Iraqcasualties

STILLWATER — A soldier from Stillwater who was killed Tuesday while serving in Afghanistan died when a roadside bomb exploded next to his military vehicle while on patrol, the Department of Defense said Thursday.

Army Reserve Maj. Scott A. Hagerty, 41, a civil affairs officer assigned to the 451st Civil Affairs Battalion out of Pasadena, Texas, was killed alongside Pfc. Derek D. Holland, 20, of Wind Gap, Pa., who was assigned to the 228th Brigade Support Battalion, Pennsylvania Army National Guard, Bethlehem, Pa.

The two soldiers died Tuesday in Zormat, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when their vehicle encountered the improvised explosive device.

Members of his family have declined to be interviewed but said in a statement that Hagerty was proud to have served his country.

"The Hagerty family is sincerely touched by the concern and interest all have taken in Scott's life. Scott was very proud of his career in the Army, and we know he died doing what he loved — serving his country. When called up for duty, he went willingly and proudly as a duty-bound soldier does.

"We would like to thank friends and his fellow soldiers in the Civil Affairs community for their sincere expressions

of sympathy during this very difficult time. Your support is appreciated as we mourn the loss of Scott who was a loving husband, a devoted father, a caring son and a selfless soldier.

"We are sincerely touched by your concern and interest in Scott's life, please remember the sacrifice made by him and many others, and keep his family and friends close in your heart and prayers."

Hagerty was born Sept. 1, 1966, in Muskogee, and was a 1984 graduate of Stillwater High School. He entered into the delayed entry program of the Army while a senior in high school.

During two active-duty enlistments, Hagerty became qualified as an Army infantryman and an air defense artilleryman, serving a 12-month tour in Korea. During his Army Reserve career, Hagerty was commissioned a field artillery officer and served in the branch for 11 years within the 291st Regiment in Oklahoma, until he transferred to the U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command in 2004.

Hagerty also spent 2006 and 2007 stationed in Africa, where he helped repair water wells in northern Uganda. His first deployment was to Iraq from October 2004 to August 2005.

Hagerty served in three civil affairs battalions, the 486th stationed in Tulsa; the 411th in Danbury, Conn., and the 413th in Lubbock, Texas, before being reassigned to the 451st Civil Affairs Battalion in Pasadena, Texas, from which he was deployed with his unit to Afghanistan.

Throughout his military career, Hagerty received several honors, among them two Meritorious Service Medals, a Joint Service Commendation Medal and two Army Commendation Medals.

After almost 3 1/2 years as an ROTC cadet at Oklahoma State University, where in 1993 he received a bachelor's degree in political science, pre-law and international relations, Hagerty received his commission as a second lieutenant in the Army Reserve.

He is survived by his wife, Daphne; their two sons, Jonathan Barrett and Samuel Aren; and his parents, Don and Shirley Hagerty of Stillwater.

DoD Identifies Army Casualties

The Department of Defense announced today the death of two soldiers who were supporting Operation Enduring Freedom. They died June 3 in Zormat, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when their vehicle encountered an improvised explosive device.

Killed were:

Maj. Scott A. Hagerty, 41, of Stillwater, Okla., who was assigned to the 451st Civil Affairs Battalion, Pasadena, Texas.

Pfc. Derek D. Holland, 20, of Wind Gap, Pa., who was assigned to the 228th Brigade Support Battalion, Pennsylvania Army National Guard, Bethlehem, Pa.

March 6, 2007

Iraq bomb kills dad-to-be

Army Spc. Luis O. Rodriguez- Contrera of Allentown had volunteered for patrol duty on day device went off.

When Luis O. Rodriguez-Contrera called his pregnant wife from Iraq last week, she knew he was going through a terrible ordeal. ''You want me to lie or do you want me to tell you the truth?'' he said after she asked how he was doing.

On Friday, two days after the phone call, Baghdad's violence caught up with 22-year-old Army Spc. Rodriguez-Contrera of Allentown. He and another soldier were killed when a roadside bomb detonated near their vehicle while they patrolled the capital, the Department of Defense said Monday.

Five months pregnant with their first child, Monica Rodriguez heard the news from two Army officers who came to see her Friday night. ''I can't fall apart,'' she said. ''It's just a horrible dream. It's just a nightmare and he's going to be here.''

