Local hero honored at rifle range

'Brothers' of fallen Marine hone their skills in his memory

Dick Foster, Rocky Mountain News

Published June 2, 2006 at midnight

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BYERS - More than five dozen Marines in camouflage and armed with M-16 rifles gathered on an unlikely expanse of rolling prairie 41 miles east of Denver Thursday to honor a fallen brother.

A long swath had been cut in the undulating grassland on the Colorado Rifle Club range north of Byers. Dirt had been piled and smoothed to about the height of a pitcher's mound. From the earthen berm, an open range stretched 500 yards to a line of targets.

Here, 63 Marine Reservists from Air Control Squadron 23 at Buckley Air Force Base will practice shooting rifles and shotguns before deploying to Iraq later this year.

On Thursday, the ground was dedicated to Lance Cpl. Gregory Rund, of Littleton.

In three years of war in Iraq, 11 Colorado Marines have died. Rund was among them.

The 21-year-old Columbine High School graduate was killed Dec. 11, 2004, in Fallujah protecting the others in his "fire team" after an ambush. He was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star for heroism.

Rund's parents, Mark and Jane Rund, and his younger brother Doug, 17, were invited to the range Thursday as the troops dedicated the berm in their son's memory.

It was a brief observance in the dust and grass, devoid of pomp or formality, but filled with the quiet empathy in every heart of every Marine that stood there with the three honored guests.

When the Runds arrived about 2 p.m., the Marines formed a semicircle beside the berm, opening a place in the center of their ranks for the family to stand among them.

Lt. Col. Lance Lammott read a citation thanking rifle club members David Jennings and Tony Stahl for providing the range, and Ames Construction Co. for donating the work.

Then Maj. Steve Beck read from the Bronze Star citation detailing Rund's actions on Dec. 11, 2004:

"In an effort to allow his team to withdraw, Lance Cpl. Rund conducted a one-man delaying action. After killing three of the enemy insurgents in an extremely close firefight and hand-to-hand combat, he fell mortally wounded under the relentless onslaughts of the insurgents' attempts to pursue the other Marines of his fire team.

"As his last courageous act, Lance Cpl. Rund placed his body across the exit from the house to further delay the enemy's pursuit. By giving his life, Lance Cpl. Rund insured the men of his fire team would live on to rid the building of enemy insurgents."

Beck said he wanted the deploying Marines to hear Rund's citation because "they need to know about the Marines that went before them."

The Marines also created the Gregory P. Rund Memorial Trophy that will carry the name of each year's top marksman at the Byers range. A copy of Rund's Bronze Star citation will be kept in a compartment inside the trophy.

Rund's family was moved by the honor.

"None of them knew him, and he never knew them. But they treat him as if he was their own brother and that they'd fought side by side along with him. That's the way he's treated by these Marines at Buckley," Mark Rund said.

"I think Greg would be honored," he said. "Because Greg was truly a Marine."

fosterd@RockyMountainNews.com or 719-633-4442

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