On October 19, 2012 Congressman Reid J. Ribble of Wisconsin was granted permission to address the U.S. House of Representatives.
“Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a fallen hero who has finally come home. Our experience is different than it would have been had Second Lieutenant James Des Jardin been found in 1944. James’ parents had already buried one son, and now would have been burying another. Grief and sadness was the companion for this family on that December day in 1944.Just three days after Christmas, the family was told of James missing in action with a letter. And I think you should know that similar letters were sent to over 73,000 families during the war saying that their loved one was missing. Our nation paid a heavy price to bring freedom to the world.”
“I cannot imagine the horror of hearing that news. More than that, I cannot fathom the uncertainty of a family not knowing. James’ brother Earl, a bomber pilot, had already been killed in service to our country, in France just two months before, and now another son was missing”, he said.
“Was James a POW? Was he hiding in Germany and working his way home?”, he said.
See video: German combat footage – WW2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DiSQ36zfWk
“Did he perish that day? Or later? These are the questions that no parent, no brother or sister or son or daughter ever wants to ask. But these questions had to be asked. They provided hope. They provided encouragement. ….. but they also provide doubt and despair. The questions certainly lingered. The sacrifice of the family, quietly held in their hearts and thoughts, and the yearning to know. December 28, 1944, and the years that followed, certainly brought heartache, that unless you have experienced it personally must have been difficult to understand”, the Congressman said (source: Congressional Record October 19, 2012 http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CREC-2012-10-19/pdf/CREC-2012-10-19.pdf ).
Congressman Ribble represents Wisconsin’s 8th Congressional District (source: http://ribble.house.gov/).