Phil Egan, special to The Sarnia Journal

(2106) Will Cushley watched the twin towers burn in the 9/11 terrorist attacks and became angry, his mother Elaine recalls.

When he heard how the Taliban treated women, the brother of three sisters became angrier still. He wanted to fight back. He was sixteen.

His family had moved to Sarnia from Bristol, England, where Will was born on July 28, 1985. After he attended elementary school at St. Benedict’s, the family resettled downriver in Port Lambton.

Even before Will Cushley graduated from high school he had resolved to join the military.

He travelled to a recruitment office in Chatham to enlist in the Canadian Forces, choosing the infantry. When he didn’t immediately hear back he began regularly phoning the office to question the delay. He was so persistent they told him to stop calling.

It was the wrong thing to say to a warrior determined to join the fight.

Cushley next attempted to join the U.S. Marines, but they told him to go back to Canada and fight with his own army. The Marines don’t take Canadians.

The Canadian Forces finally took him after he told the office he was about to leave for the United Kingdom to join the Royal Marines.

He was exceptional at basic training in Saint-Jean, Quebec and thrived at Battle School. He was assigned to CFB Petawawa, a proud member of the Royal Canadian Regiment, 1st Battalion.

Cushley pushed for the chance to serve in Afghanistan, planning eventually to apply to join Canada’s elite Joint Task Force 2, a special commando unit similar to the U.S. Navy Seals.

Will Cushley was more than just another young soldier determined to fight. He spoke to his parents, Errol and Elaine, about his feeling that Canadian Forces were helping to lift the yoke of intolerance and oppression from the people of Afghanistan. He did, indeed, display the “right stuff.”

On Sept. 3, 2006, less than two months after celebrating his 21st birthday at home with his family, William Johnathan James Cushley was killed in an ambush15 kilometres west of Kandahar. He died with three of his comrades on the opening day of Operation Medusa.

Caught by surprise and facing an estimated 1,200 Taliban fighters, his platoon might easily have been completely destroyed.

Private Cushley died trying to make a difference in one of the most dangerous places on earth, fighting in defence of a people who were among the most oppressed on earth.

He was a Canadian hero. His name will be remembered, and his memory treasured.