Bagpipe player Robert Pettigrew walked around the west side of the courthouse and seemed to disappear from view too soon, taking his mournful strains of “Amazing Grace” with him. The 21-gun salute was loud and quick and afterward drew a crowd from businesses in the area.

Nearly 20 law enforcement vehicles - all with their overhead lights on - remained parked at the courthouse throughout the ceremony.

When it ended, the lights were turned off, the music stopped and people quietly went their separate ways.

This is what happens when an officer dies and it’s what has happened for the past 22 years in Bell County when that officer is memorialized.

“People don’t realize that when you lose someone in the line of duty it is a stain upon your heart for the rest of your life,” said Mike Gentry, Harker Heights police chief.

This year local law enforcement officials paused to read the names of 22 officers who died serving in Texas in 2007, men and women who make up a fraction of the 181 who died nationwide last year.

The list included three officers who died in a single incident in Odessa and David Camden, the Temple police officer who died in September in an accident involving a funeral procession.

“We miss David and think of his family,” said Lt. Edward Best, Temple police spokesman. “It can be a dangerous profession.”

Camden did not have family at the ceremony.

His family and Temple Police Chief Gary Smith took part in the national ceremony in Washington, D.C., Thursday that honored fallen police officers.

The names of 18,274 officers who died in the line of duty are engraved on the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial.

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan authorized the memorial to be built. President George H.W. Bush dedicated the memorial in 1991.

Gentry said the annual memorial service here in Bell County is not meant to exploit grief or rehash tragedy but to remember and never forget those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in the serving others.