Lance Cpl. Jason T. Little Hometown

Aaron D. Jagger

Tuesday, August 15 2006 @ 06:57 AM MDT

Toledo Blade -- HILLSDALE - A veteran U.S. Army soldier and 1980 graduate of Camden High School was killed in Iraq last week by an enemy explosive, the U.S. Defense Department announced yesterday.

He was a member of the Army's 1st Battalion, 37th Armor Regiment, 1st Armored Division. He was stationed out of Friedberg, Germany.

A guitarist and vocalist in his company's band, The Bandits, Sergeant Jagger often performed with the group at memorial services for fallen soldiers, his mother, Carol Bailey, said in a telephone interview from her home in Rossville, Ga.

The victim has a wife and four daughters living in Germany, and another daughter who lives in Rossville, Ga., Mrs. Bailey said. His father, Dale, and a brother, Anson, live in Hillsdale, she said. Family in Hillsdale could not be reached for comment last night.

"He believed in what he was doing and thought it was the right thing," Mrs. Bailey said.

Sergeant Jagger was born in Hillsdale and lived in the area through high school. He first began playing guitar when he was 13 and went on to participate in numerous school musicals and plays, Mrs. Bailey said.

Shortly after graduation he moved to Rossville and worked at a hospital for a year before deciding to enlist in the Army with the hope of gaining money to attend college, his mother said.

"After he got out of high school and got a job, he realized he wasn't really going to get anywhere without a degree," Mrs. Bailey said.

He took college courses at various schools over the years wherever he happened to be stationed, and had interest in business administration. He finally acquired enough credits for a bachelor's degree, but never officially graduated, Mrs. Bailey said.

Sergeant Jagger had been serving his third tour of duty in Iraq. He had previously served two tours in Bosnia and was a tank commander during the Persian Gulf War, his mother said.

"He was gone from here for months at a time," she said. "We hadn't seen him in almost two years."

Sergeant Jagger will be buried at Berg Cemetery in Hillsdale next to his younger brother, Quintin Jagger, who died two years ago from brain cancer.

Services are being handled by the Hampton-Kurtz Funeral Home in Hillsdale. A date for the services was not available.

Soldier recounts how first sergeant broke the rules to help him get his life in order

FRIEDBERG, Germany — After watching his roommate get blown up by a mortar and losing two close friends in another attack 44 days later, Pfc. Joshua Revak is at a profound low.

It doesn’t help that he credits one of those friends with rescuing him.

The friend helped him out about a year and a half ago, when Revak, with the 1st Battalion, 37th Armor Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division, was in more kinds of trouble than he knew.

He compared joining the Army to buying a car you can’t test drive.

He thought he’d bought a lemon.

He’d gotten in trouble a couple times and lost rank. He drowned his sorrows in alcohol.

Friends still tease him about the day he got caught sleeping at attention.

“There were times that I would wake up just still so drunk from the night before that I couldn’t even see straight,” the 25-year-old Revak said.

Joshua Revak, singer of “The Bandit Song,” practices his guitar and vocals while he was deployed to Camp Nimur in northwest Iraq earlier in the year. Revak, who has recorded numerous songs about fallen comrades and life in Iraq, said he has lost inspiration to sing and play after the death of his mentor, 1st Sgt. Aaron Jagger.

Then a guitar lesson changed everything.

Revak, from Duluth, Minn., was at his happiest playing guitar, and wanted to get better.

That’s how he met 1st Sgt. Aaron Jagger, the battalion’s “Cobra” Company first sergeant and a fantastic guitar player. Jagger agreed to teach Revak guitar for $20 a lesson. He saw Revak’s potential both as a musician and a soldier. He also saw the young soldier as a disaster waiting to happen.

After their second lesson, Jagger didn’t ask for his $20.

“By the end of the lesson, he’s like, ‘Dude why don’t you move in upstairs?’” Revak recalled. “I was like, ‘What?’”

Even though they weren’t in the same unit, Jagger’s offer clearly broke the Army’s fraternization rules. Both men knew what breaking those rules meant. They had an idea of what would happen if they didn’t.

Revak thought passing up Jagger’s offer would be akin to suicide.

