DOB/DOD: June 18, 1983 (New Haven, CT) – June 24, 2007; 24 years old
MARITAL STATUS: Unmarried
CHILDREN: One daughter, Taylor Marcel Craig (2007-).
LOCAL ADDRESS: Rosette Street; New Haven
ENLISTMENT: October 2005
Military Occupational Specialty: 11B; Infantryman
UNIT: 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division; Fort Riley, Kansas
FAMILY: Born to Andre Sr. (1956-) and Joyce D. Cook Craig (1959-). Two sisters, Valencia Craig Cook (1977-) and Debra Cook-Russell (1979-). Three brothers, Michael Cook (1982-), Jonathan Craig (1986-), and Matthew Craig (1988-). One half-brother, Andrew Brown (1981-). One half-sister, Nashimma Williams (1979-).
DECORATIONS: Awarded the Bronze Star Medal, Purple Heart Medal, Army Good Conduct Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Iraqi Campaign Medal with device, Global War on Terrorism Medal (Service), Army Service Ribbon, Army Overseas Service Ribbon, Valorous Unit Award, and the Combat Infantry Badge (1st award).
OTHER: Andre’s mother shared that he liked watching Army movies. He would ride his bicycle to his grandmother’s house across town and go to the grocery store for her. He also tutored and mentored kids in the neighborhood. It wasn’t until his funeral that his family found out he had that kind of impact on the kids.
From The Day (New London, CT) on June 28, 2007
By John Christofferson | AP Writer
SOLDIER FROM NEW HAVEN DIES IN IRAQ BOMBING
Family spokesman says infantryman, father of 1, saw ‘deplorable’ scenes
NEW HAVEN — The family of a soldier killed in Iraq Monday blamed his death on exhaustion, saying soldiers there are not getting enough rest. Private First Class Andre Craig Jr., 24, of New Haven, died of wounds sustained from the explosion of a roadside bomb in Baghdad. Craig, a graduate of Wilbur Cross High School, was an infantryman assigned to the 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division in Fort Riley, Kansas. He entered the Army in October 2005 and began serving with the 1st Infantry Division in March 2006. This was his first deployment to Iraq. Craig, whose nickname was Dre, called his family by cell phone Saturday to tell them he was on 24-hour security duty, said Erik Brown, his godfather and family spokesman. After that, Craig went out on a mission and was killed, he said. “He was very tired, he was exhausted,” Brown said Thursday. “Due to that exhaustion, we believe that’s why we lost Andre. The soldiers are not getting rest, and they’re tired.” An Army spokeswoman did not respond for comment. Brown and family members wore T-shirts with Craig’s picture and the words, “Dre 2007 in God we trust.” Craig, 24, returned to New Haven recently for a brief visit to celebrate his birthday and to meet his infant daughter, Taylor, who was born while he was serving in Iraq. Craig described “deplorable” conditions in Iraq, including women being raped and feces in the street, Brown said. “They’re terrorizing each other, and we have our soldiers in the middle of a civil war,” Brown said. Still, Craig was happy doing his job, Brown said. Family and friends said Craig, who had been in Iraq for about six months, wanted to be a state trooper and had planned to go to college. The governor has ordered that flags be flown at half-staff until Craig’s burial. Craig was the 38th military member with Connecticut ties to die since the war began in 2002. Craig lived with his 22-year-old brother, Jonathan. Craig and his five siblings were close to their mother, a nurse’s aide at the Hospital of St. Raphael. Jonathan Craig’s eyes welled up with tears as he recalled his brother’s last visit with his daughter. “The last words he said to me in the living room is take care of my daughter as if you were a father to her until I come back,” Jonathan Craig said.