The man who had given her ''the most incredible time of my life'' joined the Army in August 2005 and arrived at Fort Hood, Texas, for training in January 2006. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division.

Before he left for Iraq in November, he told his wife, ''Baby, I promise you I'm coming back,'' she said.

Rodriguez-Contrera became the 20th person in the Lehigh Valley region or with ties to the region to die in Iraq and Afghanistan.

He and Rodriguez met three years ago while they were working at an Allentown telemarketing company. At first, she ignored ''this little kid'' seven years her junior, but he persisted. They were married April 14, 2006, in Austin, Texas.

''He loves a challenge, and I was a challenge for him,'' she said.

He soon proved to be a good father to her two children, Jonathan, now 9, and Viyonce, now 6, Rodriguez said. Another child, Jim, had been killed when hit by a car in Allentown. The baby she is carrying is a boy, she said.

Rodriguez-Contrera joined the Army to make a better life for the family, his widow said. He drove tanks. ''He actually wanted to come back and go to college so he could drive the helicopters.''

In the Army, he found new challenges: working out, getting up to go running, all the various tasks the Army had him do. He liked the discipline, but he also liked verbally jousting with his sergeant, she said. His sergeant would ask: Are you a smart-ass? ''He said, 'Yes sir, I am.'''

He liked the friends he had made in the Army, she said.

Awarded a service ribbon and a National Defense Service Medal, Rodriguez-Contrera was also quick to take on responsibility, his wife said. The day he was killed, he volunteered for patrol duty when it wasn't his day to do so, she said.

Her husband didn't approve of the war in Iraq, Rodriguez said. '''There was no reason why we need to be over there,''' she recalled him saying. ''But he had his duty, and his duty was basically to protect his country.''

Rodriguez said she and her husband had a long-distance relationship most of the time he was stationed at Fort Hood. ''We were scared, there was a lot of conflict,'' she said. ''But love conquers anything.''

The improvised explosive device that killed her husband also killed Staff Sgt. Paul M. Latourney of Roselle, Ill., according to the Department of Defense.

Rodriguez said the Army has been very attentive. ''Everybody calls me from Texas, the captain's wife and the sergeant's wife and everyone has been very supportive,'' she said.

Rodriguez said she will name their son after her husband. When he is old enough, she will talk about his dad. ''I will let him know that his father was the most incredible man, that his father was looking forward to seeing him, that his father was a hero,'' she said.

March 5, 2007

Staff Sgt. Paul M. Latourney, 28, of Roselle, Ill.

His high school German teachers used to say Paul Latourney could speak more German than they wanted to hear.

The tall, slender young man with the affable manner also spoke Spanish fluently. His talent for language was the result of a childhood in Germany and a mother of Mexican descent.

Latourney received a partial college scholarship, but he wanted to be a soldier. On Friday, while patrolling in a perilous section of Baghdad, the Humvee he commanded was struck by a roadside bomb, killing the staff sergeant and Spc. Luis O. Rodriguez-Contrera, 22, of Allentown, Pa.

"There wasn't a more noble person," his father, Paul, formerly of Roselle, said Monday night. "He had the biggest heart you could imagine."

Latourney, 28, was born in Atlanta and moved to Germany at age 3 when his father was transferred. He spent the next 13 years there before moving to Roselle in 1994 and enrolling at Lake Park High School.

He made the honor roll and was in the German club. His junior year he ran on the cross-country team. As a senior, he joined the ski club. Between his final two years of high school, he went through basic training in South Carolina, the elder Latourney said.

His parents reserved a college dorm room for him at the University of Illinois at Chicago, but Latourney never occupied it, his father said. Ten days after high school graduation, Latourney was in the Army, reporting to Ft. Bliss, near El Paso, to learn to drive Bradley tanks and Humvees, his father said.

"He just couldn't see himself in an academic environment or in an office," his father. "He came from a comfortable environment, and I think he wanted a little bit of a challenge."

The Army provided him that challenge and more. Latourney was dispatched to Germany and then served in Tikrit, Iraq, in February 2004 until February 2005, when he returned to Germany for a few months. In about November 2005, Latourney was sent to Ft. Hood, Texas, then deployed to Iraq in December 2006, his father said.

"He was out all the time—night and day," the elder Latourney said of his son's patrols. "He loved it. He knew the risks. That's real bravery—when you know the risks and you control the fear and do what you've got to do."

