How one chooses to honor the glorious fallen on Memorial Day differs from person to person. For 7-year-old Mason’s family, it was through the respectful method of heading to the Wilmington National Cemetery in order to place American flags at the graves of soldiers who had died in service to their country.
When they got there, however, Mason ran away from his mom, Sarah. She began a frantic search, only to find Mason sitting at a particular soldier’s grave.
The name on the headstone was Sergeant TJ Butler, and Sarah knew her son felt a connection with the soldier buried there …
As Sarah explained: “Mason had a lot of questions. He wanted to know if he had a son and a family, and wanted to know more about him.”
For some reason, Mason was drawn to the final resting place of Sergeant Butler. He and his mom continued to return to the cemetery so that he could pay his respects.
Little Mason drew a picture and wrote a note to the soldier, sealing it within a plastic bag so that it would remain untarnished by the elements.
Of course, Mason and Sarah weren’t the only people keen on remembering Sgt. Butler. His mom was a regular visitor, too, and travelled to the cemetery one day only to find Mason’s note placed upon her son’s headstone.
It transpired that Sergeant Butler had been killed in Afghanistan in 2012, but his mom was overcome that Mason had taken it upon himself to honor his memory.
She said: “The letter that Mason left us touched our hearts to know that there is someone out there that still cared.”
Furthermore, she knew she had to thank Mason in person. The pair of them would eventually meet at the cemetery, striking an unlikely friendship forged by the truest of causes.
For more on this tear-jerking story, watch the video below:
We think all soldiers, past and present, deserve to be honored like Sgt. Butler!
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