He moved in with Jagger, his wife and his three youngest daughters. Two older daughters were already out of the house. The whole family welcomed the addition.

“They treated me like one of their own,” Revak said. “He could’ve got in trouble for what he did, you know.”

It was at this point that Revak started to love the Army.

For the next 11 months, until the 1st Battalion, 37th Armor Regiment “Bandits” deployed to Iraq, Revak lived in secret in an upstairs room that had been Jagger’s music room. Jagger became Revak’s surrogate father and one of his closest friends. Even though they spent a lot of time together, nobody outside the house knew they were so close, Revak said.

“We played a lot of music for church and everything else. He was my teacher, and I followed him everywhere I could,” Revak said.

Revak met his wife, Marta, while living with the Jaggers. And after their first date, Revak brought Marta home to meet the Jaggers as if they were his own family. They were the first to meet her.

The couple married in Denmark on Dec. 22, 2005, just weeks before Revak deployed to Iraq. The couple had a daughter, Keilah, July 6. The name means “citadel” in Hebrew.

Before deploying, Revak and Jagger gained fame among the Bandits by recording a rock version of the unit song, which is played before daily battle updates in Iraq and leads off battalion functions.

But in Iraq, the two became better known for the original songs they wrote for fallen comrades. They regularly performed at memorial ceremonies for soldiers and Marines who died there.

“Most of them were for good friends,” Revak said.

Revak’s days of playing memorial ceremonies in Iraq ended halfway through his second Iraq tour. Revak was injured in late June when a 120-mm mortar fell just feet away from where he was standing in Ramadi, Iraq. His roommate in Iraq, Sgt. Terry Lisk, took the brunt of the blast and died within minutes. Revak was medically evacuated to Germany.

“Watching Revak carted out of here, that really hurt,” said Maj. Matthew Van Wagenen, executive officer of the 1-37. “Along with Revak leaving, a lot of our music went too.”

Jagger was distraught over Revak’s injury, which smashed bones in his right foot and ankle and clipped part of the Achilles tendon in his left. Jagger had his wife, Sandie, bring the bedridden soldier Jagger’s own guitar.

“It’s his baby,” Revak said. “I used to watch him play it.”

A bit more than a month later, Jagger and two other soldiers, including Revak’s close friend Spc. Shane Woods, were killed by a roadside bomb in Ramadi.

The deaths of Jagger and Woods devastated Revak, who now considers writing and playing songs for troops’ memorial ceremonies a part of his life he won’t go back to.

“I just feel like the music, the music died,” he said.

For days after Jagger and Woods died, Revak forgot about his shattered right foot, encased in a black cast with the Bandits’ trademark skull logo. He didn’t know whether to sit or stand. He was furious, but didn’t have anything at which to direct his anger.

Mourning with Sandie really helped him get past that, he said. He visited Jagger’s family a couple times “and just grieved, and talked and told stories about the funny things that he did. He did some off-the-wall stuff,” Revak said.

Of all the off-the-wall stuff, moving a private into his home might have taken the cake. But Revak is sure his life is better for what Jagger did for him.

“He figured he could help me,” Revak said, “and he did in more ways than he ever knew.”

First Sgt. Aaron Jagger was scheduled to come back to his hometown of

Camden with his wife and five daughters for a family reunion the first week in

July.
He and his brother, Anson Jagger, 41, of Camden planned on playing music and

celebrating with 150 family members.
Instead, his leave time was canceled at the last minute and his family decided to

stay at their home in Germany while he was deployed to a then unknown

location. His wife and daughters finally made it to Hillsdale County yesterday,

but, as Anson said, "not for the same reason. It's gonna be a little more somber."

Aaron Jagger, 43, and two other soldiers were killed while stationed in Ramadi,

Iraq, Aug. 9 when a roadside bomb exploded near their Humvee. The incident

occurred during his second tour in Iraq, following two tours in Bosnia and

serving in Operation Desert Storm in the early '90s.

With 24 years of service and 7 1/2 years of combat experience, 1st Sgt. Jagger

was used to action and assured his family that his return to Iraq would be

uneventful.
"He promised us nothing would happen to him," Anson Jagger said, recalling

the conversation.

