WEBSTER SPRINGS, W.Va. — Those who knew West Virginia Army National Guard Spc. Sarah Beckstrom say she had a big heart —-her tragic death following an ambush on the streets of Washington, D.C. has left them broken-hearted.
Beckstrom, 20, was best known in her hometown of Webster Springs. That’s where the community gathered Friday night for a candlelight vigil, the second of three scheduled to honor her memory.
“She was from Webster,” said co-worker Chrissy McCourt, who, like other locals, shortens the official name of the town to one word. “She was full of life… a girly-girl.”
McCourt, Joanie Bender and Amanda Rexrode all work at Seneca Health Services with Sarah’s mom. That’s where Sarah worked too. Those co-workers couldn’t help but smile when thinking about how she performed her duties in community outreach.
“She was all about the community—relieving families who needed help,” McCourt said, who worked several resource fairs with Sarah.
“She had a smile for everybody,” Bender said. “She had the biggest heart.”
“She chose to work in behavioral health, nobody made her do that,,” Rexrode added. “She chose to go into the Guard to help people.”
Webster County High School Class of 2023 classmate Valerie Smith of Cowen took it a step further.
“She was the peacekeeper,” Smith said, remembering how Beckstrom would step in when she and another friend were having a disagreement at school. “She would never have a bad thing to say about anybody.”
Smith said they weren’t best friends but thinking back now, she said she should have done more to keep up with her since graduation. She ran into Beckstrom in a restaurant in Summersville back in August right before she deployed to DC.
“First thing she did was she started complementing me and telling me how good I looked—she was always just so positive,” Smith said.
Eva Short said there wasn’t a mean bone in Beckstrom’s body.
“The biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met in my life,” Short said.
Short’s son and Sarah dated for six years. The whole family got to know her well and shared the joys of her teen years like helping her get her driver’s license. Short said her son and Sarah were Prom King and Queen one year.
“She was over the moon about that—she was so excited,” Short remembered. “She came dancing through the door holding the crown in her hand. She was ecstatic.”
The deployment
Short said Beckstrom joined the Guard as a step toward being an FBI agent. She was part of a Military Police company.
Short said Beckstrom was scared at first to go to D.C. but learned to like it. “She was going around seeing the monuments and stuff and sending us pictures of everything she went to—she was really falling in love with the place and she decided to stay but I wish she wouldn’t have.”
Short said Sarah was supposed to come home on Nov. 17 but decided to volunteer for more time so other Guard members with families could go home.
The Seneca work crew said that decision to volunteer comes as no surprise.
“She wanted people who had kids to go home,” McCourt said.
“Absolutely she did,” Bender agreed. “She volunteered so others could go home.”
The events of Nov. 26
Spc. Beckstrom and WV Air Guard Staff Sgt. Andrew Wolfe, 24, were patrolling near a Metro station when authorities said they were shot several times by an Afghan national who ambushed them. Beckstrom died a day later, Thanksgiving night, while Wolfe remains in critical condition.
The news has been hard to take in town and at Seneca.
“It’s terrible any time you hear anything like that happening with any of our American troops, any branch, anything, but when it’s somebody that you knew personally, and you know their family, it’s shocking, it’s devastating,” Rexrode said.
Smith said Beckstrom in no way deserved what happened to her Wednesday.
“Nobody deserves it—but it’s even worse because she was out there doing what she was doing to help other people,” Smith said. “It’s just a shame that her life got taken away from her in such a brutal and fast way.”
Gathering together
Webster County Veterans Auxiliary leader Jamie Ackerly organized three community vigils to begin the healing process.
“We felt it was important to give people an outlet, somewhere to go, to pray, that’s what this community is good at doing,” she said.
Ackerly said Webster Springs is a proud community that’s proud of its veterans. Ackerly said Beckstrom’s death hurts.
“Our son is currently active duty Army and so even though I didn’t know Sarah personally, I’m a mom, she could have been my child and I think all military moms feel that when it happens, it hits home,” Ackerly said.
Air Force veteran Jackie Lewis drove from Beverly on the other side of Elkins to attend Friday night’s vigil. He said he didn’t know Sarah but in another way he did.
“I know I’m a long way from home but once you’re a service member you’re always a service member—they’re all brothers and sisters—and this brings people together,” Lewis said.
Sen. Robbie Morris, R-Randolph, tried to encourage those at Friday night’s vigil.
“Our community will never forget their sacrifice,” he said of Beckstrom and Wolfe.
Those in attendance did what West Virginians do at vigils—they prayed, they cried and they sang.
“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost but now I’m found, was blind, but now I see”
Sen. Bill Hamilton, R-Upshur, read one verse to the crowd. He said it seemed to describe what Sarah did best—-using her big heart to help others.
“John 15:13–Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”