The Home Front: War's Real Cost

By MICHAEL RILEY/COULTERVILLE

Last Saturday they buried Thom Jenkins beneath the soaring pines of California's Sierra Nevada. As silence again envelops Dudley Cemetery, echoes of a U.S. Navy chaplain's words linger: "Thomas Allen Jenkins, your sacrifice will not be forgotten. Your courage stands as a beacon of liberty. You exemplify the U.S. Marine Corps motto, 'Semper Fidelis.' "

Lance Corporal Jenkins was one of the first ground soldiers to be killed in action in Operation Desert Storm. He turned 21 last August, just two days before leaving for Saudi Arabia. He was killed, perhaps by friendly fire, in a clash near the Kuwait border. On Feb. 9 he returned home to Coulterville in a flag-draped casket, both a hero and a haunting reminder of war's real cost. His handsome freckled face reflects the human toll of a conflict sanitized by high-tech smart bombs and camouflaged by antiseptic acronyms like KIA (killed in action).

Big cities may be able to absorb the death of one young man with indifference, but in places like Coulterville (pop. 115) the loss strikes home with intense personal force. "If I could trade for Thom, I'd do it," says the distraught Marine who helped recruit him. "Poor kid."

Shortly after the Marine messengers appeared on Tom and Joyce Jenkins' front porch with the horrible news about their only son, the word blazed across these drought-stricken mountains like a runaway forest fire. The close-knit community of this historic gold-mining town, one of simple values and sturdy folk, circled its wagons around the family, including Thom's sister Jamie, 19, in a show of patriotism and support. But the Jenkins' selfless stoicism is even more telling. "Our boy came home, and we know exactly where he's at," says Joyce, 39, who drives a school bus. "But there's lots of other men and women over there who need our love and support." She wears a sweatshirt with a yellow ribbon and a simple message: 'TIL THEY ALL COME HOME.

American flags and yellow ribbons adorn almost every house, pole, tree and car antenna in Coulterville, for here patriotism is a solemn duty. These people despise antiwar protesters, and they consider few acts more heinous than flag burning. So if anyone here believes Thom died in vain, he is keeping it to himself. "People do view him as a hero," says Tom, 42, who works for the state transportation department. "To me, he's my son." Tom has only simple requests. "Please be kind," he asks. "Please be honest. Don't be too big, because it's not real."

After arriving in Saudi Arabia with the 1st Combat Engineers Battalion, Thom fought boredom by keeping pet scorpions -- the first one, named Maurice, died; the other was called Mel Torme -- in a camouflaged desert shelter. In one letter home, he pleaded for Tabasco to spice up his rations, and in another he told a fire-fighting friend to keep the boisterous Magnolia Saloon on Main Street from burning down so they could enjoy his first legal beers there upon his return. At home, a Queensland heeler puppy named B.B. and a cat named P.J. are still waiting for him.

Protected by a web of friends, the Jenkins family spoke to no outsiders during the week following Thom's death. When they finally did, it was to reminisce for several hours as the warm winter sun sank behind the mountains. They shed no tears, but rather smiled and even laughed as the memories poured forth. Though pain seemed to burn in their eyes, the healing had begun.

Just five days after hearing of Thom's death, his parents received a letter written a few days before he died. He wrote that he had never seen so many planes in his life, and that he expected to head into Kuwait after the bombing had softened up the Iraqis. He had latched onto an infantry corporal who knew his business. "He's teaching me a lot," Thom wrote. "It's weird, but I'm not scared. Nervous, I guess, but not scared. I've been preparing for this for a year now, and ((Aunt)) Jean would probably say I'm brainwashed, but I've joined the Marines to do something for the U.S., and why not the best?" The letter ends, "Take care. I love you."

