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Decorations register · Notice Nearby

No rights-safe contemporary likeness is on file. The record is the decoration and the writing, not an invented face.

Richard J. Herrema

1979–2006

Sergeant First Class (posthumous; Special Forces Medical Sergeant 18D)

U.S. Army; B / HHC, 3rd Battalion, 327th Infantry, 101st Airborne Division; SFQC 18D; G Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Special Warfare Training Group; USASOC — KIA Baghdad, Iraq, 25 Apr 2006

Documented decorations

Richard J. Herrema’s Bronze Star Medal for valor and Purple Heart are named in the Department of Veterans Affairs’ #VeteranOfTheDay profile of his Special Forces service in Iraq. This decorations page records those two types from that VA posthumous list. It will not invent oak-leaf counts the paragraph does not carry.

Born 28 March 1979 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and a 1997 graduate of Unity Christian High School, Herrema enlisted as an infantryman in January 1999 with the 101st Airborne, completed the Special Forces Qualification Course as an 18D medical sergeant in June 2003, and later served as an instructor and USASOC team member. He was killed in combat operations in Baghdad on 25 April 2006 and was posthumously promoted to sergeant first class. The Bronze Star Medal for valor and Purple Heart are the published decoration names here.

This name is not yet on a war-roll essay. The decorations above are the documented public record this register will stand on until that essay is written.

A publisher register — not a verification

This decorations register is publisher-curated from public records — Medal of Honor Society citations, published general orders, and official Army, Navy, and Marine Corps biographies. It is not a verified-veteran product. Notice Nearby does not certify service and does not issue badges.

A paid or unpaid memorial does not enroll anyone here. Checkout, VET50, and a family’s mention of service on an obituary are not applications to this list. We add a name only when a public official source names the decoration.

Claiming a decoration that was not awarded is stolen valor. It is a disrespect to those who earned the medal and, in some cases, a federal crime. This register will not invent an award to fill a page.

These pages are a historical register. They are not Legal Publication, not a newspaper notice, and not proof that a statute was satisfied.