Services for the 28-year-old Burnet Army officer who died in Afghanistan last Thursday from a roadside attack will be held Saturday at Clements-Wilcox Funeral Home in Burnet at a time still pending.
The body of Capt. Jason Ellis Holbrook, a 2000 graduate of Burnet High School, is expected to arrive from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware sometime Friday and be taken to the funeral home.
Family and friends of Holbrook are mourning the loss of the young man they describe as a true American hero who went on to graduate from the prestigious United States Military Academy at West Point in 2004.
His father said he remembers his son's character and poise when he returned from West Point—Airborne-trained and enamored with military life.
"He loved what he was doing," said his mourning father, James P. Holbrook. "We were real proud."
Holbrook's father, himself a Vietnam veteran, said Jason was deployed to Iraq soon after his graduation and was no stranger to the hazards of war-torn countries.
"He was attacked in Iraq, too," Holbrook said. "He got his first Purple Heart there" for injuries he sustained during an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) attack in 2006.
According to an official press release from the U.S. Army Special Operations Command, Holbrook returned to the states where he attended the Special Forces Qualification Course.
Holbrook graduated the course on April 16th, 2010 and reported to 1st Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group on May 27, 2010.
Holbrook died two months later near the town of Tsagay, Afghanistan "of wounds he sustained from an IED blast during a combat reconnaissance patrol," according to the press release.
"He had just gotten to Afghanistan," said his mother, Elaine Holbrook. "He was only there a week and a half."