WARWICK — On a Friday afternoon at Bishop Hendricken High School, students are anxiously preparing for their annual homecoming weekend. Their excited cries can be heard from the school gym, where a pep rally is underway as the student body gets ready for a football game that night. Outside the back doors, however, in a small space between the school building and the athletic fields, the newly-finished Memorial Prayer Garden is quiet and calm, an area of peace in the otherwise hectic high school rush.
Bishop Hendricken President John A. Jackson and Richard J. August, the driving force behind the project, stand examining the garden, set to be dedicated this coming Sunday, November 1, All Saints’ Day. The prayer garden has many features, including a flagpole, benches and a statue of Christ embracing a soldier, but upon entering, the eye is immediately drawn to the stone memorial bearing the names of three Hendricken alumni who gave their lives in service to their country: 2nd Lt. Richard D. McKenzie, U.S. Army; Lance Cpl. Eric P. Valdepeñas, U.S. Marines; and Capt. Matthew J. August, U.S. Army – Mr. August’s son.
“He told me ‘I want to lead soldiers,’” said Mr. August about his son during an interview in the school building after visiting the garden.
Matthew August graduated from Bishop Hendricken in 1993. Mr. August describes him as “a quiet leader” who was not quite as academic as his older brother, Mark, but nonetheless possessed the rare mix of charismatic leadership, athletic ability and intelligence that earned him two military appointments — to the Air Force Academy and Military Academy at West Point — upon graduation. Matthew chose to attend West Point, going on to become an engineer officer in the Corps of Army Engineers.
At West Point, he met his wife, Maureen, also an Army officer. Matthew earned a master’s degree from the University of Missouri and was stationed for a time at Fort Riley, Kan., but in September of 2003 was deployed to Iraq. On January 27, 2004, he was killed along with three of his fellow soldiers in an ambush attack in Khalidiyah, Iraq, when an improvised explosive device went off next to his convoy.
Mr. August and his family grieved Matthew’s loss, finding solace in the Bishop Hendricken community. Though not a graduate of Hendricken himself, Mr. August said that the school’s condolences and support were instrumental during the difficult time.
“Hendricken is more than a school,” he said. “Hendricken is a family. They rallied around, and it meant a lot.”
In September of 2006, the August family attended the funeral of Lance Cpl. Eric Valdepeñas, where they met the Valdepeñas family as well as the family of 2nd Lt. Richard McKenzie, who died in combat during the Vietnam War.
Eric Valdepeñas graduated from Bishop Hendricken in 2003 and went on to pursue a degree at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he studied engineering as a member of the Marine reserves. He was assigned to serve in Iraq before finishing his degree, and was killed on September 4, 2006. Shortly after his death, Valdepeñas and several of his fellow Marines were lauded as heroes in a Boston Globe article about a newborn Iraqi girl the soldiers had successfully lobbied to bring to the United States for treatment for a rare medical condition.
President Jackson knew both of the recent graduates during his time at Hendricken, Valdepeñas as a member of the basketball team and August from his AP government class. “What I remember from Eric and Matt is that they were natural leaders,” he said. “They were always very positive, upbeat and energetic. Passionate about studies and academic pursuits.”
Richard McKenzie, the earliest graduate of those honored on the stone, graduated from Bishop Hendricken in 1963. He attended Officer Candidate School before serving in Vietnam, and attained the rank of second lieutenant before his death in 1969. He is honored on the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C.
After meeting the families of the other Bishop Hendricken alumni who died in service, Mr. August wanted to commemorate the fallen in some way on the school’s campus.
“I was thinking a stone at one of the entrances,” he said.
What he didn’t expect was the enormous outpouring of support that soon followed for a Memorial Prayer Garden to commemorate all Hendricken alumni, but in particular the three servicemen. The school already had a small prayer garden, but students and alumni wanted a larger one that could be used by the school and local community alike.
The first donation came spur-of-the-moment from former Hendricken teacher Bob Fuoroli. After winning a $195 prize at a golf tournament in 2013, Fuoroli walked up to August and handed him the money, requesting that he use it for the prayer grotto. Over the next two years, the donations continued to pour in, with fundraisers including a comedy night, a music night with the St. Kevin’s choir and a performance by the 88th Army Band. August, the prayer garden’s driving force from day one, was appointed construction boss, while Steve Pagliarini, alumnus and owner of Central Nurseries, designed the landscaping. After several years of steady work and a few hiccups, such as the accidental cutting of a sprinkler line, the garden was finally completed a short time ago.
“It’s a space where we can reflect upon the three guys on the stone — their life while they were here at Hendricken,” said Jackson. “It’s a prayerful spot where we can remember them and pray that we won’t need to add any other names to the stone.”
The stone and flagpole, completed prior to the rest of the garden, were dedicated last fall in a ceremony attended by Warwick police and Rhode Island Supreme Court Justice Francis X. Flaherty, a Vietnam veteran and Class of 1964 Hendricken alumnus.
The Mass of Remembrance for all deceased alumni and faculty of Bishop Hendricken will be celebrated at 10 a.m., this Sunday, Nov. 1, followed by the dedication of the Memorial Prayer Garden. All are invited to attend.
Matthew August, Eric Valdepeñas and Richard McKenzie may have departed from this life, but they will remain a part of the Hendricken community, and its homecoming celebration, in the thoughts and memories of those who sit beside the memorial stone.