Latourney loved to snowboard, ski, hike and brew beer, his father said. He recalled a boy who "would never argue with us" but do what he wanted. Three years ago, Latourney and his wife had a son, Isaiah, his father said.

In the Latourneys' former Roselle neighborhood, Steve Libera, who lived across the street, described Latourney as "very intelligent, very sociable" and "very polite."

"He enjoyed socializing with people who were more mature," Libera said. "He was not one of those wild boys.

"I can't believe it. After you know somebody from childhood, a super person like that, and they die in that way, it's just terrible, terrible to hear."

The elder Latourney struggled to explain exactly what drew his son to the Army. It might have been the stories his paternal grandfather, a World War II veteran, told him. Whatever the motivation, Latourney's younger sister, Anna, also was intrigued. She enlisted and rose to the rank of sergeant before leaving the Army to raise a family.

On Saturday, the family sent an e-mail to friends at St. Walter Catholic Church in Roselle, which they had attended, to inform them of the grim news.

"He was a brave and very proud soldier willing to face great danger everyday," the e-mail stated. "He was a wonderful son and the greatest of fathers. Those truths give us much comfort, and hopefully will help us get through this period of immense grief. Your prayers and any masses would be greatly appreciated."

The family plans to have Latourney buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

Soldier's boyfriend couldn't save her

Ashly Lynn Moyer, 21, of Emmaus died in Iraq when bomb detonated vehicle's fuel.

For a few moments Wednesday, Jane Drumheller turned away from her grief, speaking strongly and steadily as she remembered her daughter, Army Sgt. Ashly Lynn Moyer, an Emmaus High School graduate killed in a roadside bombing in Baghdad.

''She definitely was a hero,'' said Drumheller, of Milford, Pike County. The note of pride in her voice was unmistakable as she unfolded the all-too-familiar chronology of bad news from the war zone: the late-night visit from an Army officer, the crushing news, the sudden rush of memorial preparations and visits from friends.

It happened this way, according to the account the Army provided to Moyer's parents: Moyer, 21, assigned to the 630th Military Police Company, 793rd Military Police Battalion, was on routine patrol Saturday, steering the armored patrol vehicle she called ''my baby.''

She was driving the second vehicle in a convoy of four. As the lead vehicle drove over a buried bomb, insurgents detonated it by remote control. The occupants of the lead vehicle survived, but the explosion detonated the fuel tank on Moyer's vehicle, creating a fireball that killed her and the two sergeants with her. They were Brandon A. Parr, 25, of West Valley, Utah, and Michael C. Peek, 23, of Chesapeake, Va., the Department of Defense said Wednesday.

Among the soldiers who responded to the bombing was Moyer's boyfriend, Jake Wells, a member of her unit who tried to rescue her but was turned back by the flames and rounds of ammunition exploding in the heat.

''That's what's most heart-wrenching to me,'' said Moyer's father, Michael Moyer of Lower Macungie, a former Marine choking up briefly as he pictured the scene. ''Can you imagine that? The girl you love is in there, and not being able to do anything.''

Moyer said it was comforting to learn that a helicopter destroyed the car carrying the insurgents suspected in the bombing. But his grief was compounded when he learned that Sgt. Peek was supposed to be married in two weeks.

Moyer will be buried March 16 at Arlington National Cemetery. She was the fourth person from the region to die in combat in Iraq this year and the 21st to die thus far in the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns. More than 3,100 soldiers have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003.

Drumheller described her daughter as a tomboy with a girlish side, as fond of dolls as she was of softball. ''She would always rise to the occasion. She would mold in,'' Drumheller said. ''She was serious when she needed to get a job done, but when it was time to have fun, she was a chuckle.''

Inspired by her family's military pedigree – her Marine grandfather served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam – Moyer joined the Army Reserve through the delayed enlistment program while still attending Emmaus High. After graduating in 2003, she attended the Army Military Police School in Missouri, graduating in March 2004.

Her first assignment was Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, guarding enemy combatants held since the war in Afghanistan began. ''They were some of the real bad boys,'' her father said. ''Taliban.''

Moyer spent about a year at that task before returning home and getting an apartment in Emmaus. Restless and eager to see more of the world, she decided to return to active duty. She was stationed in Bamberg, Germany, about five months before shipping to Iraq.

