McCaughn was born in North Carolina and lived there and in Missouri before his family moved to New Hampshire about 10 years ago. Teachers said that joining the military had long been a dream of McCaughn's. "He would talk about it every day," teacher Rebecca Spiro told WMUR-TV. "You could see the excitement in his eyes. We kept journals, and he would write about it all the time." McCaughn was killed on Nov. 7, 2006, conducting combat operations in Al Anbar province.