‘Desire to serve our country’: Mother recalls fallen daughter’s love for the military

Army Specialist Toccara Green was only 23 years old when she was killed. She was ambushed on August 14th, 2005 during convoy operations in Asad, Iraq, and buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery on August 26th, 2005.

She always wanted to help others and serve her country.

She was three months from finishing her second tour of duty in Iraq when she was killed. Green is believed to be Maryland’s first female soldier to die in combat in Iraq.

Yvonne Green, her Gold Star mother says, “she was a person that whatever she put her mind to do she was going to excel at it– she was going to do it.”

She was from Rosedale, Maryland, ᴀssigned to the 57th Transportation company, a support battalion out of Fort Drum, N.Y.

“She was telling me that ‘I have this desire to serve our country’ so when she went in, we knew that that was something she really wanted to do.”

She loved roller skating and working on cars. During her last trip home just weeks before her death, she told her mom she was nervous.

Army Specialist Toccara Green

“And we were saying nervous, this little girl never says she’s nervous about anything. So then I got to thinking if she’s sensing something is something going on. I was at work, and I thought ‘do I need to go to the bathroom and pray or go to my car?’”

The Gold Star mother says her daughter’s devotion to her country is what inspired her. She died for what she believed in.

“Sometimes, when we share her story and people start to cry and it’s like oh no it’s nothing sad. Memories we will always have, and you can’t take that from us. And we knew where her heart was, and her heart was truly in the military. She loved it.“

Army Specialist Toccara Green

In only two years and seven months, Baby Green as she was known left such an impression.

Her brother is a Marine Staff Sergeant stationed in Norfolk, Virginia, and her father Garry Green Sr. is a Baltimore police detective.