Chesterland soldier honored for his sacrifice

By MICHAEL SCOTT

Plain Dealer

Chesterland

Memorial Day came home to Chesterland Monday.

Even if Chris Thibodeau could not.

Several hundred residents of the small Geauga County community, like untold others around the United States, gathered in a steamy group in a muddy graveyard Monday morning to memorialize hometown veterans killed in battles as far back as the Revolutionary War.

But they also came to remember a young man many expected they’d see again soon: Chief Warrant Officer Christopher R. Thibodeau, 28, who died when his helicopter crashed during combat Thursday in eastern Afghanistan. He was one of three Northeast Ohio servicemen killed last week.

His mother said Monday she still doesn’t know when the Army will release the body or when they’ll be able to bring their son’s body home for a funeral.

But now they do know that his memory will live on.

“We didn’t want to say anything until his wife said it was OK, but LeeSandra is five weeks pregnant and Chris knew that when he died,” said Doreen A. Thibodeau, his mother. “This will be our first grandchild, and it will be Chris’s child — even if he’s not here.”

Doreen Thibodeau said her daughter-in-law, LeeSandra Thibodeau, was stunned by the outpouring from the Chesterland community over the last week — strangers dropping off food and other gifts, a 20-by-40-foot flag on a neighbor’s lawn, a street lined with flags, yellow ribbons on utility poles.

“She said, ‘What an awesome place to live,’ after seeing everything leading up to [Monday] morning and then especially at the service,” Doreen Thibodeau said. “It was a very respectful service for all of the veterans from past wars.

“Chris used to play trumpet in high school and play ‘Taps’ for these events. Now they’re playing ‘Taps’ for him.”

A graduate of West Geauga High School (2000) and Case Western Reserve University (2004), Thibodeau was deployed just 10 months ago. He married LeeSandra right before deployment, but the couple couldn’t honeymoon until recently.

His parents, wife and other family members attended the Memorial Day service Monday, listening as two buglers played “Taps,” as a bagpiper played “Amazing Grace” and as a high school pep band played “This Land is Your Land.” They also flinched, along with almost everyone else, during a 21-gun salute.

“We were all very much moved by the fact that Warrant Officer Thibodeau’s family was here this morning, and they showed us all a tremendous amount of strength,” said State Sen. Tim Grendell, a Chesterland Republican, who spoke at the ceremony at the township cemetery on Chillicothe Road. “I have to say, it made Memorial Day come home for me. We lost one of our own.”

Chester Township Trustee Clay Lawrence, who served eight years in the Marines in the 1950s, said the community grieved together.

“The tears were flowing for them, for me and for a lot of us,” Lawrence said. “It’s extremely important to everyone in town to honor this young man, who died doing exactly what he wanted to do. We’ll need to honor him again when they finally bring him home.”

Grendell said he was going to try to go a step further.

“I’m going to ask the Ohio Legislature to rename a portion of U.S. 322 coming into Chesterland for Chief Warrant Officer Christopher R. Thibodeau.

“That won’t bring him back, but it will keep him in our minds and hearts.”