Not Forgotten I bet you won't see this on CNN NEWS BRIEFS First Black West Point Commander Dies In Iraq Sept. 27, 2006 - The nation is mourning the death of Lt Emily Perez, 23, the first Black woman to serve as corps commander sergeant major at West Point. Perez, who graduated in the top 10 percent of her class, out-ran many men, directed a gospel choir, read the Bible every day. She also headed a weekly convoy as it rolled down treacherous roads, pocked with bombs and bullets near Najaf, Iraq. As platoon leader, she insisted on leading her troops from the front. She died Sept. 12, 2006 when a bomb detonated near her Humvee in Kifl, south of Baghdad. Shortly before shipping out to Iraq with the 204th Support Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, she flew cross-country to be a bone marrow donor for a stranger who was a match. She was the 64th woman from the U.S. military to be killed in Iraq or Afghanistan. CNN.com carried this West Point 9/11 grad killed in combat Emily Perez was the highest-ranking black and Hispanic female cadet in West Point history. WEST POINT, New York (AP) -- The first member of West Point's "Class of 9/11" to die in combat was buried at the military academy Tuesday, two weeks after she was killed by a bomb at the head of a convoy in Iraq. 2nd Lt. Emily Perez, 23, was leading a platoon when a roadside bomb exploded September 12 south of Baghdad. She was the first female West Point graduate to die in Iraq and the highest-ranking black and Hispanic woman cadet in the school's history. "She was like a little superwoman, so full of energy and life," said Meghan Venable-Thomas, a senior who was on the track team and in the gospel choir with Perez. The academy's Class of 2005 is called the "Class of 9/11" because the 2001 terrorist attacks occurred just weeks into the students' freshman years. "I think we all hoped it wouldn't happen," said class President James Freeze of the first death among the graduates, who numbered exactly 911. Half of the class remains on duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. Perez was a Medical Service Corps officer assigned to the 204th Support Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 4th Infantry Division in Fort Hood, Texas. Dozens of cadets watched as she was buried in the West Point Cemetery. After accepting the folded American flag from Perez's coffin, her mother leaned over, put her forehead on the casket and whispered. Perez was fluent in German from growing up overseas. She also played the clarinet and helped start an AIDS ministry at her church. Before leaving for Iraq, she donated bone marrow to a stranger. "One of the things important to Emily was not the fear of death, but the fear of not living," the Rev. E. Faith Bell said after the service. ...and TIME in partnership with CNN COURTESY 2ND LIEUT. PAUL LUSHENKO Emily Perez, far left, with a command team from West Point's Beast Barracks, summer 2004. Nation A Death in the Class of 9/11 A star graduate from West Point, killed in Iraq, is laid to rest. (These and stories like it were carried in over 40 national publications – she was Not Forgotten)