The man selected to head the U.S. Marine Corps' new Wounded Warrior Regiment is a decorated career serviceman with firm roots in the Queen City.

Col. Gregory Boyle, 48, was recently named commanding officer of the first Marine Corps regiment charged with supporting and accounting for injured and ill Marines and sailors.

Boyle is a 1977 graduate of Manchester Central High School and 1981 graduate of St. Anselm College. His parents have lived in Manchester for 30 years.

"Obviously, I was really excited," Boyle said of his new position. "This is absolutely a great way to make a difference in the lives of these Marines and sailors who are very, very severely injured and are going to have a lifetime of disabilities."

Commandant James Conway, the Marine Corps' highest ranking officer, tapped Boyle for the job three weeks ago. The move puts Boyle in charge of Marine health care at a time when military medical services are under intense scrutiny.

Boyle said the regiment came into being last fall, several months before reporters at the Washington Post uncovered unsanitary conditions and red tape at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the Army's flagship hospital.

Boyle said he has kept a close eye on the unfolding scandal.

"I'm tied right in," he told the New Hampshire Union Leader. "I'll be attending all the various review groups and commissions that are ongoing right now.

Col. Gregory Boyle will head the Marine Corps' first regiment charged with supporting and accounting for injured and ill Marines and sailors. (COURTESY)

"As I learn from that, and as I see some areas that may need some future attention, we're certainly going incorporate some of those recommendations into the establishment of the Wounded Warrior Regiment."

As commanding officer, Boyle will oversee a staff of roughly 200 people. Today, he said, there are about 370 wounded Marines.

The new regiment will help injured and ill Marines navigate the complex world of military health care, from medical evaluations to insurance claims. Boyle said he also plans to reach out to the thousands of Marine veterans in service since 2001.

"It's a big job," said his father, Ed Boyle, himself a retired Marine Corps major. "But we don't worry about him getting the job done. It's that simple: He'll get it done."

Boyle last served two years as commanding officer of the 3rd Marine Regiment in Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. Before that, he was the senior Marine in Afghanistan, where, he said, he was responsible for "shutting down the Marine presence (there) so we could focus on Iraq."

He said he had been hoping to leave Hawaii and serve one year in Iraq when the commandant asked him to oversee the Wounded Warrior Regiment. Boyle accepted the mission as instructed.

"After 26 years, he's still got the same sense of loyalty and duty that hopefully a young private right of boot camp would have," his father said.

Family members describe Boyle as a calm and quiet type. He revered the military as a boy, clutching his father's Marine Corps guidebook while still in diapers and playing Marine at the age of 3.

"Every Halloween from there on, he was a Marine. So we knew he was going to be one," said his sister, Shelley Malone, a Manchester realtor.

Boyle and his wife, Leeann, have three children. The family plans to join Boyle in Virginia, though Boyle said he plans to retire in New Hampshire "in the next few years, when I finally leave the service."

Through all his years in the corps, Boyle has never been wounded. He notes, however, he has attended 22 funerals in recent years, and he has visited many of his own men at hospitals across the U.S.

"I think what he's going to bring to the table is to show the Marines that they're never going to be forgotten, that they will be taken care of," Malone said. "Somebody that compassionate -- I think he's the perfect guy."