Washington Police Department Cpl. Chad Edwards attended the Peace Officers Memorial Day events in Washington, D.C., on Sunday.
Peace Officers Memorial Day is celebrated May 15 of each year.
Edwards sent an email to his fellow officers and department staff Tuesday night. The following is an excerpt from that email:
“This past weekend I watched another 165 names become a permanent part of the marble wall at the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial. I saw children without parents, spouses without mates, and officers without coworkers. One poem written by a surviving child was taped to the wall under her father’s name, and I couldn’t help but share.”
Paper Daddy
My daddy is a picture hanging on the wall,
There’s another one just like it in the police department’s hall.
I kiss his paper face every night before I go to sleep.
Sometimes I pretend I can feel his whiskers tickle my cheek.
I take Daddy fishing when Momma isn’t around.
If I climb on a chair I can take my Daddy down.
Once I thought I saw a tear in his eye,
I didn’t know that paper daddies could cry.
My daddy is a picture hanging in the hall.
There’s another one just like it in the police department’s hall.
Edwards’ commented further in his email.
“No one likes to think about such a tragedy happening with our agency and I am not saying all of these deaths were preventable. I just wanted to send a reminder to stay vigilant and watch your brother’s back. None of these officers knew it would be their last shift. As a surviving husband told me Sunday, ‘Stay off the wall, but honor those on it.’”
This past weekend’s trip to the nation’s capital to observe Peace Officers Memorial Day wasn’t the first such trip for Edwards, a part-time officer for Washington.
“Last year was actually my first time,” Edwards said in a brief interview, adding that WPD Chief Mick Reed gave him permission to attend the event.
Asked what motivated him to attend last year’s event, Edwards said, “The first thing that motivated me was I attended a COPS Walk in 2009. That is an event that raised money for that institution.”
COPS stands for Concerns of Police Survivors. The organization the families of law-enforcement officers lost in the line of duty.
“It kind of me reminded me of some of the survivors I know around here,” Edwards said when asked how his visits to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial affected him, noting that he knew Charlie Brown, a Martin County Sheriff’s Office deputy killed in the line of duty in December 2009.
“Just the camaraderie up there this weekend,” Edwards said when asked about his experiences this past weekend, noting that people from as far away as Australia participated in the event.
The memorial comprises two curved, blue-gray marble walls, each 304 feet long. There are close to 19,000 names carved on the walls. The first known death of a U.S. law-enforcement officer dates back to 1791, according to the memorial’s website. Each spring, during National Police Week, new names are added to the memorial.