A Tribute to a Fallen Local Naval Officer: Will McKamey, 19, Dead Following a Blood Clot in His Brain During Football Practice

In honor of Naval Midshipman Will McKamey, 1995-2014. May he rest in peace.

In Honor of a Fallen Naval Officer: Will McKamey of Knoxville, Tennessee (1995-2014), Freshman Runningback for the Navy Midshipman

My dearest friends and beloved family members,

I want to take this opportunity as I did very early this morning in my tweet to pay tribute to the honorable gentleman Will McKamey, who passed away overnight in a coma at the University of Maryland's Shock Trauma Unit in Baltimore following a brave and valiant fight after collapsing during football practice for the Naval Academy at the tender age of 19. He was a native of Knoxville, Tennessee, my hometown. McKamey now has embarked upon his final mission, sailing to the second star on the left, and on till he reaches a new dawn and an eternal morning, never to know a twilight because his candle burned out long before his legend ever will.

As a young man who signed along the dotted line to play in Annapolis for the legendary football program, McKamey also signed himself into service for you, your neighbors next door and across the street, his family and friends, his fellow midshipmen, and me. He agreed to serve all of America so that we may remain forever free. He signed what he knew was the contract that could be his last, and he did so willingly and as a brave soldier, a warrior prepared to fight to the death if necessary. He died in a hospital following a bad break in practice from a blood clot in his brain, but let there be no doubt that he fell on the field of battle serving this blessed nation, our last best hope for the salvation of the greatest mankind has to offer.

Ray Chapman, Major League Baseball Player

Dale Earnhardt, NASCAR driver

In the spirit of sport, we never take into account that it, too, is a field of battle. In 1920, Cleveland Indians player Ray Chapman was beamed in the temple during the age where no player donned protective head gear, only their ball caps. Chapman died as a result, still the lone such casualty in baseball history, and his swan song on Earth was sung doing what he loved most: playing on a Major League Baseball diamond as one of a mere few scores comprising of the day's boys of summer. In 2001, Dale Earnhardt, to date the NASCAR Winston Cup driver tied with "The King" Richard Petty for the most championships, was tragically killed attempting to block the passing oppositions' cars for his teammates to speed by during "The Great American Race," known to fans as the Daytona 500. A man of middle age, Earnhardt certainly had many more good years to live had this not occurred. Instead, he also was called Home to Glory, driving along in old number 3 to his last finish line that will evermore remain for him to cross.

McKamey's tragedy, however, transcends these two sad chapters in the history of sport. Chapman and Earnhardt especially lived to see an advanced adulthood. McKamey was never granted such quarter. But the legacy he will leave behind for his family and friends and for the nation that regardless of the terrain - in the trenches on the gridiron or on the U.S.S. Arizona at Pearl Harbor on the day which forever will live in infamy - he served the United State Navy and died all the same: in service to you and me. And as we wave goodbye to him as he sails unto the stars in the heavens manning his "Old Ironsides," we will never forget his courage, his passion for football, but most of all the human being and model Christian, a soldier of God and disciple of Jesus, so long as there are recorded annuls to be read. 

Billy Joel once sang that only the good die young, and well, I believe we may safely claim that McKamey did. He died for us, his beloved family and dear friends, but also served his ultimate purpose by touching what lives he could until God declared he had performed a job well done. And in the end, what really matters is how God deemed his efforts while living on Earth to have been spent. He spent them well and ever wisely, and in what for us as the finite flesh bearers may appear as a sad, untimely passing, he did God's work on time. In the end, this is all he could hope to accomplish. 

At the funeral of President John F. Kennedy, the "Navy Hymn" was performed by the Navy Band, and sung as the favorite song of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in April 1945. The full title, "Eternal Father," was written into poetic verse in 1860 by William Whiting of Winchester, England for a student preparing to set sail to the U.S. The next year, the melody was composed by another fellow Englishman, the Episcopalian clergyman Rev. John Bacchus Dykes. In honor of Midshipman Will McKamey, a fallen naval officer, I wish to share with you in closing this poem, so beautiful and yet even more so apropos. He never dropped anchor, because his dawn of an Eternal Day has only just begun.

William Whiting, 1825-1878

Eternal Father (Navy Hymn), 1860

by William Whiting

Verse 1: 

Eternal Father, strong to save,

Whose arm hath bound the restless wave, 

Who bidd'st the mighty ocean deep

Its own appointed limits keep;

Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,

For those in peril on the sea! 

Verse 2: 

O Christ! Whose voice the waters heard

And hushed their raging at Thy word,

Who walked'st on the foaming deep,

And calm amidst its rage didst sleep;

Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,

For those in peril on the sea!

Verse 3: 

Most Holy Spirit! Who didst brood

Upon the chaos dark and rude,

And bid its angry tumult cease,

And give, for wild confusion, peace;

Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee,

For those in peril on the sea! 

Verse 4: 

O Trinity of love and power!

Our brethren shield in danger's hour; 

From rock and tempest, fire and foe, 

Protect them wheresoe'er they go;

Thus evermore shall rise to Thee

Glad hymns of praise from land and sea.