On the day they died, four Stryker soldiers were doing a humanitarian mission in Baqouba, seeing to it that all was secure and orderly as food and other relief supplies were delivered to women and children in the embattled Iraqi city.

“They were helping people, and enjoying that part of their mission,” said Capt. Dan Johnson, the commander of their battalion’s rear detachment at Fort Lewis.

A few hours later the four men would be back into combat operations, and then killed, when bombs exploded in a house they were clearing.

The blast also killed their Iraqi interpreter.

Fort Lewis paid tribute Friday to Staff Sgt. Jacob M. Thompson, 26; Sgt. Nicholas A. Gummersall, 23; Cpl. Juan M. Alcantara, 23; and Cpl. Kareem R. Khan, 20. They died Aug. 6.

All were assigned to the 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, part of the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division. The brigade is in the final month of its 15-month deployment to Iraq.

These past weeks have been among the toughest for the brigade since it deployed in June 2006. The unit on Wednesday held another memorial ceremony for six soldiers killed July 31 and Aug. 2 in Baghdad.

In all, 47 3rd Brigade soldiers have been killed during this deployment.

Army chaplain Maj. Steven George called Friday’s ceremony a celebration “of the lives of true American heroes … men whose lives represent the very best of what this country has to offer.”

Thompson was a Minnesotan who loved to hunt and fish and who’d been wounded on a previous deployment to Iraq.

Gummersall was an Army Ranger and football player who’d been twice before to Iraq and once to Afghanistan.

Alcantara was a Dominican-born New Yorker who longed to get home and see his baby daughter for the first time. And Khan was a Muslim from New Jersey whose family said he wanted to show the world that men of his faith were willing to fight for this country.

Khan’s parents Feroze and Elsheba, stepmother Nisha and 11-year-old sister Aliya flew from New Jersey to attend Friday’s ceremony.

They held one another close for several moments at the end as they knelt to kiss their soldier’s portrait and touch his identification tags, his helmet, his rifle and his boots assembled at the front of the Main Post Chapel.

Each soldier was represented by the traditional memorial display, along with a large photo.

Maj. Kyle Marsh, the 3rd Brigade’s rear detachment commander, said he learned from commanders in Iraq that “each was part of the new generation of soldiers … adaptive, flexible, agile, mentally tough.”

Marsh said he did not know the men personally, but “news of their deaths stung no less.

“We in the military family knew them all as Stryker soldiers: dedicated, fearless, professional members of our team.”

The four soldiers remembered Friday at Fort Lewis were killed Aug. 6 in Baqouba, Iraq, when a bomb exploded in a house they were clearing. They were all from the 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, part of the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division.

Staff Sgt. Jacob M. Thompson

Thompson, 26, of Mankato, Minn., joined the Army in 1999 and spent his career in the 1-23 Infantry, known as the Tomahawks.

He held every job as an up-and-coming soldier with the Army’s first Stryker brigade: rifleman, grenadier, sniper section leader, vehicle commander, team leader and ultimately, squad leader.

He went to Iraq with the brigade in November 2003 and was awarded the Purple Heart for wounds suffered in combat. He re-enlisted for a second tour and was already thinking about a third, his family said.

The battalion’s rear detachment commander, Capt. Dan Johnson, said he was a new platoon leader when Thompson was first a team leader. Thompson was intense, he said.

“He took his mistakes seriously and never repeated them. … We had to tell him to relax sometimes.”

He loved hunting and fishing and getting beat by his buddies in video games.

“He treated his squad like a family,” Johnson said. “He wanted to continue that, to have a get-together in Minnesota when they all got home so his parents could meet his boys.”

He is survived by his parents, Charles and Barbara, and his brother, Jason, of Mankato.

Sgt. Nicholas A. Gummersall

Gummersall, 23, of Pocatello, Idaho, joined the Army in October 2003 and after training at Fort Benning, Ga., spent two years with the elite 2nd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment at Fort Lewis, deploying three times to Iraq and Afghanistan.

A drunken-driving charge cost him his place in the Rangers, his father, Clay Gummersall told The Seattle Times, but the Army dropped the charge on his agreement to go to Iraq with the Stryker brigade. He joined the unit in June 2006.

The outcome was frustrating for his family, but Gummersall didn’t complain, his father said.

With the 1-23, Johnson said Gummersall was “a larger-than-life individual,” excitable and intense. A picture of him in Friday’s program shows him beaming and surrounded by Iraqi kids.

Friends and family members said he looked forward to life after the Army. He was a standout football player in high school and had planned to try out for the Boise State University team this fall until the brigade was extended three months in Iraq.

He is also survived by his mother, Carol, and his brother, Derek.

Cpl. Juan M. Alcantara

Alcantara, 22, of the Washington Heights area of New York City, joined the Army in September 2004 and arrived at Fort Lewis the following January. He was born in the Dominican Republic but moved to New York with his family at 5 months old and grew up in the city.

Diomaris Neris of Lakewood said she got to know Alcantara through her daughter, who met the soldier dancing at the Latin Sensation nights at the club on post. “He was a wonderful and loyal friend,” Neris said.

She said he joined the Army to earn money for college and aspired to become a New York City police officer like his sister, Samantha.

Johnson said Alcantara “was a person who wanted to make sure everyone was having as good a time as he was. ... He was the company’s social nexus.”

He was a cut-up and went around for a week talking like Marlon Brando after watching the “Godfather” movies in his hooch, Johnson said.

But above all, he looked forward to coming home to see his daughter, Jaylani, born in June.

“It breaks my heart to think that he didn’t get that chance,” Neris said.

Alcantara is survived by his mother, Maria; his sister; his fiancée, Sayo; and his daughter.

Cpl. Kareem R. Khan

Khan, 20, of Manahawkin, N.J., joined the Army after graduating from high school in 2005 and arrived at Fort Lewis the following March. Family members said from the time of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York, young Khan was committed to joining the U.S. military.

His father, Feroze, told the Asbury Park Press that his son wanted to show the world that not all Muslims were fanatics.

“He looked at it that he’s an American and he has a job to do,” Feroze Khan told the paper.

Johnson said Khan “was an extremely empathetic individual. His radar was always on for buddies who were sad. … I can say that if you only met Khan once, you’d always remember his smile.”

Fort Lewis officials said he was previously awarded the Purple Heart for wounds suffered in combat.

Family members told the Newark Star-Ledger that he often sent home pictures of himself playing soccer or surrounded by Iraqi kids on the streets of Baghdad.

They said he loved football and Disney World and playing video games with his kid sister, 11-year-old Aliya. They said he hadn’t decided whether he wanted to make a career of the Army or get out and go to medical school.

He is survived by his father and his stepmother, Nisha; his mother, Elsheba; and his sister.

Michael Gilbert: 253-597-8921

mike.gilbert@thenewstribune.com

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