From The Day (New London, CT) on March 16, 2008
A SON’S DREAM, A MOTHER’S PAIN
Andre Craig Jr. Followed His Heart And Left A Legacy Of Love
Joyce Craig opens her well-thumbed Bible, unfolds a worn and tear-stained letter, and reads: “Hi, Mom. I’m glad to hear that you are still focused on your ministry. You are truly my inspiration. …’” She pauses, closes her eyes, tries to stop her tears. Even her grandchildren, restive in their parents’ arms, grow still. After a long silence, she resumes: “I want to say thank you for raising me to be a man. You never let me quit, and you never let me settle for less. I’m glad you accept my dream. And I’m also happy to finally say, “I made my mother proud.”’ She folds the letter back between the pages. “That’s what he wanted to do,” she said. “He wanted to make his mother proud.” Army Specialist Andre Craig Jr. was just two weeks away from his 24th birthday when he left his mother’s house on New Haven’s Rosette Street for the last time in June 2007. On leave from duty in Baghdad, he had come home in May to see his family and to meet his daughter, Taylor Craig, who was born while he was in Iraq. He had grown up here and on Carmel Street, two of New Haven’s tougher neighborhoods, with his mother, brothers, and sisters, and he had shunned the shoals of crime and drugs to chase his dream. “It was always his dream to go into the Army,” Joyce Craig said, “to fight for the people. And I asked him, I said, ‘Why the Army?’ He said, ‘Ma, it’s my dream.” “He wanted to go into the Army for college to get money for college. and he wanted his family to live and have better than what they had. … He didn’t want us to struggle to pay bills.” Knowing well her son’s determination, she gave him permission to go. Her middle child, the one they called Dre, whom the others called the Momma’s Boy, went off to war. He left behind two older sisters, Valencia Cook, 31, and Debra Russell, 29, and three brothers, Michael Cook, 26, Jonathan Craig, 22, and Matthew Craig, 20. He also had a half-brother and half-sister, 27-year-old Andre Brown and Nashimma Williams, 29. His sister, Debra, muses about the special bond Andre had with their mother. “Every parent has … a child they have a closer bond to. My sister and I were more independent, and Michael was more independent, whereas Andre … he was joined to my mom’s hip a lot.” “He was a momma’s boy,” agrees his other sister, Valencia. They laugh to remember how, when the sons and son-in-law Julian Russell went bowling last May, their mother insisted she go along. “Dre said, ‘Ma, there ain’t no girls going.’ I said, ‘I don’t care, I’m going with you. … I’m gonna go, and I’m gonna kick you all butts.” The night got wild when her sons began stacking up the shot glasses and bowling two balls at a time down the same lane. “So, I really had to take them out of the place because they were cutting up,” Joyce Craig said. “And they walked outside, busting out laughing. And I said, ‘That’s not funny because you were disrespectful.’” Russell said that when Andre came home, they decided they weren’t going to let anything spoil their fun. “Life’s too short,” he said. “You never know.” Certainly, Andre had had his eyes opened. He wrote to his mother, telling her of the horrors visited on the Iraqis. “I’m glad that I’m down here and I can help them,” he wrote. “All I ask for you to ask the church to do is to pray for God’s mercy on these people.” And when he came home, it was as if the sun itself had broken through the clouds. “He came home, and he just showed everybody how much he loved us,” Julian Russell said. “He came home and did everything for everybody. Cooked, cleaned. He came to show love. “The funny thing is you wondered where all his love came from. You wondered how this man, that I’m older than, that I can look up to him. Because he chose to go where I didn’t want to go. I joined in 2000, and, believe me, if I’d known I was going to go to Iraq in 2004, I wouldn’t have joined. He was a braver man than I will ever be.” Debra Russell added, “When my husband was in Iraq, my brother took care of me. I was pregnant with my daughter, and … Andre would take my car, pick me up, and bring me to my doctor’s appointment, so much so that in the beginning, before they knew my husband was in Iraq, they thought he was my husband.” “He was the first person to see my daughter walk,” Julian said. “He was the first person to be there and encourage her and to give her a nickname. He loved my daughter a lot.” And he was smitten, they say, when he learned he had a daughter of his own. “He had wanted a child to leave behind in case something happened,” Joyce Craig said. But he had had no children with his wife, Shawntia Craig, who could not be reached to comment for this story. So, when Joyce Craig told Andre that a former girlfriend had had a child by him, he asked his mother to go see the baby. “When I walked in the house, the baby was sitting in a chair,” Joyce Craig said. “And I said, ‘Oh, my God! It looked like I had Andre all over again. It was like Andre was in that chair.” Soon, the whole family was spoiling Taylor, especially when Andre came home on leave. “And when we went to court to get her name changed to his last name,” Joyce Craig said, “the judge said, ‘Do you want to do a DNA test?’ And Dre said, ‘No, because I know that this is my child.’ That was the day before he left to go back to Iraq.” Andre had always loved children. “He would leave the house at 8 in the morning; he wouldn’t come back till dark time. He’d play basketball all day with my son. He would play ball in the street with the kids,” Valencia Cook said. “And that’s how he ended up having a close relationship with the children on this street, and that’s how they ended up naming the corner of Wilson and Rosette Street after him.” After Andre’s death, Joyce Craig said, she learned that “there were times when some parents would have troubles with their kids, and they’d call Andre, and Andre would go and talk to them. …” “And I know that Andre wanted to leave a legacy to let people know that just because you live in the ‘hood doesn’t mean that you can’t fulfill your dream and be successful.” She remembers that whenever she would ask Andre about Iraq, he would assure her, “Ma, I love my job.” And yet, when it was time for him to return, “we all sat in here, and we had a prayer, and he broke down and cried,” she said. “He cried so hard as if he knew that one day he might not come back.” July 25, 2007, the day Andre Craig died, was one week after his 24th birthday. It was also the day of Valencia Cook’s baby shower, the day — three hours before the shower — her water broke. “He called me at the house,” she said. “And she said, ‘My water broke,’ and he said, ‘I told you were gonna have that baby ‘round my birthday.’ And the next day, we got the call. … I was in labor when he passed away.” And so, Valencia Cook named her baby Andre. Joyce Craig still struggles to make sense of it all. “He was just willing to die … for his country, for his family, for his friends. I still cannot get the grips of that,” she said. “I’ll wake up in the morning. I’ll say, ‘Hi, Andre. I love you. I miss you. I wish that I could see you.’ … I was angry at him because he went into the Army and he got killed. And I was angry because I never did think I was going to lose my Dre. … “But then, when Dre got killed, I had to go and shut myself in because I knew I couldn’t be around nobody. Because I knew that I wouldn’t have been a very nice person because I was angry at Bush; I was angry at the Army. I was angry at Dre. So, to keep myself, I had to go shut myself in and pray and read my Bible. … “He didn’t die on the street behind drugs, you know? He died with a purpose, and he left a legacy. ‘This was my purpose, to be successful. And this was my legacy, to let other kids know that just because you’re poor or you live in a bad neighborhood, it doesn’t mean that you can’t be successful.’ … “So constantly thinking on that helps me more … and my anger at him is not like it used to be. I’ll tell him, I’ll sit and say, I’m proud of you, and you are my hero.’ “Just want to say to other children, if it’s not your dream, and it’s not really in your bones, don’t do it. … Now is not the time to do it, because so many of our children are dying in this war.”
Memorialized at the corner of Wilson Street and Rosette Street in New Haven, Connecticut.
From Legacy.com
“To Andre Craig’s Family: I would like to send you my deepest condolences for the loss of Andre. There are no words that can express the pain and sorrow you must feel. But know in your heart that Andre is a HERO. Not only once, but three times a HERO. The first time Andre became a HERO was when he took that giant step and joined the Army. Not only did he join, but he joined during wartime, knowing full well that he would be going into combat. Very few people in this world have the courage to step up to the plate and do what Andre did. As a citizen of the great United States, I, along with many others, appreciate the sacrifice and commitment Andre made to protect and safeguard our way of life. This alone showed that Andre was a cut above the rest and a true HERO. Second, Andre signed up to be an infantryman. Not any infantryman, but a member of the light infantry. As we all know, there are many different jobs in the Army. Many of these jobs are less dangerous than others, and soldiers are exposed to far less risk and danger depending on the job they choose. Those who choose to join the infantry are truly among the heroic few. This is even more true for those brave young men who volunteer to go into harm’s way as light infantrymen. These are the soldiers who commit their very being to stopping tyranny at its door. They not only volunteer, but they willingly take on the toughest and hardest job there is. Andre did this for us, making the ultimate sacrifice for us, the citizens of the United States. He did the job most of us are afraid to even think about. Andre is twice the HERO of any soldier. Lastly, Andre will forever be a HERO to me, my family, and my son. You see, Andre and my son, Private First Class Christopher Johnson, were in the same unit together, B/2/16. They were in different platoons, but Chris knew Andre and was his friend. I talked with Chris briefly, and he is very saddened by the loss of Andre. They manned the same fighting positions, patrolled the same roads, performed the same duties, and worked together as members of a team. They shared their sweat, blood, and tears for each other, as well as for the other members of their company. Andre gave his life protecting my son, and for that, I am deeply grateful. Andre’s selfless service, dedication, and sacrifice will forever be remembered. To Andre: Rest in peace, my friend. Know that your sacrifice did make a difference. You helped protect my son. Know that I am forever in your debt. You are three times a HERO.
— Stephen Johnson
Specialist Craig is buried in Connecticut State Veterans Cemetery, 317 Bow Lane, Middletown, Connecticut; Section 62A, Site 3.