In Baghdad, Moyer took an instant liking to her job as a driver. Her father would send her rearview mirror dice and other gag gifts to dress up the interior of the armored vehicle, a lumbering, plated truck with machine guns mounted on the rear. On the exterior, she mounted a toy Incredible Hulk head, which other soldiers would rub for luck before missions.

Last fall, while on a 10-day leave, Moyer visited her brother Kyle's school, Shohola Elementary, in Milford. Kathy Maida, the physical education teacher and student council adviser, said Moyer was nervous about the appearance before the fifth- and sixth-graders but carried it off as though she'd been doing it for years, speaking plainly and engagingly about Army life and her hopes for the future.

Afterward, Maida struck up an e-mail correspondence with Moyer. Maida said Moyer's messages reflected the fears and frustrations of Army life and indicated she was ready to come home for good.

Moyer's father, though, said his daughter believed strongly in the American cause and had recently extended her enlistment for a year. ''She really liked what she was doing,'' he said. ''The MPs over there are a very close family.'' For Ashly, that might have become literally true in the coming months.

''I just talked to her last week,'' her father said. ''They were coming home in June and planning two weeks in Pennsylvania and two weeks in Texas, where Jake is from. They were coming here because he was going to ask me for her hand in marriage.''

Family, friends remember Moyer

They recall her as gregarious tomboy who was close to siblings; interment will be Friday.

By Genevieve Marshall Of The Morning Call

Army Sgt. Ashly Lynn Moyer's friends from Emmaus High School stood across the street Saturday from the Bachman, Kulik & Reinsmith Funeral Home for a tearful reunion of the Class of 2003.

Veterans, some in motorcycle jackets and leather chaps, ringed the Emmaus funeral home with 25 U.S. flags. They nodded solemnly at the 300 mourners who filed in for Moyer's memorial service.

Moyer, 21, died March 3 in a roadside bombing in Baghdad. The Army told her parents, Jane Drumheller of Pike County and Michael Moyer of Lower Macungie, that insurgents detonated a buried bomb right in front of her armored patrol vehicle, creating a fireball out of the fuel tank and killing her and two sergeants riding with her.

She was cremated and will be interred Friday at Arlington National Cemetery.

''The good go young,'' said Terry Schwartz of Macungie, who met her at Eyer Middle School. ''That's all I can say that makes sense.''

The sweet teenager he knew – the one who went to Dorney Park with them and goofed off and had fun and dated one of his friends – was gone. Unbelievable.

Her teenage years were turbulent and troubled, friends and family said. But Moyer pulled her life together in 10th grade and began hitting the books, said Kevin Torpey of Wescosville.

''She started to really think about her future,'' Torpey said. ''She wanted to join the Army.''

After high school, she attended the Army Military Police School in Missouri, graduating in March 2004. After her first assignment in Cuba, she returned home to Emmaus for a year before returning to active duty. She was stationed in Bamberg, Germany, for about five months before shipping off to Iraq.

''She was so excited about it,'' Schwartz said. ''She was turning her life around.''

Sgt. Reginald McClary of Souderton served with Moyer in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from 2004 to 2005, guarding enemy combatants held since the war in Afghanistan began. He remembered her as a jolly person who made the other soldiers laugh, liked to bowl with her friends, and always stood up for what she believed.

McClary heard about the explosion from other people in her unit, the 630th Military Police Company, 793rd Military Police Battalion.

Moyer was the fourth person from the region to die in combat in Iraq this year and the 21st to die thus far in the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns. Nearly 3,200 soldiers have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003.

''She was just a baby,'' said McClary, a strapping man in camouflage and combat boots. ''A baby.''

Inside, mourners queued in three rooms to pay their respects to the family, passing a display of photos, flowers, sports memorabilia and a condolence letter with a handwritten note from Gov. Ed Rendell.

The first thing they saw was created by Moyer's youngest sister, Teagan Moyer, who colored posterboard with markers, adorned it with pictures of her and her big sister, and wrote across it: ''My sister rocks and is a hero!''

Moyer was extremely close to her two brothers and two sisters, making no distinction between step-, half- or full siblings, relatives said.

She called Tyler and Kyle Clark her ''slaves'' and liked to dunk her brothers underwater, a fact one of the boys called out during Army Chaplain David Farrell's eulogy.

