DOVER, N.H. (AP) – Sgt. Jeremiah Holmes, the only New Hampshire National Guardsman killed in Iraq, was remembered Wednesday as a hero to family, friends and his country.

Speaking at a Mass of Christian burial, Army National Guard Chaplain William Paige said Holmes “was a hero long before he was deployed” to Iraq.

He said Holmes was a hero to his wife; his son, whose first birthday is Thursday; his brothers and sisters, his friends.

“He was a hero to us,” he told the standing-room-only crowd of about 450 at St. Joseph Church. “He protected the ideals of freedom and democracy.

“It’s hard to say goodbye to a hero.”

His wife, Kimberly, later tearfully read a poem of remembrance.

Holmes, 27, who was born in Dover and lived in North Berwick, Maine, was killed March 29 when a bomb rocked the truck in which he was riding in a convoy.

Three regular Army soldiers from New Hampshire also have died in the Middle East, two in Iraq and one in Kuwait.

He was a member of the Army National Guard 744th Transportation Company with headquarters in Hillsboro, N.H., and detachments in Claremont and Somersworth. His unit was deployed for training in late December, and sent to Iraq in February for 18 months.

Of the 2,700 Army and Air National Guard members in New Hampshire, about 1,000 are serving in the Middle East.

About 75 members of the Air and Army National Guard were on hand for the service in the church where Holmes was baptized.

They lined the entrance to the church at attention as his flag-draped coffin was carried inside by nine guard pallbearers, and again was it was brought out to the mournful skirl of a single bagpiper.

Holmes, who was promoted posthumously to sergeant, was buried at St. Mary New Cemetery, where his mother was buried after she was murdered in 1990.

New Hampshire Adjutant Gen. John Blair, a Vietnam combat veteran, presented Holmes’ wife with the folded flag from the coffin and the Bronze Star and Purple Heart that Holmes was awarded “on behalf of a grateful nation for the dedicated … and heroic service of your husband.”

Dozens of friends and family members, led by Holmes’ wife, each placed a single flower on the coffin.

After the graveside service, Blair said every guard member knows the day could come when the country calls, and he or she is asked to respond.

But ever since hearing the news of Holmes, he said he has been thinking “how I prayed this day would never happen, and when it happened, that it would never happen again.”

And Wednesday, his thoughts also were with the families of those guardsmen still in Iraq.

“Their fears can only be heightened how,” he said.

He and his wife were among them. Their son is stationed in Turkey.

AP-ES-04-07-04 1842EDT