4 Brothers and Their Uncle Die in Oceanside Fire : Tragedy: The boys, for whom the man was baby-sitting, range in age from 6 months to 4 years. A priest says their parents ‘are in a state of shock, grief, despondency and anger; all these emotions are mixed up.’

Four young brothers and their uncle died of apparent smoke inhalation Monday morning after a fire engulfed their Oceanside apartment.

Firefighters responded shortly after 8 a.m. to a report of smoke curling from the windows of a ground-floor apartment in the eastern section of the city. Battering in the door of the apartment, they found two of the boys and their uncle dead, and two other boys unconscious and barely clinging to life. The latter two were taken by helicopter to San Diego’s Children’s Hospital about 20 miles away, where they were pronounced dead in the emergency room.

Fire Chief Dale Geldert said the fire, of unknown origin, began in a closet of the master bedroom. The boys were found sprawled in a hallway; their uncle, who was baby-sitting, was found on a bed in a smaller bedroom.

The dead were identified as Joseph Arriola, 21, and his nephews Joshua, 4; Jesse, 3; Joseph, 2, and Jeremiah, 6 months. The apartment, as required by law, was equipped with a smoke detector and investigators are attempting to determine if it was working.

The detector was found melted. “If it worked, it didn’t wake anybody up,” said Fire Marshal Ted Wackerman.

The fire was reported by an upstairs neighbor whose smoke detector had gone off.

The children’s parents, Jesse and Angela Arriola, apparently were at work when the fire began. The mother and the father, a Marine lance corporal stationed at Camp Pendleton, both arrived shortly after the firefighters knocked down the blaze.

The father, who has been in the Marine Corps for four years, was overcome by emotion and had to be led away.

Accompanied by other Marines, the parents went to Mission San Luis Rey to pray with Father Warren Rouse, guardian of the mission and a family friend.

“They are in a state of shock, grief, despondency and anger; all these emotions are mixed up,” Father Rouse said. “They didn’t know the other two children were dead. I had to tell them.”

Natives of Guam, the couple often attended services at the mission parish.

“They were my boys,” the North County Blade-Citizen quoted Jesse Arriola as saying as he left the mission. “I want them back.”

Thirty-one firefighters, five engines and three ambulances responded to the fire, with the first arriving within four minutes. Attempts to resuscitate the victims were futile.

“It was just too late when we got there,” said a Fire Department spokeswoman.

The fire was the most deadly in Oceanside history and the second tragedy to hit Oceanside and Marine families recently.

Three young women and two children were killed May 25 at Camp Pendleton when their speeding car went out of control and crashed into a transit district bus. All of the women were married to Marine enlisted men.