Marine Sgt. Lonny D. Wells

Died November 9, 2004 Serving During Operation Iraqi Freedom

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29, of Vandergrift, Pa.; assigned to 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C.; killed Nov. 9 by enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq.

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Camp Lejeune Marine killed in Iraq

Associated Press

VANDERGRIFT, Pa. — A North Carolina Marine killed in Iraq this week was a great father who left behind four children, his mother said.

Sgt. Lonny D. Wells, 29, of Vandergrift, died Tuesday in enemy action in Iraq’s Anbar province, a volatile area that stretches west from Baghdad to the Syrian border, the Defense Department said in a statement. He died in an explosion, his family said.

He had been in the Marine Corps for eight years and served in Kosovo, France, Spain and Germany, said his mother, Yvonne Lynn Wells. He had been in Iraq since June and was scheduled to come home in January, his family said.

Wells’ wife, Jennifer, and the couple’s 7-month-old daughter, Jade, live at the Marine base in Camp Lejeune, N.C., his family said. The 1994 graduate of Kiski Area High School also had three children — Marissa, Lonny Jr. and Daylon — from a previous marriage who live in Apollo, his mother said.

“He was a great father,” Yvonne Lynn Wells told the Valley News Dispatch of Tarentum. “He would do anything for his kids.”

His mother remembered her son as a man who loved the Dallas Cowboys, sang Kenny Rogers songs in the car and loved the Marines.

“He was committed,” she said. “He was all-military.”

Wells was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division based at Camp Lejeune, the Defense Department said.