Remains Returned

WWII/Korean/Cold War remains returned.

If you are able,
save them a place
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving
for the places they can
no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say
you loved them,
though you may
or may not have always.
Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.
And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane,
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.

Major Michael Davis O'Donnell
Written in Dak To, Vietnam 1 January 1970
Missing in Action 24 March 1970
Group Identification 06/2001 - DNA Match

AMERICANS IDENTIFIED SINCE 1989
WWII, KOREA, COLD WAR

Previously 'Unknown' Pearl Harbor Victim Reburied With Full Honors American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, March 29, 2006 – A once-unidentified sailor killed in the Pearl Harbor attack almost 65 years ago was laid to rest today with full honors and a grave marker bearing his name, thanks to sleuth work by a Pearl Harbor survivor and U.S. Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command's expertise. Navy Seaman 2nd Class Warren Paul Hickock was buried with full military honors in Honolulu on March 29, more than 64 years after he died in the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. His remains were only recently identified. Courtesy photo   Seaman 2nd Class Warren Paul Hickok was reinterred this morning at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, more commonly called the Punchbowl. The 18-year-old Kalamazoo, Mich., native had been among more than 1,500 sailors, soldiers, Marines and civilians killed during the Dec. 7, 1941, attack but never identified. Hickok was assigned to the light mine layer USS Sicard when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. According to defense officials, many Sicard crewmembers had been dispatched at the time to help the crew of USS Cummings, a destroyer docked nearby. The Cummings got under way and cleared Pearl Harbor after the attack and reported no injuries. An investigation into those still unaccounted-for determined that Hickok may have been among the Sicard crewmen aboard USS Pennsylvania during the attack. However, he was not among those reported lost, officials said. In the days following the attack, the unidentified dead, including a sailor identified only as "X-2," were buried in Nuuanu Cemetery in Oahu, Hawaii. Years later, after World War II ended, the Army Graves Registration Service disinterred the remains and attempted to identify them. Those that couldn't be identified, including "X-2's," were reburied at the Punchbowl on June 9, 1949, defense officials said. About 1,000 others are interred aboard USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor. This might have been the end of the story, except for the detective work of Ray Emory, a Pearl Harbor survivor and researcher who has spent the past 12 years trying to help match names to unknowns. Emory, a sailor assigned to USS Honolulu during the attack, calls his effort a labor of love to help honor the memories of those who died and to bring closure to their families. "I'll be doing this to my dying day," said the 84-year-old Hawaii resident. He scrubs deceased servicemembers' military records, most obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, looking for details that link them to those unidentified from the Pearl Harbor attack. "You usually need five or six documents to put the puzzle together,' he said, calling the effort "a lot like chess." As in many of the other cases he investigates, dental and medical records offered the critical clues in linking the unknown sailor designated as "X-2" to Hickok, he said. When he thought he was on to something, Emory said, he contacted JPAC, which found his evidence convincing enough to exhume the grave last June. Forensic anthropologists from the command used historical reports, dental and anthropological analysis and mitochondrial DNA to successfully match the remains with information in Hickok's military records, defense officials said. Heather Harris, the JPAC historian who wrote the historical report for Hickok's case, verified the new information, which led to a second examination of the remains and his ultimate identification. "We got lucky in our reexamination of the case," said Harris. "During the original processing of X-2 Nuuanu, they noted in their paperwork that he had a healed right femur. Hickok's medical records had no indication of this injury, but when I looked at his paperwork from his enlistment to the service (paperwork that wouldn't have been previously available), I noticed that he had written that he'd broken his right leg as a boy." The Defense Department announced the successful identification Dec. 16, 2005. Harris said information from third parties often proves valuable in bringing a case to JPAC's attention. "Mr. Emory has been collecting and analyzing information about World War II unknowns and the unknowns associated with the attack on Pearl Harbor for longer than I have been alive," Harris said. "He amassed a prodigious amount of information and developed a keen understanding of how the information he obtained fit together. "That said, JPAC historians and analysts often have easier access to much of this information and can obtain information that Mr. Emory may have a difficult time obtaining," she said. "In this instance, we were able to use the information Mr. Emory provided as a starting point for researching the case." Emory said he gets a huge lift by helping to piece together an unsolved case. "You don't know how good it feels to get a call from JPAC saying, 'You've done it again," he said. But the biggest reward, he said, is being able to call family members and tell them that their loved one has been identified. In the Hickok case, tracking down his only living survivor took a bit of detective work, too, Emory said. Failing to locate them through a records search, he contacted the Kalamazoo newspaper, which ran an article about the successful identification and the attempt to locate Hickok's sister. The article made its way to the Internet, and eventually Hickok was able to make contact with Marilyn "Kay" Woodring, now living in Florida. "She was astounded," Woodring said. He was looking forward to meeting her for the first time today, at Hickok's funeral. Harris said it's important to identify all unknowns from past conflicts to acknowledge and honor each individual's sacrifice. Of the 88,000 unaccounted-for Americans from all conflicts, 78,000 are from World War II. "To acknowledge the commitments of the dead, we also recognize the loss incurred by their family and friends and, while we can never return their loved one, we can offer them the solace that comes with knowing what happened and being able to bury them," she said. "We recommit ourselves to a national sentiment that we will not leave our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines behind and we won't forget their sacrifice." (Compiled from Defense Department and Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command releases and an interview by American Forces Press Service.)

