Schuyler B. Haynes killed by I.E.D.

Named after an ancestor who was a Revolutionary War general, Schuyler B. Haynes seemed destined to serve his country.

Haynes, 40, did just that, becoming an Army platoon leader whose "men worshiped him," his mother said.

On his second tour in Iraq, Sgt. 1st Class Haynes, of Manhattan, was killed Wednesday in Baquba, Iraq, when a bomb exploded near his vehicle during combat operations, according to a Department of Defense news release.

"I'm not accepting it yet," his mother, Sophy Haynes, 78, said by phone from her Manhattan home Friday night. "I'm having a tough time with it. I'm still sort of in denial, hoping they made a mistake."

Sophy Haynes said an e-mail from a fellow soldier summed up what her son meant to those he led. No matter the circumstances, the note said, if Haynes was there, it was a better place.

"He was a very dedicated person with a strong sense of duty," she said.

Haynes was president of the student council at Millbrook School, a boarding school in upstate Millbrook, northeast of Poughkeepsie. He graduated from Trinity College in Hartford with a degree in history and then enlisted in the Army in 1989, his mother said.

Schuyler Haynes served in Panama, Kosovo, Germany and Iraq, said his cousin, Anne Bimstock, of Manhattan. Stationed out of Fort Hood, Texas, he was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 12th Calvary Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Calvary Division. Killed alongside him was Spc. Mitchel T. Mutz, 23, of Falls City, Texas, according to the Department of Defense.

The family has not yet learned the specifics of his death.

"It's such a shock," Bimstock said. "With all the media, it's a violently visual attack. You see it every day on TV and imagine it happening to a loved one."

He is survived by his mother; a sister, Sophy Townsend Haynes, 38; and a brother, Robert Haynes, 36.

A cat named Rembrandt is also left behind. Schuyler Haynes picked up the feline while he was stationed in Germany. Later, he and his mother would joke about ownership of the animal. The feline stayed in New York when Haynes was overseas.

"He always wanted an update from his mother on how Rembrandt was doing," Bimstock said.

Haynes was named after Philip Schuyler, who served first with the British military and then during the Revolutionary War as one of four major generals in the Continental Army.

In 1788, he became one of the first two United States senators from New York, according to a biography written by Stefan Bielinski, founder and director of the Colonial Albany Social History Project.

Haynes will be buried in the family plot near Schuyler in Albany, his mother said. Funeral details have not been finalized.

From Newsday