Returning soldier says they did their best for Haiti, but it needs more. (Originated from Knight-Ridder Newspapers)

FORT DRUM, N.Y., _ As the joyous crowd surged from the bleachers toward the soldiers on the gym floor, Gina Buttery stood frozen in the front row, clutching the baby to her chest, biting her lip and searching with anguished eyes for her husband.

Spc. Harry Buttery, of the Army's 10th Mountain Division, had been away in Haiti when the baby was born Nov. 28. But now he was back. His battalion had swooped home from Port-au-Prince out of a rainy winter sky last Friday. And he was about to see his firstborn, 7-week-old son for the first time.

For Buttery, for about 390 other members of the 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry, and for their family and friends, the four months of soldiering and separation in Operation Uphold Democracy was about to end. For them, Haiti was over.

But for several anxious moments that night, Gina could not find her husband amid the pandemonium in the gym where this base holds its welcoming ceremonies. Her eyes filled as reunions occurred all around. Clad in a denim skirt and white blouse, her hair braided and her nails polished red, she waited and watched for the young man from Unity, Maine, who had been her high school sweetheart. ...