Several relatives, including Teagan, shared their memories of Moyer. An aunt spoke about another family member's military service – her grandfather served as a Marine in World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

''Ashly went into the Army to fight for our freedom,'' Teagan said.

One of the closest people in the world to Moyer was her stepsister Karissa Thomas. They met when they were both 4. Thomas was six months older, and she never let Moyer forget it.

As young girls, they dressed up their dogs as bride and groom and threw them a pretend wedding. Dozens of photos depict them wrestling, hugging and grinning at the camera as they grew from children to teenagers to young adults.

''My sister was strong and ambitious, had an amazing personality, and was bright in so many ways,'' Thomas said.

Moyer was both a tomboy and a princess, a pretty young woman with brown hair and blue eyes who loved softball, acrobatics and jazz.

The strength she possessed put most grown men to shame, Thomas said, tears rolling down her cheeks.

''I know she's standing behind me right now, telling me to stop crying like a girl,'' she said.

Pfc. Derek Holland, a National Guard soldier from Wind Gap in eastern Pennsylvania, was killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan on Tuesday afternoon, according to military officials.

The bomb, which struck Holland’s Humvee near the town of Zormat, also killed an Air Force major serving with the Provincial Reconstruction Team and wounded the vehicle’s gunner.

Holland, 20, was a 2006 graduate of Pen Argyl High School and enlisted in the National Guard during his senior year. He was attached to the 228th Brigade Support Battalion in Bethlehem.

“He was one of the most dedicated soldiers I have known,” said Sgt. 1st Class Timothy Horner, Holland’s supervisor. “He just wanted to do his part in serving his county. He wanted to do the job he came in to do.”

Holland was enrolled in the information systems technology program at the Career Institute of Technology, a vocational-technical school that serves students from Pen Argyl.

His teacher at CIT, Andra Groller, said Holland was shy when he first arrived. He became interested in the military in his senior year and hoped to combine it with his computer education, she said.

“He was a very quiet ... thoughtful kind of person,” said John Smith, principal of Pen Argyl High School, who announced Holland’s death at a faculty meeting Thursday morning. “We had a moment of prayer for him.”

Derek D. Holland, 20, of Wind Gap, died Tuesday, June 3, in Afghanistan. Born in Bethlehem, he was a son of Kathy L. Andreas of Wind Gap and David G. Holland of Coplay.

He was a 2006 graduate of Pen Argyl High School and attended the Career Institute of Technology in Forks Township. He was a member of Co. A 228th. FSB, PAARNG. Derek worked at B'nai B'rith Apartments, Allentown, during the summers and between his basic training and advanced infantry training.

Several years ago he wrote: "A man with his head held high and a man with his head held low both have the ability to see what's in front of them. But the man with his head held high can see farthest."

He is survived by his parents; by his Aunt Penny A., wife of Richard Spingarn of Trumansburg, N.Y.; his Uncle William S. Andreas of Sudbury, Mass.; and a cousin, Russell B. Spingarn of Trumansburg, N.Y.

A service, with military honors, will begin at 11 a.m. Thursday, June 12, at Donald S. Reinert VFW Post # 7293, 5209 Springmill Road, Whitehall. Calling hours will be held from 6 to 9 p.m. Wednesday at the Trexler Funeral Home, 1625 Highland St., Allentown, and from 10 to 11 a.m. Thursday at the VFW Post.

In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to Co. A 228th. FSB Family Readiness Group, 301 Prospect Ave., Bethlehem, PA 18018, or to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, c/o Trexler Funeral Home, 1625 Highland St., Allentown, PA 18102.

Maj. Scott A. Hagerty

A statement released Thursday by Hagerty's family said, "Scott was very proud of his career in the Army, and we know he died doing what he loved —serving his country.

"When called up for duty, he went willingly and proudly as a duty-bound soldier does."

Hagerty was a Reservist serving as a civil affairs officer with the 451st Civil Affairs Battalion based in Pasadena, Texas.

Hagerty was a 1984 graduate of Stillwater High School and a 1993 graduate of Oklahoma State University, with a bachelor's degree in political science. He was employed by National Standard, an industrial wire manufacturer headquartered in Stillwater.

Hagerty enlisted in the Army in 1983 while in high school through the delayed entry program, which allows recruits to gain rank before basic training.

He served active duty enlistments as an infantryman and an air defense artilleryman, with 12 months in South Korea.