 

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Farewell to a warrior

Submitted by Moffat Mamu on 24 February, 2006 - 4:21pm. Weekend Magazine

IT is the 10th January 1943. The men of the US Army’s L Company, 3rd Battalion, 35th Infantry (L/3/35) are moving into an area known as Sea Horse.
It is called Sea Horse because of its shape when viewed from the air. The western slope of Sea Horse drops down to a river called the Matanikau.
Sea Horse and the Matanikau River are on an island called Guadalcanal.
The Battle of Guadalcanal began with the landing of the US 1st Marine Division on 7th August 1942.
The Marines quickly took the almost completed Japanese airfield and renamed it Henderson field.
This was followed by a violent six months long struggle with the Japanese as both sides tried to win control of the island and its precious airfield.
By January 1943 the Americal and 25th Divisions of the US Army had joined in the battle.
The men of L Company are part of the 25th Division. Private Martin P Odenthal is a member of L Company. When war broke out he had enlisted in the services at the same time as his brothers including Albert, who was also on Guadalcanal.
To move into position for the attack on Sea Horse a wide flanking movement behind Mount Austen was used. L Company and the 3rd Battalion were moving deeper into the jungle than any American unit had been. It was hard work.
The jungle is thick and the terrain is difficult as L Company finally approaches Sea Horse.
The Japanese are well dug in and it is now up to the men of the 3rd Battalion to clear the Sea Horse of the enemy.
The arrow at the bottom right of the screen shows the direction of the advance of the 3rd Battalion 35th Infantry.
Jungle view of the approach to Sea Horse.
The enemy is engaged and Private Martin Odenthal goes into action firing his M1-Garrand rifle. The fighting is fierce; two Medals of Honor, America’s highest award for bravery are earned in the action. The men of the 3rd Battalion take the Ridge but suffer many casualties. In the six months struggle for Guadalcanal more than 31,000 Japanese and 7,000 Americans died in the fighting.
Private Martin P Odenthal is one of them.
During a lull in the battle Martin’s buddies bury him where he fell.
One of his two dog tags is taken to give to Grave Registration the other one is left on Martin in the grave.
Martin’s buddies continue with their job of fighting the enemy. It is up to the people at Grave Registration to recover those that have fallen. In the later search for Martin, the people from Graves Registration failed to find his location remote and deep in the jungle.
It is now January 2006 Sam Besi from Barana Village on Mount Austen goes to the Sea Horse looking for an American helmet to put on display in the village. He comes upon fighting positions and foxholes and starts his search.
Whilst digging, he finds bones with an American dog tag. He immediately reports his find to other people in the village and to John Innes. John is a WWII historian who runs a Computer business on Guadalcanal.
He takes John and four others to the grave site. After visiting the site and armed with the details from the dog tag a computer is used to establish that Martin P Odenthal is listed as KIA (Killed in Action) in 1943.
The computer is also used to find Martin’s family and contact is made. His brother and the rest of the family were amazed that he had been found. Their reaction was predictably emotional.
When asked “do you want the remains left in the grave?” their response was a firm “no we want him home!”
As a result of that request a forensic team from the Solomon Island Police force was taken to the grave site and recovered the remains.
Here a NZ contingent of the Solomon Island Police forensic team is at the grave site with the discoverers from Barana Village.
A Karakia is being offered. A Karakia is a Maori prayer paying respect to a spiritual presence.
In Martin’s grave/fighting position 35 cartridges from Martins rifle were found, all fired!
Later in the fighting Martin’s brother Albert also loses his life. Another brother Ralph, who is in the US Navy, is sent home when news came that his two brothers had been killed.
The US Army has a command based in Hawaii known as JPAC (Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command) who were notified of the discovery of Martin.
Their duty is to find and collect remains that are found of US servicemen killed in action.
JPAC use their resources to confirm the identity of remains found and return them with full ceremony and honors to the family of those killed.
Last week Martin Odenthal began his journey home. He was sent to JPAC so they can prepare his final homecoming to his family.
His departure was not anonymous and unrecognized. A contingent of the Solomon Island Police and Military from RAMSI were there to pay there respects in a ceremonial farewell to a fallen warrior and hero of the Battle of Guadalcanal.

