Four Fort Richardson soldiers were memorialized Wednesday for their deeds, heroism and camaraderie, but the quiet grieving of parents for a lost son seemed to eclipse the power and symbols of the military ceremony.

The soldiers died in Afghanistan over the past month as part of the deployment of the 4th Brigade Combat Team (Airborne) of the 25th Infantry Division. All served with the 1st Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, a unit that has suffered a growing number of losses recently as the conflict intensifies in its area of operations in Paktika Province.

It's the usual practice for the rear detachment of a deployed unit to honor its fallen with a gun salute, a bugler, eulogies, the last roll call and other traditions. The service is primarily for other soldiers, though family members who attend are seated as guests of honor.

Such was the case Wednesday, when Fort Richardson remembered 2nd Lt. Darryn Andrews, Staff Sgts. Kurt Curtiss and Michael Murphrey, and Pfc. Matthew Martinek.

After the 35-minute memorial, Andrews' parents, Andy and Sondra Andrews, met with reporters in a small side room of the Fort Richardson chapel.

Andrews, 34, from Texas, transferred to the 4-25th as a platoon leader in April, two months after it deployed. It was his second tour in Afghanistan.

On Sept. 4 a vehicle in his convoy was blasted by a roadside bomb. That attack wasn't fatal, though the vehicle was wrecked, and Andrews and other soldiers attempted to recover it. Outside the relative safety of the armored vehicle, Andrews saw a rocket-propelled grenade hurtling in their direction, his parents have been told.

Through tears, Andy Andrews repeated how one of the soldiers was saved by his son. "The last words he heard from Darryn was, 'Jason, watch out!' and he pushed him out of the way."

"He, from what they tell us, did the job he was supposed to do, and he died a man," Andy Andrews said. "I, of course, regret that my son died. I do not regret the way he died."

The rocket-propelled grenade wounded another six soldiers. One was Martinek, 20, who died a week later in a military hospital in Germany.

Andy Andrews has been a principal and Sondra a speech therapist and school librarian, and they moved two or three times around Texas while raising their family. Darryn graduated from high school in 1994 in the small Texas town of Cameron.

Since he was 14, Darryn had wanted to be soldier, his parents said. Sondra's father had been a prisoner of war in Germany during World War II, Andy served in Vietnam, and Sondra's brother was in the Air Force.

"He just felt it was somewhat of a family obligation," Sondra said. She talked him out of joining the service right out of high school, and instead he attended Texas Tech with his twin, Jarrett, now a lawyer in Dallas. Darryn got a degree in international business.

"Then, when 9-11 happened, he was determined to go," his father said.

Now, in addition to his parents, Darryn leaves his pregnant wife, Julie, and son, Daylan, at their home in New Braunfels, near San Antonio.

"Darryn made a better daddy than I ever thought he would," his father said. "He was a good daddy. And he's got a boy, and the little girl is going to be born in December and they don't have a daddy. And that's just not right."

Darryn was killed on the day Andy and Sondra were celebrating their 41st anniversary. "So there won't be much celebrating on the 42nd," Andy said.

Darryn, at least after his first deployment, didn't think the war in Afghanistan was going well, his father said.

"I said, 'Darryn, what's the solution over there?' He said, 'As near as I can determine, they hate us with a passion and want us dead, and the only solution is to kill them all.' "

Find Richard Mauer online at adn.com/contact/rmauer or call 257-4345.

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