Jose Galvan killed in combat

The word spread early Monday at Holmes High School. Marine Cpl. Jose A. Galvan, something of a legend there for his theatrics with the school's championship armed drill team three years ago, had been killed in Iraq.

"You talk about being stung," said retired Air Force Maj. Larry Workcuff, one of his JROTC instructors and a veteran of Operation Desert Storm.

"It was just a big sting."

Galvan, 22, of San Antonio died Saturday while on combat operations in Anbar province, where U.S. and Iraqi army troops constantly battle insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists.

A younger brother now in JROTC at Holmes told instructors and students before school began Monday that Galvan had stepped on a land mine. Neither his parents nor Marine officials at Camp Pendleton, Calif., his home base, could be reached to confirm details of his death.

"I think he was just emotionally distraught," Workcuff, 55, of San Antonio, said of the brother. "He was really hurt, and I think he needed someone to talk to. After he told one of the instructors and myself what happened, the other instructor called his family to come and get him."

Galvan, a 2003 Holmes High graduate, is the second Marine from the San Antonio area to perish in Anbar over the past week. He is the 26th San Antonio-area resident lost in Iraq since the March 20, 2003, invasion. Four others have died in Afghanistan.

Defense Department records indicate Galvan is the ninth Marine to die in Anbar since Oct. 27.

One of them, Lance Cpl. Luke Benjamin Holler, 21, of Bulverde, was on a foot patrol in Anbar last Thursday when a roadside bomb claimed his life.

The military death toll in Iraq as of Monday was 2,836, with 2,276 killed in action.

No one has yet said when services will be held for Galvan and Holler, a 2003 graduate of Bracken Christian School in Bulverde.

A memorial for Holler is planned at the school at 8:30 a.m. Friday at its seventh annual Veterans Day program.

"Our school has taken it pretty hard," said Bracken Christian School English teacher Judy Watters, adding that Holler's parents have been invited. "It's a very small school. Their graduating class, I think, had 20 kids in it. Everyone knew Luke was military-minded and wanted to go into the Marines."

It isn't clear whether Galvan was set on becoming a Marine as soon as he graduated. Workcuff, his JROTC instructor, wasn't aware of his post-graduation plans. But he said Galvan stopped by Holmes last summer as he prepared to deploy to Iraq, perhaps to check up on his kid brother.

While reserved, he said, the older Galvan was involved in every aspect of JROTC, a guy who got things done and someone other cadets — both younger and older — could turn to for advice.

"He wanted to make sure his brother did good, did OK, and that's a loving touch," Workcuff commented. "When he came here to visit prior to leaving in August, he was like a celebrity."

The tall, slim Galvan was a central figure in the armed drill team's best year in memory, when it beat out reigning champion John Jay High School in 2003 for top honors in the Northside school district. That was a big deal because John Jay had long dominated the contest.

The team also claimed first place in the American Legion National JROTC Drill Tournament in Montgomery, Ala., fulfilling a bold vow to come back home to Texas as champions.

From the San Antonio Express