Steven Jewell remembered

Cindy Jewell Weisner picked out her son’s burial plot Thursday.

Weisner’s son, Steven Jewell, 26, died Tuesday when the Chinook helicopter he and four other Army soldiers were in crashed just outside Baghdad.

The military said the crash was not combat-related.

“I have not heard from the military as to when he is coming home,” his mother said. “The toughest part is yet to come.”

Steven was the son of Weisner, who works in a physician’s office in New Bern, and Billy Jewell, a detective with the Pamlico County Sheriff’s Office.

“I talked to him the day before he died,” Weisner said. “He was happy with the way his career was turning out. He was a mechanic in the Army. He scored second-highest in his class. He was so proud. But he became bored to tears. He was trained to be a door-gunner on the Chinock, he loved it.”

She said she had a good relationship with her son, but he would never tell her when or if he was going into combat. “He would never talk to me about it,” she said.

She sees not only the sadness but the irony in her son’s death. “He joined the military two years to the day that he died,” Weisner said.

She described her son growing up in Dover in the western part of Craven County as a good kid. She said he was a volunteer firefighter with the Dover fire department for two years.

She said her son went to West Craven High School and dropped out in the 10th grade to take care of his son, Will, who is now 8.

She said he got his high school diploma at Craven Community College in May 2004 and joined the military Aug. 14, 2005.

The last time she saw her son was in June. He said he was looking forward to going to Iraq and was ready to go. He was supposed to be deployed for 15 months. He had been in Iraq only a month when he died.

Jewell was an Army specialist with the 1st Battalion, 52nd Aviation Regiment Task Force 49, based at Fort Wainwright, Alaska.

Steven’s wife, Lisa, is in the Army stationed at Fort Wainwright. Will Jewell is in Deep Run in Lenoir County with his his grandmother and great-grandfather.

Steven Jewell will be buried at Pine Lawn Cemetery in Kinston, where his mother also plans to be buried.

“I wanted him to be close to me and Billy wanted him close, and Lisa said Steven would want it that way,” Weisner said.

From the Sun Journal

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