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http://www.thepilot.com/news/022206Hero.html
DNA Identifies Flier's Body in China: Hero Returning - Finally

BY JOHN CHAPPELL: Staff Writer

Hoyle Upchurch is coming home. It took a long time.

Upchurch was lost in World War II when his P-40 crashed in China. A monument stands beside the United Methodist Church in High Falls, where he grew up.

It bears his name, but he is not buried there.

His remains, now identified through DNA tests, long lay buried under a simple cross in the mountains of China. His family back here, like many such families, was officially notified that Lt. Robert Hoyle Upchurch had been reported Missing in Action near Kanchow Airbase, on Oct. 6, 1944.

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http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/02/03/airman.identified/
Friday, February 3, 2006; Posted: 10:58 p.m. EST (03:58 GMT) 

Frozen WWII airman identified
Climbers found body in glacier, near where training craft crashed

From CNN Correspondent Thelma Gutierrez
and Senior Producer Dree De Clamecy

ORANGE PARK, Florida (CNN) -- The U.S. military has identified the body of a World War II airman that climbers found in October at the bottom of a glacier in the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

Family members said they learned this week that the man was 22-year-old Army Air Corps cadet Leo Mustonen, who died in a 1942 plane crash.

Mustonen joined the Army during his senior year in high school in Brainerd, Minnesota, and was in training to become a navigator when he was reported missing on November 18, 1942.

Mustonen was son of Finnish immigrants. He was one of four cadets aboard a training flight that crashed in the Sierra Nevada mountains east of Fresno....... 
click on the above link for the entire story

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http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060122/OPED0301/601220314

Airman's remains recovered
Wreckage discovered decades after other remains buried

Published Sunday, Jan 22, 2006

On Sept. 13, 1944, 20-year-old turret gunner Wesley Stuart of French Camp was shot down in his three-man Avenger bomber as it pounded Japanese positions in a desperate battle over a speck of a Pacific island called Peleliu.

Neither Stuart's body, crew mates nor aircraft were ever found

Now, after more than 60 years, Stuart's remains finally may be coming home to his Stockton sister, Mary Roberts, and his other family.

The twist is that the Navy already sent what it thought were Stuart's remains home once, in 1948.

The remains were not positively identified. So the family had doubts. Still, they held services. They entombed the remains in a French Camp mausoleum. The crypt bears Stuart's name.

"I was overwhelmed," stammered Roberts, 74. "I mean, I - I just couldn't even think, you know? After 61 years to have this happen. My mind was just - it was mind-boggling."...

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Tue December 27, 2005
Location of fallen troops’ remains brings certainty to their relatives

By Jay Marks
The Oklahoman

Lee Gordon got an early Christmas gift this year, courtesy of the Defense Department.

The Shawnee native learned this month the military has recovered the remains of her brother, Navy Seaman 2nd Class Dee Hall, who died in an Alaska plane crash in 1942.

Gordon, who was 11, said she always wondered if somehow her brother had survived the crash.

“It was only this year that we found out what had really happened,” the Floresville, Texas, resident said in a telephone interview last week. “To me, it’s a wonderful Christmas present.”.....

