Jared Soares | The Roanoke Times

Attendees leave Life Church in Roanoke County after a memorial service for Fred Hutchins on Saturday afternoon. Hutchins was found dead near his SUV of a gunshot wound to the head early last week.

As a kindergartner, Fred Hutchins tore the pages from a coloring book he had painstakingly completed with crayons and took them as presents to a Roanoke retirement home. But he wept when there weren't enough for all the elderly residents, according to an often-told family story.

On Saturday, hundreds of Hutchins' friends and loved ones cried at the funeral of the rising political operative and Botetourt County native gone far too soon, said the mourners, at age 26.

Hutchins, who ran the Roanoke County office of U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., was found early Tuesday beside his sport utility vehicle just off U.S. 220 near Fincastle. He had a fatal gunshot wound to the head, and a handgun was discovered underneath his body. It is still unknown if the gunshot wound was self-inflicted or if Hutchins was the victim of foul play.

Webb was among those who spoke at the two-hour memorial service, which nearly filled the 400-seat sanctuary of Life Church in North Roanoke County. He lauded Hutchins' diplomatic acumen and said he had believed that in perhaps 10 years his aide would become "a member of the United States Congress. He's not going to do that."

But the somber tone was leavened with light-hearted recollections of Hutchins, a country boy at heart who loved NASCAR races and loved to take sharp turns in his pickup truck at about 70 miles per hour -- even when driving Webb to visit rural Virginia constituents, the senator said during his remarks.

Some mourners sought to turn the funeral into a celebration -- almost a good-natured roast at times. Richard Cranwell, who as Virginia house majority leader in the early 1990s gave Hutchins his first job as a page in the General Assembly, joked that he would surely be campaigning in heaven already -- "putting up yard signs that say 'grace.' "

Then Cranwell, now state Democratic party chairman, looked down at the sanctuary floor, and pretended to warn the devil: "Brother, you're in trouble now."

Del. Onzlee Ware, D-Roanoke, with whom Hutchins had worked closely as a campaign manager and legislative aide, said he had an "infectious laugh." But that laugh could be so loud as to be embarrassing, Ware said, which occasionally caused him to "leave Fred standing there" and distance himself at political social events.

Still, those conducting the service couldn't long break free of the mystery and shock surrounding Hutchins' death. His uncle, the Rev. Bob Hutchins, said in prayer, "Father, we're just going to have to trust you. We don't understand it all." He added, "We know you're there to comfort us and help us. We're thankful for that."

Investigators with the Botetourt County Sheriff's Office have said they will make a determination when they receive a report from the state forensic lab. Maj. Delbert Dudding with the sheriff's office has said it probably won't be returned until this week or later.

Authorities have so far declined to discuss details of the death scene or any evidence that might have been found there -- such as whether Fred Hutchins left a note or if the gun that was found was registered to him. Hutchins had obtained a concealed-weapon permit in 2004.

Friends and associates have wondered where Hutchins had been in the early hours of Tuesday. But nothing has become public about his whereabouts before the shooting, or where he was going. And if the gunshot wound was self-inflicted, they questioned why the apparently happy, career-minded Hutchins -- who was steadily making more connections in Virginia and Washington, D.C. -- would have taken his own life. Friends said he had recently complained of migraine headaches, a malady that had plagued him off and on for years, but they stopped short of linking the illness to his death.

None of those eulogizing Hutchins on Saturday mentioned his health, or alluded to any other personal problems he might have had. Instead, most tried to keep the mood upbeat. Another anecdote about Hutchins' childhood, told by Dick Wasson, a family friend and retired pastor from Kentucky, referred to his sense of humor as a kindergartner: During a test of pupils' motor skills, a teacher asked Hutchins if he could jump over a yardstick being held some distance above the floor. As Wasson recounted it, Hutchins said, "No ma'am, I can't, but I'll hold it for you."

The music was mostly secular, including the Beatles' "Hello, Goodbye" and an instrumental cover of "Big Rock Candy Mountain." Another tune was a recorded version of Frank Sinatra's "My Way." Bob Hutchins commented with a smile, "That was Freddie. He did everything his way."