Lowell T. Miller
Major, United States Army National Guard
March 20, 1970 – August 31, 2005
Age – 35
Flint, MI
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Member of Michigan National Guard, but Deployed with 1st Battalion, 155th Infantry, Mississippi National Guard
Died of wounds suffered when they came under attack by enemy forces using small arms fire in Iskandariyah, Iraq
There was only one man who Lowell T. Miller (Tommy) wanted to have pin military bars to his uniform, one man he wanted to salute after being commissioned as an officer: his father. “Dad, I serve so others don’t have to,” he once wrote to his father, Lowell Miller, who served 22 years in the Naval Reserves. “You taught me to be a leader, to stand up and sacrifice so others would not have to. You were in the military and served so your kids wouldn’t, yet we do. You taught us well.”
Major Miller was killed by small-arms fire in Iskandariyah. He graduated in 1993 from Virginia Military Institute with an engineering degree and later joined the Michigan Army National Guard. Miller worked for automotive supplier Yazaki North America Inc. and was an engineering supervisor.
His father wrote the following –
On Wednesday 31 August I received a knock on my door at 9:55 PM. It was a knock that I have dreaded for the past 2 years. An Army Major in full Class “A” uniform was standing on my porch. It didn’t dawn on me at the time until he asked are you Mr. Miller and I said, “yes”, then I realized who and why he was there. He said that on behalf of the Secretary of Defense, he regretted to inform me that my son Captain Lowell T. Miller II had been killed in action in Iraq. I had envisioned this same thing in my mind many times, since his brother Patrick first went to Iraq in 2003. My wife, Linda was not at home because she works nights at a funeral home and was running late. I had the grim task of meeting her as she got out of her car. She knew something was wrong by the look on my face. She asked, “is there something wrong.” I said that I was just informed that Tommy has been killed.
It was a night mission. A night mission that they said was too dangerous for American soldiers and they called on the group of Iraqi soldiers that he had been training for the past 6 weeks since he returned from his 2 weeks home on leave in July. He didn’t want them to go alone so he went with them. I’m not sure of the following but was told by the CAO (casualty assistance officer) that they were ambushed and he was shot once in the chest. He did not live but a short while. Tommy was a soldiers’ soldier. He always took care of his men and never gave thought for his own safety.
His body is at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, arriving today (2 September 2005). They will be preparing his body and sometime next week he will be flown back to Flint. There will be a full rites military funeral. He will be cremated and part of his ashes will be interned here and the other part will be scattered on the Parade Grounds of Virginia Military Institute where he graduated in 1993 and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant.
We have been told that he is to be posthumously promoted to Major and will receive a Bronze Star and Purple Heart. He was a longtime member of the Michigan National Guard and served a stint patrolling the U.S. border with Canada. Last year, he was sent to Sinai, Egypt, where he served with Captain Thomas Golden of Utica, Michigan.
“He’s the kind of guy that, if you were at war, you’d want right next to you,” said Golden, 39, who later roomed with Miller during a two-week officers school at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The men had a chance to share a few beers, Golden said, and became friends in addition to comrades. “He was a good man, beyond being a soldier,” Golden said. “He thought about other people first.”
Tommy enjoyed being a soldier. He had joined the 155th Infantry at Camp Shelby in Mississippi in order to be able to deploy to Iraq. In an email he stated that his job was fun training these soldiers and it appears that he had made some good Iraqi comrades.
He died doing what he believed in. I only ask that you keep my family in your thoughts and prayers as we go through this time. Tommy was a born-again Christian by accepting Jesus as his savior at the early age of 8 years. He still remained a believer until the end. He is now at peace with the Heavenly Father. He will go to war no more.
Thank you all so much.
Tom Miller
His fellow soldiers remembered him as follows:
I worked with when I was on active duty training the 155 IN for their deployment to Iraq. He was a NO B.S. straight shooter and was great to work with. We would see each others with our better halves in the morning for breakfast at the Holiday Inn in Hattiesburg, MS. You will never be forgotten my Friend and I have saved the email that you sent me. God speed Sir. Never forgotten!
SFC Benson (Ret) Served In Military Together
Tom, I will never forget you and the friendship that we had. I wear your name around my wrist not to remind me of the day you left us but so that I can tell your story to everyone that asks about you. Calling in the Angle Flight for you that terrible day is a memory that is burned so deep into my soul that 100 years from now I will be living that moment over and over in my dreams….we miss you “Tommy Two Tone”
Dave Laydon
Capt. Miller. It has been years since we were assigned to HHC 1/125th inf. But as veterans day is upon us my thoughts turn to you again. You were definitely a soldiers officer which is why I was not surprised to hear what happened to you. You were one who would stand by your soldiers in the thick and thin. You never acted better or above your soldiers. You stood next to them working fighting by their side and leading the way. You lead by example and were looked upon that if * hit the fan I wanted you by my side. This world and the soldiers has truly lost a great man soldier and officer.”
Formerly Sgt. Michael Sarnowski of Bay City, Michigan USA