Bradley S. Beard
Profile
Age: 22
From: Chapel Hill, N.C.
Assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, Camp Casey, Korea
Incident: Army Spc. Bradley S. Beard was killed Oct. 14 when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle as he was doing reconnaissance for explosives at Camp Ramadi, Iraq.
Died: October 14, 2004
Family remembers slain soldier as bright, funny
Associated Press
PITTSBORO, N.C. — Spc. Bradley S. Beard built his own computer once and entertained friends with jokes and impressions.
But the former engineering student at North Carolina State University took service to his country seriously. Beard, 22, dropped out of school a few months after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 to enlist in the Army.
He was one of three soldiers killed Thursday while hunting for explosives in Iraq when a bomb exploded near their convoy in the city of Ramadi.
He was a member of the 2nd Battalion, 17th Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, a unit based at Camp Casey, South Korea.
He’d only recently requested to be moved to Iraq because “he thought it was important,” his father, Randall, said Monday.
Randall Beard and his wife, Betsy, live in Chatham County. Their dining room table was filled with...