Russell McKelvey is a captain in The Georgia Army National Guard 108th Cavalry and in November 2009 he and his colleagues made news when they embarked on a march of 118 miles from Toccoa to Atlanta to commemorate a record-breaking march made by Georgia soldiers during World War II who inspired "Band of Brothers".
In uniform the group of about 10 men started the march from Toccoa early on a Wednesday morning and stopped in Lula to sleep for the night. By about 10:30 a.m. Thursday, the group’s healthy pace had them at the Northeast Georgia Medical Center in Gainesville. They covered an average of 35 miles each day.
Russell was honest and realistic enough to admit, “We’re hurting pretty good right now”.
Sandwiched between a Humvee, police cars and a fire truck, the procession marched down Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard toward Atlanta Highway.
Onlookers peered out of doors and windows and some offered up words of support, something the soldiers said was motivation to keep going.
“It helps keep your endurance up when you’re tired,” said Spc. Jason Cormier.
Cormier said one special supporter of the march is a man who watched the original group of paratroopers march in Atlanta in the ’40s and has come out for the past two years to see the re-enactment.
“He is a big motivation,” Cormier said. “He makes it all worth it.”
In 1942, members of the Army’s 101st Airborne Division marched 118 miles from Toccoa to Atlanta before heading to Columbus to begin parachute training.
A year after Pearl Harbor was bombed, they broke the record for an endurance march, which at the time was held by the Japanese.
The group’s service in World War II was immortalized in Stephen Ambrose’s book “Band of Brothers,” which was made into a mini series of the same name in 2001.
Russell’s squad marched to the finish at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta. They then marched in the Atlanta Veterans Day parade Saturday.
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