Williams said he did not know Adam but met Danny recently at a League of Municipalities meeting. Williams said he heard about Adam’s death when he returned to the office following a Greater Limestone County Chamber of Commerce luncheon Thursday.

“It made me physically ill,” Williams said. “To see a man happy about his new job and then have the worst tragedy ever to befall him. They’re a nice family and we hope everybody will pray for them.”

Becky Loggins joined an area group called Alabama Marine Moms at about the time Adam was deployed, said Athens resident Helen Hickman, a member of the group whose son, Andrew Hickman, is a Marine stationed in Okinawa. She said Andrew would be deployed to Iraq later this year.

“We have been in contact with the family and they’ve asked us to give them space,” Hickman said Friday. “When they’re ready, they said they’d contact us. Immediately yesterday, we planned to make meals, clean house, hold hands — whatever the family needed us to do.”

Until they know what they can do to help, Marine Moms will begin preparing a book of condolences, which they do after each military death, from any branch, in the state.

“It’s a 12-by-12 scrapbook of poems and letters of condolence with a patriotic, military theme that we personally deliver to the families of people killed,” Hickman said.

Residents can send condolences, and also make donations of money or scrapbook supplies to Marine Moms president Pam Adcock at 338 Joe Quick Road, Hazel Green, Ala., 35750.

Hickman said the 20 members of Marine Moms meet monthly to offer support but they do not discuss the possible death of their children who serve in the military.

“I don’t know if we’ve ever really had that conversation,” she said.