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SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1152AP_Navy_WWII_Remains.html

Thursday, December 15, 2005 · Last updated 4:20 p.m. PT

Pentagon identifies Navy sailor from 1941

By ROBERT BURNS
AP MILITARY WRITER

WASHINGTON -- One week after the 64th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Pentagon announced on Thursday that the remains of a Navy sailor missing in action from the historic attack have been identified by forensic experts and will be returned to his family for burial.

He is Seaman 2nd Class Warren P. Hickok of Kalamazoo, Mich.

It marks the second time this week that the Pentagon has announced an identification of remains of a Navy serviceman lost in World War II.

On Wednesday it was Seaman 2nd Class Dee Hall, one of seven crewmen aboard a Navy PBY-5 Catalina aircraft that crashed on the Japanese-held island of Kiska after having flown from Kodiak Island, Alaska, on June 14, 1942, to attack Japanese targets on Kiska.

In Thursday's announcement, the Pentagon said Hickok was assigned to the USS Sicard, a mine-laying ship, when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. He and other crewmen of the Sicard were sent to help the crew of another ship, the USS Cummings, a Navy destroyer docked near the Sicard. The Cummings managed to get underway and clear the harbor, with no casualties reported.

During an investigation to determine who was still unaccounted for after the attack, it was surmised that Hickok may have been killed aboard the battleship USS Pennsylvania; it was known that some of the Sicard's crew had been dispatched to the Pennsylvania during the attack.

In the days following the attack, many of the dead who could not be identified were buried in Nuuanu Cemetery on the island of Oahu. Among them was an unknown sailor identified only as "X-2."

After the war, the Army Graves Registration Service oversaw the disinterment of unknown remains, including those of X-2. They could not be identified, however, and were reburied in Grave 731 at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, known as the Punchbowl, on June 9, 1949.

In 2004, an amateur historian, whom the Pentagon did not identify by name in its announcement Thursday, contacted the Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command in Hawaii and suggested that the remains in Grave 731 may include those of Hickok. The grave was exhumed in June 2005, and forensic anthropologists of the Joint POW-MIA Accounting Command were able to match those remains, including dental remains, with detailed information found in Hickok's World War II medical and dental records.

 

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Bodies identified of missing WWII crewmen

Navy plane took off from Kodiak to attack Japanese on Chain

Article published on Thursday, December 15th, 2005

By KRISTEN INBODY

Mirror Writer

On June 14, 1942, Oklahoma native Dee Hall and six other Navy crewmen took off from Kodiak in a Navy plane to attack the Japanese on the Aleutian island of Kiska, which the Japanese had invaded eight days earlier.

Amid stormy weather and Japanese anti-aircraft fire, their flying boat exploded, littering the side of Kiska Volcano with pieces of burning metal.

Like 78,000 World War II servicemen, they remained unaccounted for. Until now.

The Department of Defense announced Wednesday that all seven servicemen have been identified through DNA testing and dental forensics.

Hall is the first returned to his family. He will be buried today at the Fort Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio with full military honors.

Other members of the crew included pilot Leland Davis, copilot Robert Keller and crewmen Albert Gyorfi, Robert Smith, Elwin Alford and John Hathaway, according to information on the POW Network Web page.

Their families are still working through the briefing process, where they review with the agency reports on the testing.

The Japanese held Kiska Island until July 1943.

“The Japanese were on Alaskan soil. Strategically, it was not very important, but psychologically it was very important,” said Joe Stevens, president of the Kodiak Military History Museum.

The Japanese intended the Aleutians Campaign to divert American forces from other battles in the Pacific and to psychologically jar Americans by establishing a foothold in their nation.

Kodiak was the headquarters for the North Pacific Campaign.

After U.S. forces retook Attu at the western tip of the Aleutians, the 5,100 Japanese troops at Kiska Harbor sneaked out the night of July 28, 1943.

U.S. and Canadian forces invaded anyway, and 313 allied soldiers died from “friendly fire,” mines and bobby traps, according to the Aleutian World War II National Historic Area.

An American search team found the Kodiak crew’s PBY-5 Catalina on the side of Kiska volcano. They buried the crew in a common grave with a wooden marker reading, “Seven U.S. N. Airmen.”

In 1946 and 1947, search teams attempted to relocate the crew but were hindered by heavy snow. The seven missing crewmen were dubbed “non-recoverable.”

