Richard P Ramey

CANTON, Ohio — When an Ohio soldier killed in Iraq was once asked as a third grader what he wanted to do when he grew up, he wrote to his teacher: “I’ll go to war and fight.”

“The teacher called and was a little alarmed and I said, ‘No, that’s my son,”’ recalled the mother of Army Staff Sgt. Richard Ramey, Julie Ramey.

Ramey, 27, of Canton, was killed Feb. 8 in an attack in Mahmudiyah, Iraq, 20 miles south of Baghdad as insurgents attacked separate Army convoys with explosives, the Pentagon said. Three other soldiers were wounded.

He was assigned to the 703rd Ordnance Company out of Fort Knox, Ky., and was supporting the work of the 82nd...