WALLER COUNTY, Texas — On Saturday afternoon, dozens of friends, family, and total strangers came together in Waller County to surprise a local soldier returning from his first combat deployment.
Along FM 1488 in Waller County, in front of the Texas Thunder Saloon, Army Private First Class Justin Swarb, 20, was greeted with cheers, handshakes, and hugs went he stepped out of a red pickup that pulled into the parking lot just before 4 p.m.
“My grandma…she told me we were going to get something that her friend was making or something like that, so I didn’t think anything of it, and then that’s when we went down 1488 and saw the flags and stuff, and I was like ‘Aw, they got me,’” recalled Pfc. Swarb. “I started to tear up a little bit. It was a pretty surreal moment.”
Riders from the Patriot Guard Riders and local law enforcement then escorted the family to the Waller County native’s home a few miles away.
“I’m just…I’m happy,” said Pfc. Swarb, once he arrived home. “Today is a good day.”
It’s the 2017 Waller High graduate’s first time home in nearly a year after his first tour in Kuwait and Afghanistan with the 1st Striker Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, out of Fort Carson, Colorado.
“Definitely hard,” said Johnny Swarb, when asked about his son’s deployment. “Proud of him and scared for him at the same time.”
“We’re really close,” said Johnny Swarb, Jr., Pfc. Swarb’s older brother. “We would chat back and forth through Facebook, but that was one of probably the hardest parts because you don’t really get to talk to someone that, like I said, you talk to every day,”
When asked what he missed the most while deployed, Pfc. Swarb, surrounded by family and friends at home, said, “This”.
To keep him going, his family kept in touch when possible and sent care packages.
“Ding Dongs,” recalled his sister, Jordan. “He loved the Pop Tarts. Pop Tarts was the craziest thing. My mom would send him tons and tons of candy and beef jerky and peanuts.”
After more than nine months on deployment, in which Pfc. Swarb earned an Army commendation medal for combat service and achievement, he returned to Fort Carson in late January.
“It didn’t even sink in when I was on the plane ride home,” he recalled. “We got off the plane and I was like, ‘am I really home?’”
He later drove home, arriving Feb. 11.
“It has been awesome,” said Joyce Swarb, his mother. “It’s been nice to know when you wake up you get to see him and he’s gonna be here and he’s not somewhere scary.”
Among the family, friends, and neighbors welcoming him home were strangers from the Patriot Guard Riders, most of whom are also veterans.
“That smile, you saw it when he got out of the truck, that makes your day,” said Bobby Stroka, one of the riders.
Stoka says the group got the request through their website, though he had seen the ‘Welcome Home’ sign outside the Swarb family home.
“The Vietnam vets did not get this reception, and that’s part of their mission,” said Stoka. “They’re not gonna let that happen again.”
Pfc. Swarb will return to Fort Carson on Feb. 25.
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