Marine Corps Staff Sgt. David Wyatt's Family Comforted by Community

Multitudes gather to mourn and honor fallen Marine Staff Sgt. David Wyatt
Times Free Press
by Tyler Jett
July 25th, 2015

(The turnout for the funeral) took our breath away. Chattanooga has touched us. Dawne Trent, sister of David Wyatt

United States Marines carry the casket of U.S. Marine Corps Staff Sgt. David Wyatt out of Hixson United Methodist Church after his funeral service Friday, July 24, 2015, in Hixson, Tenn. Staff Sgt. Wyatt was killed in the July, 16 shootings at the Naval Operational Support Center and Marine Corps Reserve Center on Amnicola Highway which left five dead, including shooter Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez, and a Chattanooga police officer wounded.
Photo by Doug Strickland /Times Free Press.

Seven men in crisp uniforms walked into the church, six gripping the casket handles, one leading them out front.

The Marines in Mike Battery had drilled for a moment like this, the way they drill through even the most mundane details of their jobs. Their expressions were practiced. Their steps in sync.

Mike Battery was accustomed to the ceremony of military funerals. Often, they attend the memorials of veterans, men who fought in old wars and died of old age.

But on Friday, the Marines carried the casket, draped in the American flag, for one of their own. Staff Sgt. David Allen Wyatt, 35, was one of five military servicemen who died on July 16, when the FBI says a 24-year-old Muslim from Hixson attacked the U.S. Naval and Marine Reserve Center with a handgun and an assault rifle.

But, Shell told her, "the impact has gone far beyond the bounds of your family. July 16 has impacted this community in ways it may not have been impacted since 9/11."
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