“Our hearts beat for Ukraine and the atrocities that are happening globally right now: the example of our children continues to be a source of inspiration for so many people around the world.” It is the story of Karla Webber, Terrie Lawrence and Alison Magallon, who together founded the association “Moms taking actions” to bring together the mothers of American soldiers who lost their lives in Ukraine. Andrew Weber and Lance Lawrence were serving in the 59th Motorized Infantry Brigade of the Land Forces and lost their lives while defending the line of their retreating comrades. Jericho Skye Magallon was a police officer attached to the special forces of the Ukrainian army, who died in a firefight in the Bakhmut region of Donetsk.
The stories of the volunteers
Born towards the end of 2023, Moms taking actions has started a series of awareness-raising activities in favor of peace in Ukraine, culminating in the Summit last April in Washington, right in front of the Congress building on Capitol Hill. On that occasion Karla, Terrie and Alison told the story of their childrenreported by the daily newspaper “Ukrainska Pravda”, underlining a sense of duty similar to a sort of moral obligation, which ended up representing the stimulus to undertake that journey towards an unknown country, on the other side of the ocean.
A journey, the last of their lives, which nevertheless proved to be a largely natural choice, judging by the words of the three women. “As soon as Lance found out what was happening in Ukraine, he immediately felt the duty to be there to lend a hand – recalls Terrie Lawrence not without a hint of emotion -. He knew the risks and we knew them too, but he felt it was worth it. Mobilizing for what we believe is right is always better than regretting it while sitting back and watching”.
Andrew Webber was a US Army veteran. After graduating from West Point Military Academy he took part in the mission in Iraq and twice in Afghanistan. Upon returning to America he began to practice as a lawyer, a path however fatally interrupted by the decision to leave as a volunteer for Ukraine, a few days after the invasion of the Russian army. «Andrew could not bear all the atrocities committed by the Putin regime. He wasn’t the type who stood by and did nothing because he couldn’t stand injustice and when he saw a problem he wanted to solve it immediately”, says Karla Webber.
Lance Lawrence, a Marine veteran, was a fellow Marine of Andrew, who also volunteered from the United States and was killed on the battlefield on July 29, 2023. during an assault by Russian infantry. “When he found out what was happening in Ukraine, Lance was shocked,” recalled Terrie Lawrence. “He had a friend who was sending him videos of what was happening in the very early days of the invasion and when he saw those images he felt the need to go and provide his support.” Serhiy Tsekhotsky, an officer attached to the 59th Brigade, also wanted to remember his fallen comrades: “Andrew and Lance were scouts in our assault group, they were experts and had a great deal of authority. Theirs was a very delicate and dangerous job, which involved direct contact with enemy positions.”
Jericho Skye Magallon left in March 2022shortly after the Russian invasion, and remained fighting until December. Upon arriving in Ukraine, he volunteered for a medical association in Kiev and was soon transferred to the Eastern Front. He returned to the United States at the end of the year, but the bonds he had formed on the battlefield were too strong to break: “Even when he was home, Jericho stayed in touch with his comrades every day,” Alison Magallon recalls. “It’s like watching bullies beat up a child on the playground, I have to go,” he once told his mother. After his first 10 months in Ukraine, Jericho returned to Donbass in late summer, but on September 5, he was killed in a gunfight with Russian forces in Bakhmut, and his body was recovered and returned to his family nine months after his death.
Three similar stories, united not only by the one-way trip from America to Ukraine, also from a sense of mobilization for a just cause in defense of the weakest, regardless of distance. Stories that now, a year after the disappearance of their children, three mothers united by grief have chosen to tell, becoming spokespeople for the more than thirty American volunteers who have lost their lives in Ukraine since the beginning of the conflict. “They didn’t want our children’s stories to be lost”: if you look closely, however, their words transcend national borders and rise to a universal message of peace. Just as universal is, without risk of being mistaken, the grief of a mother for the loss of her own son.
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