A man of few words, Claude Darius Alexander let his actions speak for him. Born on August 16, 1946, Claude was a native Kansan. He grew up on a farm near Ulysses, a small town of 3,000 souls. In a family of eight, Claude was the youngest son and reputedly the favorite.
From an early age, Claude did his share of the chores, milking cows and feeding livestock. Attending grammar school in a one-room school house, he became an avid reader. In high school, he co-captained the football team, played sax in the band, and completed four years of Russian, unusual in that day and age.
On his 16th birthday, Claude’s parents gave him a new Corvette Stingray. Claude soon developed an affinity for driving faster than the posted speed limit, along with an aversion for traffic cops. Both proved to be lifelong characteristics.
Upon graduating from high school in 1964, Claude enlisted in the Army “to jump out of airplanes.” This he did, completing Jump School prior to joining the 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, KY.
His stay at Campbell proved to be brief. When Congressman Robert Dole offered Claude an appointment to West Point, he accepted. On July 1, 1965, with other members of the Class of 1969, he reported for duty.
As a cadet, Claude seemed hardly to break a sweat. A member of company C-1, he finished academically in the top 10 percent of his class. He continued studying Russian, which became an enduring interest. During one summer, Claude spent time at the Army’s Russian Institute, then located at Garmisch, West Germany.
He was as impressive in the field as in the section room. At Camp Buckner during yearling summer, while others struggled to align their compass, Claude was already bounding through the orienteering course. Competence, integrity, stamina, and quiet self-confidence were traits that impressed his classmates about Claude. He was a leader. When firstie year rolled around, Claude chose Infantry, as he had intended from day one. He also bought himself another Corvette.
Despite his sober demeanor, Claude was by no means averse to having a good time. After attending the Infantry Branch Reception, Claude continued to celebrate back in East Barracks. The result was a famous episode that ended with Claude awarded a slug large enough to earn him membership in the Century Club. Ever stoic, he walked his tours and served his confinement without complaint.
With graduation, it was off to Fort Benning, GA for Ranger School and the basic course before assignment to Fort Bragg, NC with the 82nd Airborne Division. Soon enough, orders came to deploy to Vietnam.
Claude arrived in-country in the summer of 1970 and rejoined the 101st Airborne, where he was assigned to Company L, 75th Rangers. Once again, however, his time with the 101st was destined to be brief.
On August 25, 1970, Claude led a heliborne assault into a hot LZ. Upon landing, his RTO was immediately killed. In the ensuing firefight, Claude sustained a severe gunshot wound to the leg. Medevac’d first to Phu Bai and then to CONUS, he ended up at Fitzsimmons Army Hospital. Sadly, surgeons were unable to save Claude’s leg.
During his long hospitalization, Claude took up amputee skiing, becoming an early champion in this nascent sport. Upon discharge from the hospital, Claude was medically retired as a captain. For his combat service, he received the Bronze Star for Valor and the Purple Heart. Having to leave the Army remained a source of enduring disappointment.
Nonetheless, he moved on, determined to live life to the fullest. In 1971, Claude enrolled at Columbia University to study international relations. This was not a time when Vietnam vets felt all that welcome on Ivy League campuses. As an “extra duty,” Claude served as an undergraduate RA, which occasioned cross-cultural encounters that challenged both sides.
In 1974, after receiving his M.A. from Columbia, Claude walked into the Capitol Hill offices of Bob Dole, now a U.S. Senator, and landed himself a job. For the next four years, Claude served on the senator’s staff, specializing in issues related to agriculture and defense. Again, there were “extra duties.” Senator Dole occasionally tasked Claude with picking up Mary Elizabeth ‘Liddy’ Hanford, whom Dole was then courting (and would soon marry).
Along with fast cars (Claude now favored Porsches), skiing had become a passion, and Claude was soon organizing outings for other Washington-area amputee vets, serving in his understated way as an inspiring role model. In 1978, he left Dole’s staff for the private sector, first working for the National Food Processors Association and then Ralston Purina. During Claude’s 20-year stay with Ralston Purina, he was instrumental in opening up trade relations with the Soviet Union.
Claude also married Denise Love, whom he had met while working on the Hill. This union produced three children of whom both parents were immensely proud: Meg, Philip, and Kevin. Claude was a loving and attentive father, not in “a Hallmark card sort of way,” Meg recalls, but in all the ways that count.
When Claude retired in 2003, new wars were producing a whole new generation of badly wounded young veterans to whom Claude devoted himself with unflagging energy. Visiting Walter Reed on a weekly basis, he organized innumerable outings and brought troops home for Christmas dinner. This may have been Claude’s finest hour.
The end came with tragic suddenness. While skydiving in October 2007, Claude’s parachute malfunctioned. Severely injured, he developed a fatal infection in the hospital which caused his death. Interment followed at Arlington National Cemetery.
Seeking neither credit nor recognition, Claude gave himself unstintingly to family, friends, and fellow wounded vets.
— Lonnie Adams and Andrew Bacevich, Classmates, Class of 1969