Final Salute

I don’t know which photo in Todd Heisler’s 2006 Pulitzer Prize series from the now-closed Rocky Mountain News hits me the hardest.

Heisler, now at The New York Times, and reporter Jim Sheeler both earned Pulitzers for the poignant story about notification officers and the families who have to be told that someone they love has died in battle.

Heisler’s 20-photo essay will wrench every tear from your body as you watch Marines attending to the body of 2nd Lt. James Cathey being brought home for burial. The photos mark every beat of a funeral procession from notifying the families to the white granite headstones on the grave.

Get a box of tissues. You’re going to need them.

These are the photos you must see.

• Marines drape the flag over the casket of 2nd Lt. James Cathey in an airliner's cargo hold.

• Katherine Cathey sleeping next to her husband for the last time.

• Katherine Cathey falls onto the flag covering his husband's casket.

• Link to the Pulitzer Prize page

• Rocky Mountain News Archive

And make sure you read Sheeler’s story.