Correspondent photo / Kathryn Adams ... Eddie Williams served for 13 1/2 years in the U.S. Army.

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By KATHRYN ADAMS

Correspondent

LIBERTY — Eddie Williams has been involved with the Mahoning Chapter of Disabled American Veterans since 2002. He served as a steward and as treasurer before becoming chaplain this past year.

Williams can relate to the veterans he meets at the DAV because he has a history of service in the military. He completed boot camp at Fort Knox, Kentucky. In 1986, while stationed in Bad Hersfeld, Germany, where he served as a border guard, he hit black ice while driving on the autobahn and lost control of the vehicle. The accident left him with brain damage and in a coma. His wife did not survive the accident.

He was placed on the Temporary Disabled Retired List and received a medical discharge due to brain damage because of the accident. After two years on the TDRL, he was evaluated and returned to the U.S. Reflecting on his recovery from the accident, Eddie says, “I’m a fighter.”

Eddie went on to serve 10 more years in the Army, during which he was stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky. He remembers when the U.S. initiated Operation Desert Shield during the Gulf War in 1990 and 1991.

“If my number had been called, I would have gone. But my number wasn’t called,” he said.

While at Fort Knox, he went on to become a drill sergeant, tank commander and platoon sergeant.

He said his best job was as a drill sergeant from 1995 to 1997.

“I had the men for 12 weeks as I changed them from civilians into soldiers,” Williams said.

He believes we need a strong military and said, “The Army I was in is different from the Army of today. It used to be us versus the Russians — the good guys against the bad guys. Sept. 11 changed all that. Now we have a war on terror.”

He concluded his service in the Army in December 1999.

The Mahoning Chapter of the Disabled American Veterans meets on the third Wednesday of the month at 7 p.m. at the Austintown Senior Center on Mahoning Avenue. He said the DAV is a large organization that helps veterans apply for and receive disability benefits.

The DAV is active in other ways in the lives of veterans. With the help of Second Harvest Food Bank, it sponsors food drives in which once a month food is distributed to any veteran who signs up to receive it.

It also has a “pinning” around Veterans Day with the help of Hospice of the Valley in which members go into area nursing homes and present certificates and pins to veterans, thanking them for their service. Williams said, “They are so thankful for the recognition that many cry.”

“I’m a little wheel and I do my part. There are big wheels. We’re all in the machine, and it all works out for good,” Williams said of his service to the DAV.

Williams is a 1984 graduate of The Rayen School. He was raised in Youngstown and moved to Liberty in 2007.

He has two grown daughters. One daughter, Shaiyla, has served in the Army Reserve for 19 years and is stationed in Iraq, where she is a reporter for the U.S. Army. His second daughter, Iesha, is finishing up her nursing degree at a school in Louisville, Kentucky.

Williams is a member of St. Peter Baptist Church in Youngstown, where he serves as a deacon.