While serving in Iraq, Ozaukee sheriff received letter from boy who later became his deputy

PORT WASHINGTON - While doing a little spring cleaning recently, Ozaukee County Sheriff James Johnson found himself rereading some of the letters he received during his military service in Iraq in 2003.

One of the Christmas letters came from Chris Uselding, a fourth-grade student from Cedar Grove-Belgium Elementary School. The name sounded familiar to Johnson; then he realized it was the name of one of his deputy sheriffs in the jail division. Johnson had personally hired him nearly three years ago.

Johnson brought the letter into the office, and had it framed and hung up in the roll call room of the jail division.

When Uselding arrived for work that afternoon, one of the other deputies noticed the letter on the wall and Uselding's name signed at the bottom. Uselding was understandably confused why a letter he wrote in fourth grade was hung on the wall.

"I was kind of shocked that something like that would be there," he said. "I thought it was some kind of joke."

Then Johnson came into the roll call room and asked Uselding if he knew anything about the letter. Uselding couldn't recall. He knew it must have been part of a class project around Christmastime, but he didn't know where the letters had been sent or whom specifically it had been sent to.

That's when Johnson told him about the incredible coincidence: that his letter had been shipped to him during his time in Iraq.

"My jaw hit the floor," Uselding said.

Without realizing it, Uselding's letter had an impact on Johnson in the midst of a 14-month deployment to Baghdad. After serving in the Marine Corps in the 1980s, Johnson joined the Wisconsin Army National Guard's 32nd Military Police Company in 1999 and served for nine years.

The letters were so meaningful to Johnson that he has held onto them ever since.

"It’s nice to get letters from young people," he said. "It makes you realize the level of support people have for the soldiers."