AUGUSTA — Andrew Hutchins never wanted to leave his Army buddies.

After falling from a guard tower a month into his duty in Afghanistan, the 20-year-old military police officer from New Portland endured a long and painful recovery, friends said Friday. He ignored pleas from his doctors and the Army and fought his way back to his platoon, part of the 101st Airborne Division.

“I know that if Andrew knew the outcome of his returning, he would still do it because for him, making the ultimate sacrifice was an easy decision,” said his friend, Staff Sgt. Jarrod Stritt.

On Nov. 8, eight weeks after he returned to his platoon, Cpl. Hutchins died. He was in Khost province in Afghanistan, killed when insurgents attacked his unit with small-arms fire.

On Friday, Stritt joined hundreds who packed the Augusta Armory to say goodbye to the man who will be remembered for his patriotism, his heart and his valor.

During a 90-minute service — attended by Gov. John Baldacci, Rep. Michael Michaud and Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins — people spoke of the man they miss and all he sacrificed.

“He gave his youth and his future,” said Maj. Gen. John “Bill” Libby, Maine’s adjutant general.

The funeral was a military affair, with a wall-sized American flag hanging behind the armory stage. Patriotic songs played as people filed past family photos and friends’ snapshots. A military-themed poem Hutchins had written as a 14-year-old  was blown up across a photo of a sunset. Programs pictured Hutchins in his uniform and beret, a casual smile on his face.

While flags outside the armory and across Maine hung at half-staff, an Army honor guard escorted Hutchins’ flag-draped casket inside.

During the funeral ceremony, Hutchins was awarded a posthumous Purple Heart and Bronze Star. Baldacci awarded Hutchins the Maine Gold Star Honorable Service Medal, awarded to service members who have died in support of combat operations since Sept. 11, 2001.

He was the 48th recipient.

Hutchins’ family — including his father, Jeffrey, of Leeds, his mother, Rachel, of Waltham, and his wife, Heather — sat in the front row as people recalled Andrew as a guy who seemed destined for a military life. 

At Carrabec High School — a small, 300-student school in North Anson, Hutchins was known as a weightlifter who was smart, earning good grades in the toughest classes.

Despite his age, he quickly earned a reputation as a leader, said Staff Sgt. Chantal Kelly.

“The platoon will never be the same without him,” she said.

She and Hutchins sometimes patrolled together, she said. He’d talk about life after the Army, about becoming a pharmacist and, most important, becoming a dad.

“He would have been a great father,” Kelly said.

Staff Sgt. Stritt recalled the night Hutchins fell, working to fortify a guard tower in torrential rain. Stritt was at his side in a moment.

“He looks up at me and he’s got this big smile on his face,” Stritt said. “I looked down at him and said, ‘You all right, man?'”

Hutchins said his wrist hurt and his hip felt funny. “It turned out he had shattered his wrist and cracked his hip,” Stritt said.

“We all thought he wouldn’t return,” Stritt said. “But he did. He did.”

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