At march, an honor for soldier

QUINCY - Her sisters walked 4 miles yesterday to raise money for cancer care. It was what Ciara M. Durkin would have demanded, they said.

During the march, a moment of silence was held in honor of Durkin, a 30-year-old specialist in the Massachusetts Army National Guard, who was killed in action last week in Afghanistan.

The Quincy woman pledged $100 for the Quincy Medical Center Cancer Walk and wrote: "I give because I learned to stay strong here in Afghanistan because of your courage. I love you."

Durkin was born in Ireland, the eighth of nine children. A devoted aunt, she sent allowance money from a war zone so her nieces and nephews would know she was thinking of them. She is the third female soldier from Massachusetts to die in the current Mideast wars the first in Afghanistan. Circumstances of her death have not been announced.

Family members said they were told she died Friday.

However, in a statement yesterday, the Massachusetts National Guard said Durkin was killed in action on Thursday in Afghanistan. She had been assigned to Task Force Diamond, as part of a finance unit that had deployed in November, the statement read.

"Whenever a soldier dies in the line of duty, it is a tragedy that affects us all," Major General Joseph C. Carter, adjutant general of the Massachusetts National Guard, said in the statement. "Our thoughts and prayers are with Specialist Durkin's family and her fellow soldiers."

The death is under investigation in accordance with US Central Command policy, the statement indicated.

Yesterday, her sister Deirdre Durkin's house in Quincy had become a shrine and a place to trade memories about Ciara (pronounced Kee-ra). On the walls hung two painted portraits of her as a young girl, with lush, curly red hair and a bright smile. On the dining room table and along the shelves sat photos of her at prom during her student years at Fontbonne Academy in Milton; at communion and confirmation in Ireland; and with family. One of her green Army dress uniforms hung by a window.

"She was very vocal about her feelings," said her sister Fiona Canavan, 44, of Quincy. "She was constantly telling us she loved us . . . before she was even in the Army."

Before she enlisted two years ago, she worked in information technology for a healthcare company, relatives said. She joined the Army National Guard because she admired military discipline and wanted to do something for her country, they said.

She was sent to Bagram Air Base in February and was expected to end her tour of duty a year later. She returned for two weeks with her family early last month - painting steps, mowing lawns, and building shelves at her mother's and sister's houses, spending happy times with friends and family, and attending Red Sox games to reconnect with her beloved team.

Her 17 nieces and nephews were Durkin's other passion.

"She was the aunt that would take them outside and play," said Canavan. "She rough-housed."

Together they would play foosball, and a game in which the children had to lie still and keep from laughing as Durkin tickled, teased, or pretended to sit on them. If they showed their teeth, they would lose.

The children seldom won, Canavan said.

"She'd be all red-faced out there and beaming, herself," said Deirdre Durkin, 45.

Ciara Durkin took a special interest in Deirdre's three children because they lost their father, Barry Goonan, to cancer eight years ago. Ciara Durkin lost her own father to a heart attack when she was 9 years old, just six weeks after she and her parents moved to Massachusetts from Ireland. Deirdre said it was important to Ciara that she serve as a role model for the youngsters.

She would announce bedroom inspections and threaten to withhold allowances for those who failed. But she would deposit the allowance regardless, Deirdre Durkin said. She sent Deirdre's 14-year-old son, Brian, a merit medal, something that is helping him as he grieves his aunt, Deirdre said.

In April, she sent the family an e-mail with a photograph of her and an American private contractor, who explained in a note how Durkin had helped break his fall from a 26-foot ladder.

"Without a doubt, she saved my life," he wrote. "Her personal sacrifice has bonded her and I as friends (to the bone) for life."

In other e-mails, Durkin told her sisters that she loved Afghanistan and was amazed by its landscape, though a little bothered by the constant dust.

In July, she celebrated her 30th birthday with friends at the Kabul airport, the only place she could get Pad Thai noodles, her favorite meal. The family sent her a package with cards and a four-hour video compilation made from old home movies. It made her cry, the sisters said.

A few weeks ago, Durkin's last night on leave, the family took her to dinner at the Fowler House restaurant in Quincy. Deirdre asked her sister if she had any reservations about returning to Afghanistan. She did not, Ciara told her sister. On her way back to Kabul, Durkin's plane stopped for refueling in Shannon, Ireland, where she called two sisters and a brother who live there. She planned to return to school when her service ended, her sisters said.

Durkin's body was returned to the United States Saturday, Canavan said. Funeral arrangements have not been finalized.