Via Daily Mail, Times Free Press and NYDN:

STAFF SGT DAVID WYATT
Active duty.
From: Burke, North Carolina
Entered service: September 2004
Occupation: Field artillery operations man
Deployments: Afghanistan (October 2010 to May 2011), Iraq (October 2007 to January 2008)

Staff Sgt. David Allen Wyatt, age 35, of Hixson, selflessly gave his life Thursday, July 16, 2015 in Chattanooga, Tennessee while protecting his Chattanooga community, his country and his fellow Marines. David will always be remembered for the heroic way in which he lived, served, and died.

He was born November 7, 1979 in Morganton, North Carolina. He grew up in Ozark and Russellville, Arkansas. One of David’s proud accomplishments was achieving the rank of Eagle Scout through the Boy Scouts of America.

He graduated from Russellville High School in 1998 and attended Piedmont Community College in Morganton, North Carolina, Arkansas Tech, and MSU in Missoula, Montana.

Following the events of 9/11, being the longtime patriot he was, David joined the United States Marine Corp. He graduated Boot Camp from Parris Island, South Carolina which began an eleven year career that led him to serve in multiple locations including Okinawa, Japan, 29 Palms, California, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, Kuwait, and Korea. He courageously fought in Operation Freedom in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

As friends and family wrote their condolences on Facebook Thursday night, Lorri responded and thanked everyone for their support, writing that her husband had been ‘an amazing father’.

“He died honorably, doing exactly what he was trained to do. He loved his country, his family, his friends and his brothers of the Marine Corps,” David Wyatt’s wife, Lorri Wyatt, told the Daily News in a statement Monday.

The father of two had served one tour in Afghanistan and two in Iraq during his more than 10 years in the U.S. Marine Corps.

Amid Lorri Wyatt’s heartbreak, the grieving widow said she’d been comforted by resonating messages of “love, gratitude and memories” by those who knew him.

“It gives me a little (bit) of peace, knowing so many knew the same incredible man I did,” she said in the statement. “David was truly the greatest man I have ever known, and I was blessed to know him and be his wife. Watching him father our children was the greatest gift he could ever give me. David knew how to truly love, and when he loved you, it was undeniable.”

That love went beyond his wife and kids and to his military family, which expanded “every time he deployed, every class he took,” Wyatt said.

“He loved his country; he fought for it every day. He had many deployments, unaccompanied tours and other training exercises, where he was able to shine.

“He was incredible at his job, and we are blessed as a country that he was,” she continued. “I want everyone to know, he is gone, but never forgotten, always cherished, his legacy continues.”