Last Christmas his parents sent Thom a 35-mm camera, and the photos from the roll he mailed home in January are among his family's greatest treasures. One shows Thom clowning around in a red-checked kaffiyeh under a camouflage net. Another portrays him standing in his tent, an M-16 on his arm and a cigarette hanging jauntily from his mouth. Several others show his light armored vehicle, hauntingly dubbed "Blaze of Glory." Painted on one side is a cartoon of an armed Saddam Hussein atop a camel, his body framed within the cross hairs. Says Dan Bartok, Thom's boss back when he spent a summer fighting fires for the U.S. Forest Service: "We figure he'd have pulled the mustache off of Saddam Hussein."

Thom's roots are deep in the rocky mountain soil, stretching back seven generations to Coulterville's first settlers. His forefathers arrived in the 1850s, shortly after the California gold rush began. This proud heritage infused every bit of his 6-ft. 1-in., 180-lb. frame. In some of Thom's desert pictures, his greenish-brown eyes, often hidden behind mirrored sunglasses, are filled with the glint of a growing confidence as he began to make his way in the world. His bearing betrayed a lifelong fascination with the military. Thom often wore camouflage pants and shirts, and he spent weekends playing survivalist in the mountains around his family's 160-acre ranch up toward Yosemite. His high school classmates picked him as the best companion on a desert island.

Though Thom took a lot of teasing about his paramilitary pursuits, he fascinated some kids at Mariposa County High School with tales about a secret cave called Havoc, where he claimed to have stored a cache of weapons. Thom could identify knives and guns with uncanny precision, and his military obsession gave rise to a nickname, "G.I. Jenkins." Another was "Indiana Jenkins," since Thom often sported a hat like Indiana Jones' in Raiders of the Lost Ark, his favorite movie. Says his cousin Ed Jenkins: "He was always a dreamer, dreaming of exciting places." His high school yearbook announced, "Expect the best from your future."

Friends recall that if Thom dove into something, from emergency medical training to playing basketball in high school, he gave it his best. "He never made the first string, but he was always close," says Jon Turner, his English teacher and a Vietnam vet. "If he got in, he'd win the game for you." That was true whether he was square dancing as a kid or out on a county search-and- rescue mission. His steady marksmanship enabled him to bag a four-point buck, whose weathered rack sits on a fence beside his house. Around town, folks knew Thom was coming when they saw "Baby Huey," a battered green-and- rust 1972 GMC pickup. He would zoom through mud puddles in it, yelling at friends, "Just like a Jeep commercial!"

Though Thom had long wanted to join the Marines, the first time he talked with his dad about it the answer was no. Tom wanted his son to go to college. So he studied criminal justice for a year, planning to become a peace officer. But he got restless and asked again. This time the answer was yes. Explains Jenkins: "I have a saying -- save the boy, destroy the man."

At least 15 other local men and women are in the gulf, a consequence of the convergence of patriotism and economics in rural America. Their parents are proud but also worried that their child could be next. At home, TVs blare incessantly. Parents stay awake at night hoping for reassuring phone calls from the front. They get headaches. They cry, they hug, they pray.

There was some talk around Coulterville about building a permanent memorial for Thom, but it has been silenced. "We're postponing that decision because he may not be the only one," explains Sharon Tucker, a close family friend. Thom's cousin Ed Jenkins and his friend Jason Turpin are signed up to join the Navy this summer, after they graduate from high school. Ed is the last male in the Jenkins line. "I don't know whether to serve my family or my country," he says. But in his heart he knows he will join the Navy.

The last time Tom Jenkins saw his son alive was after drinking several cups of coffee with him at the breakfast table three weeks before he left for Saudi Arabia. Two days before the funeral, Tom paid a solitary visit to the funeral home in nearby Sonora. He propped Thom's wooden-framed portrait in front of the gunmetal-gray steel casket, then stood quietly to one side, his eyes misting up. It was the first time he'd been alone with his son since Thom ) returned from the Persian Gulf. "Good memories flow," said Jenkins. "They just keep flowing."

Shortly after Thom's death, this poem "for Tommy J." from "Kathy B." appeared on local bulletin boards:

When Old Folks Die

I Don't Cry

It's Time

But

When The Young Ones Go

It Grieves Me So

Who Can Count The Cost

Of A

Young Life

Lost?

The Sharpest Sorrow

Is For What Might Have Been