Booth remembered by father

Josh Booth considered himself a proud Virginian, although he spent most of his growing up years in Massachusetts.

And as his family prepares to bury him, they are bringing him home to Bedford.

Booth, a U.S. Marine 2nd lieutenant, was killed Tuesday by a single shot from a sniper’s rifle while serving in Iraq. He was 23.

His burial will be in Bedford’s Longwood Cemetery at a time yet to be determined.

He will be buried in a plot that contains at least a dozen of his relatives.

“My family is from Bedford,” his father, Jack Booth, said.

James Edwin Booth Sr. and James Edwin Booth Jr., his great-grandfather and grandfather, lived on Baltimore Avenue in Bedford since the 1930s. Josh Booth would come to Bedford to visit them.

“He loved the Peaks of Otter,” Jack Booth said. “He loved the history of the area. He got to where he felt right at home. He used to travel all over the state looking at historic sites with his great-grandfather.”

A painting of the Peaks of Otter still adorns a wall in his room in his Massachusetts home.

He and his dad were Virginia Tech football fans.

“We went to every bowl game,” his father said. “He had all this history of a love for Virginia.”

Born in Virginia Beach, Josh Booth developed an appreciation for military history.

At age 7, he went to elementary school in Massachusetts dressed as Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

“Josh, at an early age, decided he wanted to go into the military,” his father said.

He went to St. John’s High School in Shrewsbury, Mass.

“In 10th grade he joined a unit of Navy sea cadets that were associated with the local (Worcester, Mass.) Marine and Navy reserve center,” his father said. “It was during that time that he met Marines, liked them and started reading about the Marines and decided he wanted to be a Marine to defend his country.”

He finished St. Johns with good grades and decided to go to The Citadel, a South Carolina military college, because of its close association with the Marine Corps.

During his first year at The Citadel, terrorists flew commercial jet airliners into the World Trade Center and Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, in the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history.

“I said to him, “Josh, if you continue on this course, you could be a wartime Marine,” his father said.

Josh Booth replied, “That’s OK, Dad, that’s why we’re here.”

In the meantime, the U.S. Army offered him a scholarship.

“Dad, if I have to take it I will, but I want to be a Marine,” his father recalled him saying.

“That’s all right Josh, we’ll pay for you the rest of the way,” his father said.

Josh Booth graduated The Citadel in 2005 and was commissioned as a Marine officer.

That same weekend, he married his wife, Erica. The couple have a daughter, Grace, 1½, and a son, Tristen Joshua Booth, who is on the way.

“He had already been through two summers of Marine training at Quantico,” his father said. “He returned to Quantico for the basic school and got a Marine infantry slot.”

He was assigned to 2nd Battalion, 3rd Regiment at Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii, where he went with wife and daughter in tow.

He was then assigned to California for desert training in preparation for deployment to Iraq.

“We went to visit with him (in Hawaii) the last 10 days of August,” his father said. “That’s when he told me there was a good chance he wouldn’t be coming back because of the type of tactic they were going to utilize. He would be meeting Iraqis face-to-face and trying to get intelligence from these folks.”

Following his deployment to Iraq in September, Josh Booth would lead three patrols a day where he gleaned intelligence from Iraqi citizens.

“He’d knock on the door, look the head of the house in the eye, shake his hand and sit down and let them know we were there to help them,” Jack Booth said. “He let them know if they’ll help us, we can help them. He was successful in that because of his forward approach, his upright approach.”

His success likely made him the target of an assassin’s bullet.

“They hit only one Marine. He was my son and best friend. Now he’s gone,” Jack Booth said.

With that in mind, Jack Booth resents polls that say Americans oppose the war, but support the troops.

“That’s hogwash,” he said. “If you don’t like the policy, take your polls every two years and four years (on Election Day). Don’t come in behind the Marines when they’re out there being shot at from every alleyway and behind every door.”

Josh Booth wanted to be buried in Bedford because of his love for Virginia and so spaces at Arlington National Cemetery would be available for “his Marines.”

He had memories of how his family would gather and take sled rides down Sharp Top.

“All the people he grew to love are from Virginia,” his father said. “He always loved Virginia and never lost his love of Virginia.”

In August, he made his father promise to do two things if he didn’t get out of Iraq alive:

Take care of his wife and children.

And bring him home to Virginia.

From the News Advance

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