Quinn Jagger, who died two years ago from brain cancer at age 36. Quinn

Jagger was a graduate of Hillsdale Col-lege and a school teacher.
Anson Jagger recalled writing Quinn's eulogy with Aaron Jagger on what would

be his last visit to Camden.

said, 'Aaron, do not make me go through this again.'"

in the field in Iraq. His talents as a songwriter attracted the interest of Contemporary Christian artist Dwayne Jones who recorded Jagger's song, "It Was Me," on his album "Humble Me."

"His personality was so engaging," said Anson Jagger, "he was a real good front man, and after he found Jesus he was quite a witness to other servicemen."
One friend of Aaron Jagger recalled how he went beyond his musical talents to reach out to others in a letter. "Aaron saved my life when I was on the emotional edge," wrote the anonymous friend. "He could have gotten in trouble for what he did for me, but he did it anyway."

Aaron Jagger's brother and father recounted the Tuesday night they found out he had been killed.

"I went to bed pretty early," said Anson Jagger, "and my son took the call from Sandy (Jagger's wife) in Germany. I thought I was dreaming. It was terrible."
Anson left his home to tell his father the news, but was concerned that his oldest son, Seth, 19 wasn't home yet. "When something like this happens, you just worry to death where your kids are." Upon arriving at his father's house, he found his son there, playing music with some friends in Aaron and Anson's "legendary band room" where they played together as teenagers.

"The irony of the news of Aaron, and Seth playing music at the same time..." Aaron Jagger's father had only one word to describe his reaction to learning of his son's death: "Disbelief."

It was the belief, however, of Aaron Jagger that drew so many to his through his music, worship and friendships. In a Mother's Day card sent to his step-mother, Phyllis Jagger in May, he reflected on that belief and the impact of it in his life: "For if it was without the Christian love, understanding and, yes, even the discipline, I would not be the man I am today." Though the majority of his service was spent living in Germany, Anson Jagger believes that his brother's patriotism and American resolve were only strengthened by his time away.
"Absence makes the heart grow fonder," Anson Jagger said, "He would remember life in Hillsdale County as bigger than life. His patriotism was driven in by the dreams of the freedoms we have back home. The irony of it is those who have those bigger than life dreams of home are the ones who don't get to live them out."
Aaron Jagger leaves behind his wife, Sandy, 34; twin daughters Tessa and Ashley, 13; daughter Kelly, 12 and daughters Nicole, 21 and Kirstin, 17 from a previous marriage and step-daughters Maja and Elaine, daughters of his first wife; his sister, April, 45; brother Anson, 41; father, Dale 68; mother, Carol Bailey of Chattanooga, Tenn., and step-mother, Phyllis, 69.
No final plans have been made for funeral services. A viewing is tentatively planned for Friday evening at Kurtz Funeral Home in Hillsdale. Source: The Hillsdale Daily News, Hillsdale, MI, Aug. 16, 2006, extracted

September 22, 2007.

Sgt. Gabriel De Roo, 25, fell by enemy fire, Aug. 20, 2006, in Mosul, Iraq. A loving husband, father, son, and noble hero, now stands with his Savior in heaven. Gabriel was born April 1, 1981, to David and Laura De Roo, and he grew up in Paw Paw, Michigan. As a teenager he entrusted his life to Christ, a decision that shaped the rest of his life.

After attending college, he enlisted in the Army and joined the Stryker Brigade stationed at Ft. Lewis, WA. He desired to serve his God and his country, and he impacted everyone around him by his integrity, work ethic, and gentleness. Before his first year-long tour in Iraq he fell in love with Hannah Suko, and they were married Dec. 31, 2004, after his return home. A year later their lives were blessed with a baby boy, Gabriel II.

In late June 2006 he left for Iraq to serve his second tour with the Stryker Brigade. On August 20, 2006, he was killed in action by small arms fire. He had said that if anyone died, he wanted it to me him so that his buddies would have time to get right with the Lord. “Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13 He will be dearly missed by those he leaves behind: his wife and baby, his parents, sisters (Angel, Chastity, Charity, and Patience), father-in-law and mother-in-law, Mark and Nancy Suko, of Gig Harbor, and many brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, nieces, and nephews.