Houston Chronicle -- Army Pfc. Wesley Robert Riggs, 19, of Beach City, was killed Tuesday in Tikrit by injuries suffered in an explosion during a routine patrol.

Riggs, of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division, was a 2003 graduate of Barbers Hill High in Mount Belvieu in Chambers County and enlisted in February last year.

Family and friends said Riggs had blue eyes that would put movie star Paul Newman to shame, a tranquil presence and pensive nature.

But, when he was quiet "it made you wonder what he was up to," family friend BJ McCoy said with a smile.

It's not that Riggs got into any kind of trouble, but he was a connoisseur of "Southern fun," said BJ's husband, Gary.

That usually meant that Riggs, along with his inseparable cohorts — William Kirk, a stepbrother, and Kelly McCoy, Gary's son — would be tearing through the closest mud field in a big-wheeled truck.

"They would go muddin' or riding any kind of motorized anything that could go fast," McCoy said of the boys. "You think about such a quality young man and it's hard to believe that he is gone."

"He was 100 percent an outdoors person, he loved dirt bikes, he loved to fish," said his stepmother, Vicki Riggs.

"He was a real Southerner," she said, pausing. "And he was raised by two Yankees," she said with a smile.

Both Riggs and her husband, Daniel, are Midwestern transplants to Texas, she said.

It was hard to get mad at Wesley, Kelly and William, family and friends said, even when they returned their parents' trucks covered in mud. "They had such an enthusiasm for living," Vicki Riggs said.

Gary McCoy can recall failing more than once to keep a stern look on his face, instead breaking into a smile at the latest shenanigans of the boys.

"They could make a party out of just about any day," he said.

But in 2002, Kelly McCoy was killed in a car accident, which "devastated Wesley," Vicki Riggs said.

The happy-go-lucky young man grew withdrawn.

"He changed," Gary McCoy said. "Wesley took it hard."

So, when Wesley Riggs announced to his family and friends that he was joining the military, they knew he was going into the service with his eyes wide open, having already suffered a great loss.

"This is a young man that went into the military with no illusions and he still went to do his duty," Gary McCoy said. "That's how strongly he felt about it."

In addition to his father and stepmother, survivors include his mother, Gayle McDermott; three brothers, Patrick and Kevin McDermott, and Daniel Riggs; and two stepbrothers, J William Kirk and Justin Kirk.