Battle at Mosque Ends Brothers’ Plan to Meet

As an Army paratrooper and then as a Marine, Jeffrey Bohr saw combat in Grenada, Panama, the first Gulf War and Somalia. He was promoted to gunnery sergeant and was assigned to Camp Pendleton, where he trained young Marines.

It’s a career his younger brother, Richard, an Army reservist, followed with pride. This winter, when the brothers from Ossian, Iowa, population 900, realized they probably would see duty in Iraq, they made a pact to meet during the war.

That plan ended Thursday morning when Jeffrey Bohr, 39, was killed during a seven-hour gun battle outside a Baghdad mosque. He leaves his wife, Lori, who lived with him in San Clemente, just a few miles north of Camp Pendleton.

Twenty-two other Marines were injured in the firefight.

Capt. Frank Thorp, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said Bohr’s unit was acting on information that leaders of the Baghdad regime were organizing a meeting in the area. During the operation, Thorp said, gunmen fired at the Marines from the mosque compound.

Sunday, Richard Bohr, 36, was grieving with family and friends at the home where he and his brother used to milk the family cow and dream of serving their country. He said he hasn’t given up his plans of a special meeting in Iraq.

When his company deploys to Iraq in early May, Richard Bohr will be with them. He will take with him mementos in order to set up a memorial for his brother at the mosque where he lost his life. “I think I could get out of it now,” he said. “But I think I owe it to my brother to go over there and pay respect to him where he was killed.

“I spent time in the military with my brother. I tried to mimic him. He knew everything. You couldn’t beat him. He was a good soldier, a paratrooper. He believed in his country. He believed in something and stood for something, and a lot of people don’t do that.”

Jeffrey Bohr went home whenever he could. He’d meet up with his childhood friend, Troy Breitsprecher, and fish for trout and hunt deer or squirrels. They’d grab a case of beer and drink it on the town’s isolated gravel roads, and Bohr would talk about combat and the danger of the job.

“Jeff is a dedicated military person. I think this is the way he often thought he might go,” said Breitsprecher, whose family has lived next to the Bohrs for decades. “He knew the dangers of his profession. When you spend that much time in the service ... you accept these responsibilities.”

Edward Bohr said he had received several letters from his son since he shipped off to the Persian Gulf.

He said his son planned to leave the military in two years, but that he didn’t hesitate to serve in another war. He wanted to start a business repairing computers.

In Bohr’s memory, flags flew at half staff Sunday at the Ossian fire station and at Carey Park on Highway 52, where the town recently installed a memorial to those killed in wars.

“He was a tough kid,” Edward Bohr said. “He liked the Marine Corps, and I was proud of him. He knew the chances. Things happen. You put yourself in harm’s way, eventually it’s going to get you.”