Army was everything to slain Seattle soldier

Published 9:00 pm Sunday, August 13, 2006

SEATTLE – A Seattle soldier killed in Iraq was serving his second tour there.

Staff Sgt. Tracy L. Melvin, 31, died of injuries he sustained Aug. 6, when an improvised explosive device detonated near his vehicle during combat in Ramadi, Iraq. Two other soldiers also died in the attack.

Melvin was assigned to the Army’s 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division in Baumholder, Germany. Family said being a soldier was what Melvin always wanted.

“The Army was his life. He was on his third enlistment and said he would ‘re-up’ and go as long as he could,” said his father, Bill Swindle.

An amateur historian, Melvin could recite famous battles and name of generals from World War II and Vietnam. As a senior in high school, he helped his history teacher lecture on the Vietnam War.

After graduating in 1995, he completed basic training and married Sheri Washington of San Antonio, who also enlisted in the Army.

Melvin served four years with the 3rd United States Infantry Regiment – known as the Old Guard – at Fort Meyer in Virginia, home of Arlington National Cemetery. The unit’s responsibilities include guarding the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as well as combat readiness in defense of Washington, D.C.

In 1999, Melvin and Washington were transferred to Fort Lewis, where he became an infantry soldier.

He first served in Iraq in 2003, his family said. The couple divorced that same year and Melvin later remarried.

He is to be buried Friday at Tahoma National Cemetery near Kent.

More than 125 military personnel with ties to Washington state have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003.