He was commissioned through ROTC at Oklahoma State University and then completed the Field Artillery Officer Basic Course at Fort Sill. He 11 years with the 291st Regiment (Training Support) in Oklahoma before transferring to the U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command (Airborne) in 2004.

Hagerty was born Sept. 1, 1966, in Muskogee, He had lived in Stillwater since 1976 when his family moved to Oklahoma. He graduated from Stillwater High School in 1984 and joined the Army in 1986.

His first deployment was to Iraq from October 2004 to August 2005.

Hagerty earned a bachelor’s degree in 1993 in political science, pre-law and international relations from Oklahoma State University.

Maj. Scott A. Hagerty was deployed to Afghanistan shortly after being assigned to the 451st Civil Affairs Battalion in February. Prior to that, he had been in Uganda, where his mission was to prevent conflict and promote regional stability.

"I have always dreamed about being a soldier, even as a little boy, so I know I am doing the job that was destined for me," he told the NewsPress via e-mail for a story published in April 2007.

Maj. Hagerty was highly decorated. His military awards included two Meritorious Service Medals, a Joint Service Commendation Medal, two Army Commendation Medals, six Army Achievement Medals, a Good Conduct Medal, three Army Reserve Components Achievement Medals, two National Defense Service Medals, an Iraq Campaign Medal, Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary and Service Medals, a Korean Defense Service Medal, Armed Forces Reserve Medal with "M" (mobilization) device and numeral "2," the Army Service Ribbon, Overseas Service Ribbon, Combat Action Badge, Driver and Mechanic Badge with Driver-Tracked Vehicle Bar and the Marksmanship Qualification Badge.

Funeral arrangements for Maj. Hagerty are pending. The family is still waiting for his body to be returned home.

Maj. Hagerty is survived by his wife, Daphne, by their sons, Jonathan, 10, and Samuel, 20 months, and by his parents, Don and Shirley, all of Stillwater.

DOYLESTOWN, Pa. - February 23, 2009 (WPVI) -- A local guardsman was killed in Iraq over the weekend.

Staff Sgt. Mark C. Baum, 32, of Telford, was a member of the PA Army National Guard's Detachment 1, Company B, 1st Battalion 111th Infantry Regiment.

Officials with the National Guard say Baum was severely wounded by gunfire while responding to an attack using improvised explosive devices at about 5 a.m. Saturday in Mushada, Iraq. He was flown to Baghdad for treatment but died about 5 hours later.

He was a member of the 56th Stryker Brigade, which

Family and friends of Staff Sgt. Mark Baum are crushed over news of his death. They say he was a good family man and a good soldier.

"He died a hero. He gave the ultimate sacrifice for his country... his life," said Mary Miller, Baum's mother-in-law. "He died saving an 18-year-old and a 19-year-old, and now his children are fatherless. He died saving two young men. He pushed them out of the way, he took a bullet for them."

SSgt. Baum leaves behind his wife of 10 years, Heather, 7-month-old son C.J., 3-year-old daughter Kaley and daughter Alexis. The family was celebrating Alexis' 6th birthday when news came of her father's death.

"He loved his children. He lived for his wife and his children. They meant the world to him," Miller said.

In civilian life, SSgt. Baum was a Bucks County Corrections Officer. Before joining the Guard in 2005, he was a former active duty combat veteran, serving tours in Iraq, Kosovo and the Sinai.

"A man who loved his family, a man who loved the Army, loved his country and served well," said First Sgt. Mark Kelly of the U.S. Army.

"This is truly a sad day for both the family of Staff Sgt. Baum and members of the Pennsylvania National Guard," said Maj. Gen. Jessica L. Wright, commander of the Pennsylvania National Guard. "His bravery and dedication serve as a reminder of all of the sacrifices that are made each day to ensure that freedom and democracy prevail. There are no words for the loss we feel."

Bucks County Commissioners ordered the Bucks County flag to be lowered to half-staff at all county facilities.

The PA State and American flags are also to be lowered, by order of the Governor.

Mark Baum was promoted to Staff Sergeant posthumously. He also received the Purple Heart.

SSgt. Baum is the first 56th Stryker Brigade soldier killed in combat. In all, 33 members of the Pa. National Guard have died in Iraq. However, a U.S. commander says violent attacks are at their lowest levels since August 2003, noticeably improved since the "surge" of 2007.