Patriot Point hosted a group of five Gold Star families for a retreat this past weekend.

“It was awesome, very peaceful and restful and something we all needed,” said Jane Horton, whose husband, Specialist Christopher Horton, was an army sniper killed in action while serving in Afghanistan. “Stuff we used to do with our loved ones – I used to fish with my husband – and things many of us haven’t done in years or ever done.”

The group arrived on Friday for Veterans Day weekend and stayed through Monday, enjoying many of the activities Patriot Point has to offer. They fished, enjoyed a duck hunt and went skeet shooting. “And relaxed,” Horton added.

“It was a fantastic weekend,” said Kylie Owen Willis, whose father, Staff Sergeant Kirk Owen, was the squad leader for the scout and sniper platoon on which Horton served; Owen was killed in action one month before Horton. “We got together as mostly people who didn’t know each other at the beginning of the weekend. We hunted duck together, cooked for each other, sat around the fire and roasted marshmallows together. We could be ourselves and there were people who could understand what I had been through.”