Jay Collins This is Me

 Web References

1. 1. wiscassetnewspaper.maine.com

   wiscassetnewspaper.maine.com/2 - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/1/2007   Last Visited: 12/23/2007

   Retired Marine Colonel Jay Collins, and his wife, Barbara, hold a memorial flag placed on her great-great uncle, Sam Beck's casket after World War I. Beck was gassed during the war and died shortly after returning home from the war.
   ...
   Collins was the guest (Photo Charlotte Boynton)
   
   Communities throughout the nation held Memorial Day services this past Monday to honor the war dead. The town of Woolwich, in keeping with a 100-year old tradition, held its annual Memorial Day service this year in the historic Nequasset Meeting House.
   
   The program included a tribute to all veterans, prayers, hymns, patriotic songs, and a speaker, Ret. Marine Colonel Jay Collins of Woolwich who joined the Marines as a private, and retired as a colonel. He talked about the impact of war on families, friends, and lovers, for generations to come. Collins is a second-generation Vietnam veteran. His father was there as an advisor in 1958, and he was there, 10 years later, in 1968 as an advisor.
   
   Collins said his first deep sense of Memorial Day was a trip that his father took him on after the war. It was a trip to one of the many U.S. military cemeteries in Europe, with rows of crosses in every direction, marking the gravesite of American war dead.
   
   "If you have not seen it, and you can go, please do, it is a place that overwhelms you with the impact of war," he said.
   ...
   Collins spoke about the three-day Battle of Gettysburg, the turning point in the Civil War, which resulted in 51,000 casualties.
   
   "Someone said after the Civil War, it was a tremendous price to pay, greater than any language can adequately portray: but so too was the reward that followed."
   
   The estimated war dead of all wars the U.S. was involved in is 3.8 million, with over one million in World War II, according to Collins.
   
   "War is measured, not only by the number of casualties or what was secured, but also by what it prevented." he said.
   
   During Collins' tour of duty, he was the casualty officer who notified parents, and wives of deaths, missing in action and serious injuries to their loved ones, and was sometimes responsible for making funeral arrangements and escorting the bodies home.
   
   "Why do they fight?" Collins asked. "From my experience, being around the four services, the one theme I hear and have come to believe is for their country, and a belief in their country. They join - not as a member or a unit or as a Marine - but as an individual. One with a belief that their - our county is worth fighting for."
   
   Collins told a story about the heroic acts of four different Marines, in four different wars.
   
   PFC Jacklyn Lucus, a ninth grader, joined the Marines during World War II, just five days after his seventeenth birthday. He landed in the fourth wave on Iowa Jima. Later that day Lucus and three other men were suddenly ambushed by a hostile patrol which attacked with rifles and grenades. Two hand grenades landed near him. He jumped over his fellow marines and landed on one grenade and pulled the other one under him. He was thought to be dead until Lucus moved his hand.
   ...
   According to Collins, he did return to school, a ninth grader, with a Medal of Honor around his neck.
   
   Collins told a story about two Marines he knew during the Vietnam Conflict. He referred to the first Marine as 2 nd Lt. Bobo. He was attacked by a North Vietnamese company supported by heavy automatic weapons and mortar fire when an exploding enemy mortar round severed his right leg below the knee. He refused to be evacuated and insisted upon being placed in a firing position to cover the movement of the groups to a safe location.
   ...
   In an ultimate and selfless act of bravery in which he was mortally wounded, he saved the lives of at least two Marines," Collins said.

2. 2. Press-Telegram - Beachweek

   www.presstelegram.com/Stories/ - [Cached]

   Published on: 9/10/2003   Last Visited: 9/14/2003

   Jason P. Collins, a 1992 graduate of Long Beach Poly High School, participated in the ninth annual Cooperation Afloat Readiness and Training Exercise this summer in Southeast Asia with the 3rd Marine Expeditionary Force, based in Okinawa. Four American ships represented the U.S. Navy in the exercise, which included forces from Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. Collins commanded the combat service support element for the Marine Air and Ground Task Force.

3. 3. wiscassetnewspaper.maine.com

   wiscassetnewspaper.maine.com/2 - [Cached]

   Published on: 6/1/2007   Last Visited: 10/9/2007

   Retired Marine Colonel Jay Collins, and his wife, Barbara, hold a memorial flag placed on her great-great uncle, Sam Beck's casket after World War I. Beck was gassed during the war and died shortly after returning home from the war.
   ...
   Collins was the guest (Photo Charlotte Boynton)
   
   Communities throughout the nation held Memorial Day services this past Monday to honor the war dead. The town of Woolwich, in keeping with a 100-year old tradition, held its annual Memorial Day service this year in the historic Nequasset Meeting House.
   
   The program included a tribute to all veterans, prayers, hymns, patriotic songs, and a speaker, Ret. Marine Colonel Jay Collins of Woolwich who joined the Marines as a private, and retired as a colonel. He talked about the impact of war on families, friends, and lovers, for generations to come. Collins is a second-generation Vietnam veteran. His father was there as an advisor in 1958, and he was there, 10 years later, in 1968 as an advisor.
   
   Collins said his first deep sense of Memorial Day was a trip that his father took him on after the war. It was a trip to one of the many U.S. military cemeteries in Europe, with rows of crosses in every direction, marking the gravesite of American war dead.
   
   "If you have not seen it, and you can go, please do, it is a place that overwhelms you with the impact of war," he said.
   ...
   Collins spoke about the three-day Battle of Gettysburg, the turning point in the Civil War, which resulted in 51,000 casualties.
   
   "Someone said after the Civil War, it was a tremendous price to pay, greater than any language can adequately portray: but so too was the reward that followed."
   
   The estimated war dead of all wars the U.S. was involved in is 3.8 million, with over one million in World War II, according to Collins.
   
   "War is measured, not only by the number of casualties or what was secured, but also by what it prevented." he said.
   
   During Collins' tour of duty, he was the casualty officer who notified parents, and wives of deaths, missing in action and serious injuries to their loved ones, and was sometimes responsible for making funeral arrangements and escorting the bodies home.
   
   "Why do they fight?" Collins asked. "From my experience, being around the four services, the one theme I hear and have come to believe is for their country, and a belief in their country. They join - not as a member or a unit or as a Marine - but as an individual. One with a belief that their - our county is worth fighting for."
   
   Collins told a story about the heroic acts of four different Marines, in four different wars.
   
   PFC Jacklyn Lucus, a ninth grader, joined the Marines during World War II, just five days after his seventeenth birthday. He landed in the fourth wave on Iowa Jima. Later that day Lucus and three other men were suddenly ambushed by a hostile patrol which attacked with rifles and grenades. Two hand grenades landed near him. He jumped over his fellow marines and landed on one grenade and pulled the other one under him. He was thought to be dead until Lucus moved his hand.
   ...
   According to Collins, he did return to school, a ninth grader, with a Medal of Honor around his neck.
   
   Collins told a story about two Marines he knew during the Vietnam Conflict. He referred to the first Marine as 2 nd Lt. Bobo. He was attacked by a North Vietnamese company supported by heavy automatic weapons and mortar fire when an exploding enemy mortar round severed his right leg below the knee. He refused to be evacuated and insisted upon being placed in a firing position to cover the movement of the groups to a safe location.
   ...
   In an ultimate and selfless act of bravery in which he was mortally wounded, he saved the lives of at least two Marines," Collins said.