The Foreign Service Journal, March 2017

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | MARCH 2017 73 IN MEMORY n Bruce Baldwin, 66, the husband of Office Management Specialist (USNATO) Virginia Baldwin, died on March 22, 2016, in Brussels, one of four American victims of terrorist attacks that day at the city’s airport. Mr. Baldwin had worked for the Department of State as a classified pouch supervisor and Engineering Services Office logistician. In Tbilisi he received a Superior Honor Award for his work as the APO supervisor. Born and raised in St. Louis, Mo., Mr. Baldwin joined the U.S. Army, serving in Vietnam. After an honorable discharge, he moved to Arizona to work as a guide at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. He did extensive hiking and camping in the canyon, much of it on backcountry trails; he rafted the Colorado River and motored his own boat on the stretch of the Colorado between Lake Powell and Lee’s Ferry every chance he got. Mr. Baldwin’s curiosity and enthusiasm for exploration were boundless, making every outing an adventure, whether climb- ing on sheer cliffs on the North Rim of the Canyon or jumping into icy streams in the Rockies in the winter. Banging around on desert back roads in Jordan, exploring remote Caucasus tower ruins, exploring the beauty of Syria or careening around Cairo, he embraced it all. An exceptionally generous person, he took a strong interest in helping other For- eign Service family members navigate the department’s bureaucracy. He is missed by many. n Robert L. Burns, 90, a retired Foreign Service officer, died on Dec. 24 in Santa Cruz, Calif. Mr. Burns was born in Oakland, Calif., and grew up in Washington, D.C. He served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific dur- ing World War II and held a reserve com- mission in naval intelligence. In 1949 he graduated fromThe George Washington University, where he also pursued gradu- ate studies. Mr. Burns entered the State Depart- ment in 1949 as a member of its first intern program. In 1952 he was assigned to Beirut as acting political adviser to the Secretary of State’s special representative in the Near East for economic-technical assistance. He returned to Washington, D.C., and in 1954 was named acting officer-in- charge of Israel-Jordan affairs. He received his Foreign Service commission in 1955, and was posted to Jerusalem as a political officer in 1958. In 1961 Mr. Burns was detailed to the Defense Department, a member of the first State-Defense Exchange Program. He then served as assistant political adviser at the U.S. European Command in Paris, and in 1965 was assigned as political-military officer in Paris. In 1967 he was named the first politi- cal adviser to U.S. Air Forces Europe in Wiesbaden. After an assignment to NATO Affairs in the State Department and gradu- ation from the Senior Seminar in 1972, he served as political counselor at The Hague and later in Wellington. Mr. Burns retired in 1976. Mr. Burns was a member of the American Foreign Service Association, the Military Officers Association of America and the Sons in Retirement. He also belonged to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion and the U.S.S. LCI Association. He settled in Santa Cruz in 1997 and, for a period of years, served as an officer of the United Veterans Council of Santa Cruz County. Mr. Burns’ wife, Ruth, died in 1998. He is survived by a daughter, Roberta Burns of Santa Cruz; three sons, Arthur and Scott, both of Santa Cruz, and Gregory of Cuper- tino, Calif., and Singapore; and grandsons Grant and Cole Margerum of Santa Cruz. Contributions in his memory may be made to Hospice of Santa Cruz County, 940 Disc Drive, Scotts Valley CA 95066. n Christian Addison Chapman, 95, a retired Foreign Service officer, died on Nov. 27 at his home in Washington, D.C. Mr. Chapman was born in Paris on Sept. 19, 1921, to a French mother, Marthe, a devout Catholic from a Parisian family of wine merchants, and an American father, Percy, who was a professor of French literature at Princeton University. His early life unfolded in an apartment at Place de l’Estrapade in Paris. He and his younger brothers, Francois and Antoine, attended the local school, while his par- ents spent the academic year in Princeton. These were the days before large-scale commercial flight, and the family travelled back and forth to the United States on a large ocean liner. Eventually, the boys joined their parents; Mr. Chapman attended Princeton Country Day School and Exeter, going on to Princeton University. During one of the Atlantic crossings, on Mr. Chapman’s 15th birthday, his father died of a sudden heart attack. When World War II broke out, Mr. Chapman and his brother, Francois, volunteered. Before the United States had entered the war, he had signed up with the Free French. Leaving Princeton after his sophomore year, he joined a French squadron under the British Royal Air Force that trained on the Canadian plains. Mr. Chapman, his family recalls, loved flying the Spitfire and remained lifelong friends with several of the French pilots with whom he flew. The squadron was relocated to the staging area in Southern England for