Carnegie Hero Fund President Eric Zahren presented a posthumous Carnegie Medal to 7-year-old Keeley Bailey, the daughter of Carnegie Hero Kelly Bailey, at a private ceremony held June 25 in Leesville, Louisiana.
Bailey was posthumously honored with the medal in December 2024 after he died Aug. 26, 2022 in an attempt to save Keeley in Merryville, Louisiana.
Around sunset, a group of friends and their children had been playing in the Sabine River, when they got pulled into deeper water with a strong current. Bailey’s partner had entered the river and was working to keep Keeley and her own two children, 4 and 6, afloat.
Along the shore, 28-year-old Bailey and his friend entered the deeper water and reached the four of them. While the partner held onto her daughter, Bailey grasped Keeley, his friend collected the boy, and the current carried all six downstream toward a 57-year-old man, who had been alerted by calls for help, along the beach. The partner briefly saw the man going to the aid of Bailey and Keeley before the man submerged. While Keeley had grasped onto an exposed branch in the river, Bailey, as well as his friend and the boy, went underwater and did not resurface. A nearby camper swam out to the partner and her daughter and brought them back to the beach. Using a float, the camper then re-entered the river, reached Keeley, and towed her to the beach. Keeley, the partner and her daughter, and the camper were not injured.
First-responders searched the scene into the darkness that night without finding any of the missing four. Search crews eventually found the 57-year-old man the next day, Bailey and the friend two days after, and the partner’s son three days after he submerged. All had drowned.
Keeley accepted her father’s medal and stood alongside Zahren to display the recognition for his bravery.
