Caldwell High School alumna who died in Iraq honored at assembly with USS Idaho sailors

Thu Jan 26th, 2023

CALDWELL — Carrie French was just another high schooler, her mom Paula Hansen said.

“She wanted to be a lawyer. And she knew that that was going to cost a lot of money. And that’s why she joined the guard,” Hansen said.

French — who walked the halls of Caldwell High School as a student and cheerleader — joined the National Guard in 2003 and graduated in 2004. French was killed in 2005 in Kirkuk, Iraq, when an explosive hit a vehicle she was in. She was 19.

The devastation of losing her is still fresh in Hansen’s mind, as if it had happened yesterday.

On Tuesday, French was honored at an assembly with USS Idaho sailors at Caldwell High School. The USS Idaho is under construction in Groton, Connecticut, and is scheduled to be commissioned into the U.S. Navy active duty in 2025. The Virginia-class nuclear-powered attack submarine is the first Navy vessel to be named after Idaho in over 100 years, according to a release. Right now, those sailors are training to be the first crew members on the submarine.

Caldwell High has honored French and her family several times, according to French’s sister, Sara Gillnan.

At the time of her death, French served as one of 5,000 troops under Brig. Gen. Alan Gayhart’s command. He recalls being rendered “speechless” when he heard about her death.

“My heart sank because all these young soldiers were doing such good things for the Iraqi people,” Gayhart said.

Marisa McCarter met French at the Boise Airport. They were both put through deployment training called Renegades. They became inseparable, McCarter said.

“We were kids,” McCarter said. “We were very close.”

The two girls were admittedly different in appearance — McCarter with pixie cut dark hair, and French with long blond hair — but they provided each other with support while serving in Iraq.

“It is hard to fit in and feel like you can keep up as a woman in the military a lot of times and I adapted. She adapted in a different way that I really admire,” McCarter said. “She’s a great role model for a lot of women veterans because she was unapologetically woman.”

French didn’t try to be a soldier like McCarter did. She was authentic, McCarter said.

”She had her hair net, she had her face masks to keep the dust out of her pores, she had her low-calorie bars and meals,” McCarter recalled. “When I got up in the morning, she was all ready — makeup done, sleeping bag done up ... she was a better soldier.”

McCarter did ramp ceremonies, similar to funerals, while in Iraq. The ceremonies are used for soldiers who are killed in a war zone. French’s ceremony had the biggest turnout McCarter had ever seen.

“She touched so many lives,” McCarter said.

Anita Wilson, principal at Caldwell High School, recalls French as a junior and senior going to homecoming, prom, attending classes with the same teachers the school has now, walking through the halls with her friends.

“She was an all-American girl,” Wilson said. “I remember she was very happy-go-lucky, very smiley.”

The high school has a memorial plaque for three soldiers who attended the school: Jacob Allcott, Octavio Herrera and French.

“Military is a big deal at our school,” Wilson said. “If we have the opportunity to hire veterans, we do.”

Those soldiers, along with French, are frozen in time at Caldwell High. Their names are brought up and honored every Veterans Day, remembered as young people at the height of their lives who died as heroes.