Grandmother sacrifices self to save grandson in Sutherland Springs shooting

Peggy Warden died protecting her grandson, Zachary, according to family members. Her sister-in-law called her “our hero.” Peggy Warden died protecting her grandson, Zachary, according to family members. Her sister-in-law called her “our hero.” Photo: Courtesy Of Korri Scheel Stevens Photo: Courtesy Of Korri Scheel Stevens Image 1 of / 38 Caption Close Grandmother sacrifices self to save grandson in Sutherland Springs shooting 1 / 38 Back to Gallery

As a shooter attacked parishioners in a Sutherland Springs church Sunday, a grandmother stepped in front of her 18-year-old grandson, absorbing the bullets and saving his life, according to a family member.

Peggy Lynn Warden, 56, of La Vernia, was killed in the mass shooting at First Baptist Church that also left her grandson, Zachary Logan Poston, with multiple gunshot wounds in the arms and legs, said Korri Scheel Stevens, Warden’s sister-in-law and Poston’s great-aunt.

“She is our hero,” Stevens said. “She saved Zachary's life.”

Stevens first shared the family’s story on a GoFundMe page created to help raise money for Poston’s medical expenses and his college education.

Warden was among the 26 people killed by Devin Patrick Kelley, who walked into the church with an assault rifle and opened fire.

“She died very quickly,” Warden’s brother and Korri Stevens’ husband Jimmy Stevens told News4 on Tuesday. “She died serving the Lord and helping someone who needed it, and that’s what she lived for. So that is a victory, and she will be missed every day of my life, forever.”

Warden volunteered at the church and taught Sunday school, Korri Stevens said in a text message Wednesday. Warden had recently taken a year off to stay at home with her husband, Christopher Warden, who had terminal lung cancer.

Christopher Warden died in July at age 59, according to an obituary in the Wilson County News. They were married 39 years.

“(Peggy) just started going back to church a month ago,” Stevens said. “The kids were so happy to have her back. She was very loved!”

West Point, New York, resident Andrea Franz knew Warden from childhood, when she was an “inseparable” friend of Warden’s daughter and Poston’s mother, Jennifer Racey, while growing up in La Vernia, she said.

“Our mother worked a lot and Peggy was happy to pick up the slack,” Franz said via Facebook message Wednesday. “She treated us like her own. She fed us well and entertained us with crafts.”

Franz said she saw the family less often after moving to San Antonio in middle school and then mostly lost touch when she left the state at age 18, though she would still stop by to say hello from time to time when visiting Texas.

As a child, Franz saw Warden as a role model for the person she would one day become.

“I wanted to be the ultimate housewife and mom just like her when I grew up,” she said. “I’m an Army spouse and mother today. It hadn’t occurred to me how much of an influence she had on my life until she passed.”

It did not surprise her that Warden died protecting her grandson.

“She was the kind of person that always put others’ needs before her own,” she said. “A true hero.”

During the attack, Poston acted in a similar way as his grandmother. As he was trying to push a young girl beneath a church pew, hiding her from the shooter’s vision, a bullet struck Poston in the leg, shattering his kneecap, Stevens said. Poston then pretended to be dead to avoid attracting attention.

In a Facebook post about 7 a.m. Tuesday, Racey wrote that her son “has a long road ahead of him but is stable, alert and doing very well.”

“She hasn’t left his side since this happened,” Stevens wrote in a text message Wednesday. Racey also has two other sons, Roman and Kriegen.

In an update to the GoFundMe page, Stevens wrote that Poston was recovering Tuesday evening after eight hours of surgery that involved placing a titanium rod in his leg.

“It will be a long recovery with several more surgeries,” she said.

High school sports database MaxPreps lists Poston on the roster of La Vernia High School’s football team. Stevens said Poston flies a drone used to take videos of practices and football games.

“He’s very electronically minded, as are his brothers,” she said.

In a request for donations, Stevens called her great-nephew a “bright young man, destined for greatness.”

“He has his heart on graduating and attending college in the future and we desperately want to keep that dream alive for him,” she wrote.