In Memory of Cpl Mark Robert McLaren

Cpl. Mark Robert McLaren MMV

1st Battalion of The Royal Canadian Regiment

Former member of The Hastings & Prince Edward Regiment

Born - September 7, 1985 - KIA Afghanistan - December 5, 2008.

In December of 2008 Canada lost it's 100th soldier in Afghanistan Cpl. Mark Robert McLaren MMV was serving his country and was involved in an roadside attack and sadly lost his life.  Many members of the general public in the Peterborough, Ontario region came out to show their respects at his funeral and also every overpass was lined with supporters when he came down the "Highway Of Heroes" from Trenton, Ontario.

More than a year after he was killed by a roadside bomb, Peterborough's Cpl. Mark McLaren was honoured with the Medal of Military Valour as he was recognized for pulling an Afghan interpreter to safety while on patrol.

On Nov. 6, 2008, Cpl. McLaren's joint Canadian-Afghan patrol was ambushed in Kandahar Province. The attack seriously injured the team's Afghan interpreter who was paralyzed and exposed to further enemy fire.

Today Jo-Anne Mclaren posted the below photo to the "Thank A Soldier" Facebook page :

"This is our son Cpl. Mark Robert McLaren MMV. He was killed in Afghanistan December 5, 2008. His Dad has been creating photos from pictures he has taken and some he has received like this one of Mark. The tree is across the street from where we live and this was the first major snowfall here in Peterborough. These photos are helping with his healing and mine as well. We miss him every day, every hour, every minute...." - Jo-Ann McLaren"


She was overwhelmed with all the messages of support that started to come in from people all over the world and I told her "This is just the way the people of my page are" and thus the reason I chose to list it as a "Community" and not a "Fan Page"

I do what I can to keep the names of our fallen heroes alive so they just don't become a number or a statistic on a website and when we did "The Gratitude Project last year I received this photo from Cpl McLaren's family to submit for our project.

R.I.P Cpl Mark Robert McLaren - May you never be forgotten