Van of Valor

By Dr. Kevin Wallace
Van of Valor 

WHITE RIVER JUNCTION, Vt. — In a solemn ceremony merely a few months before the Van of Valor arrived in Vermont, three National Guardsmen were honored with Purple Heart Medals.

The Van of Valor team, having broken down in Boston, had to arrange a rental car and missed the official ceremony.

The valor happened on Christmas Day in 2023, when terrorists launched a drone attack on U.S. forces in Iraq. All three were wounded, but according to official statements, the,  “wounded soldiers who, despite their injuries, executed a critical medevac to save a comrade; the enduring pride of service and family.”

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But for those of us who make it our mission to listen to the stories behind the medals, the ceremony is just the prologue. 

The real narrative lives in the hearts and minds of the honorees — Maj. John Lescure, Chief Warrant Officer 2 Nicholas Fazio, and Sgt. Alex Jarvis — and in the quiet burden carried by those who bear witness to the attack that fatal day.

After an aggressive spell of back-to-back interviews across New England, the Van of Valor tried to find a moment of silence in the Green Mountains, near the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. 

The team decided to set out on a half-day hike meant for reflection, for air. Yet, the stories of these three Vermont soldiers followed them up every switchback, their Christmas Day in the desert a stark contrast to the lush, peaceful summits we climbed.

“This is the hardest part of the work with Van of Valor, the nonprofit we founded to share the stories of veterans and first responders. You don’t just report; you absorb,” said anthropologist Lauren Wallace, who cofounded the Van of Valor. “You listen to the account of the blast, the smoke, the pain, and the steadfast focus on the mission, and you try to hold it with the honor it deserves. But it takes root.”

It’s a privilege to be entrusted with these stories, but it is a weight, she continued.

“You sit with someone and they hand you this piece of their trauma, their valor, their hardest day. You carry it home. It lives with you. The emotional toll is real, and it accumulates,” she said.

Looking at her husband, her gaze holding a mixture of professional understanding and personal concern, she continued…

“But I also know that for Kevin, it’s different. It doesn’t just accumulate; it resonates,” she said. “It finds the cracks in his own armor from his own Purple Heart and Bronze Star days. These stories don’t just sit with him; they reawaken the old weather in his bones. My toll feels pale in comparison to the way it builds on his psyche.”

Even the crisp Vermont air couldn’t clear the mental replay of the details they’d learned. The incongruity of a Christmas Day attack. The metallic taste of fear they must have swallowed to still execute a complex evacuation. The lifelong meaning now embedded in a small, heart-shaped medal.

They couldn’t get them off our minds — Lescure, Fazio, Jarvis. Their honor was public, but their healing, like all of ours, would be a private, ongoing mission. 

The trail, with its deliberate, physical struggle and its ultimate reward of a clear vista, felt like a metaphor they themselves would understand: the path forward is steep, sometimes isolating, but you keep moving, one step at a time, bearing the weight you’ve been given.

Their Purple Hearts speak to wounds received. But their actions speak to a profound resilience—the same resilience we talk about in veteran circles, the same thread that connects all who have served and seen too much. They saved a life. Now, they, and their families, begin the lifelong work of safeguarding their own peace.

As the Wallaces reached a viewpoint, looking out over the rolling peaks, the burden felt a little different, said Lauren. It wasn’t just the weight of their story anymore. It was the shared understanding that the journey for these three Vermont heroes is now forever changed. 

The trail for them, as for so many they’ve met, has just begun. 

In bearing witness, they promise to walk a part of it with the wounded and fallen, in solidarity, one story, one step, at a time.

Van of Valor is a veteran-run nonprofit dedicated to sharing the stories of service, sacrifice, and resilience. To learn more, visit www.HelpVoV.com.