Sixty years after the plane from Kodiak crashed, Ian Jones, a Nova Scotia biology professor researching the impact of Norway rats on Kiska’s auklet population, told the Department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office that he’d found the wreckage of a World War II plane on Kiska volcano.

The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command excavated the crash site in August 2003 and found debris from the plane and personal items from the crew.

The remains were found near the wooden marker.

Laboratory analysis, including DNA testing and dental forensics, led to the individual identification of all seven crewmen.

Hall’s sister, Lee Gordon, told The Associated Press that her brother, 18 when he died, didn’t even live long enough to have a Social Security card or a girlfriend.

“We’re just so grateful that he’s finally coming home after 63 years,” Gordon said. “They’re still finding people and bringing them home to their families. To me, that’s important. They never gave up.”

The POW/MIA office reports that of the 88,000 unaccounted for Americans from conflicts since 1941, 89 percent are World War II servicemen.

In October, the POW/MIA office identified the remains of three World War II airmen whose plane crashed in Panama in 1941.

The department also is working on a recovery case from the Pearl Harbor attack, said Larry Greer, public affairs officer for the Department of Defense POW/MIA matters.

“Finding World War II missing in action is a difficult detective case,” he said. “These remains are more than 60 years old, but there’s a much larger number.”

The central identification laboratory in Hawaii, which identified the Kiska remains, also has worked on identifying remains from a Civil War submarine and has successfully identified a World War I soldier, though his identity has not been announced as the agency works with his family.

Most Americans are unaware that such extensive efforts to recover soldiers’ remains continues after a conflict, said Ken Terry, who heads the POW-MIA section of the Navy casualty office.

He said it may take one to five years to identify remains, especially if the servicemen died in a group, such as was the case with the Kiska crash.

“We’re all trying to resolve these issues for the family, to provide closure for the families and honor the men who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country,” Terry said.

Mirror writer Kristen Inbody may be reached via e-mail at kinbody@kodiakdailymirror.com.

 

 

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No. 1294-05
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Dec 14, 2005
Navy Seaman MIA from World War II is Identified

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from World War II, have been identified and returned to his family for burial tomorrow with full military honors.

Seaman 2nd Class Dee Hall, of Syra, Okla. He is to be buried at the Ft. Sam Houston National Cemetery in San Antonio.

Hall was one of seven crewmen aboard a U.S. Navy PBY-5 Catalina that took off from Kodiak Island, Alaska on June 14, 1942, to attack Japanese targets in Kiska Harbor, Alaska.

The crew encountered inclement weather and heavy Japanese anti-aircraft fire near the target. Their plane crashed on the Japanese-held Kiska Island, Alaska with all seven crewmen on board.

In August 1943, the United States retook Kiska Island from the Japanese. Wreckage of the PBY-5 was found on the side of Kiska volcano. The remains of the crew were buried in a common grave marked "Seven U.S.N. Airmen" with a wooden marker. Following the war, attempts to locate the common grave were unsuccessful and the remains of all seven were declared to be non-recoverable.

In 2002, a wildlife biologist notified DPMO that he had found the wreckage of a World War II aircraft on the slope of Kiska volcano. Using that information, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) excavated the crash site in August 2003 and found debris from the PBY-5 as well as crew-related items. The JPAC team also located the wooden marker as well as the remains buried nearby. Subsequent JPAC laboratory analysis led to the individual identification of all seven crewmembers.

Of the 88,000 unaccounted-for Americans from all conflicts, 78,000 are from World War II. For additional information visit the DPMO Web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.

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Narrowing down ID of airman frozen in the Sierra
Military has list of 10 missing World War II flyer

Suzanne Herel, Chronicle Staff Writer

Thursday, October 20, 2005

Investigators for a U.S. military unit formed to account for missing war veterans have compiled a list of fewer than 10 missing World War II Army airmen who could have crashed in Kings Canyon National Park in the early 1940s and whose remains could be those of an ice-encased soldier thawing out in the Fresno County morgue.

Ice climbers discovered the man last weekend at the base of Mount Mendel, in the extreme northern portion of the park's mountainous wilderness. On Wednesday, park rangers and a forensic anthropologist from the military's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command chipped the man out of the ice.

A helicopter then delivered the airman to the Fresno County morgue Wednesday night, said Coroner Lori Cervantes. He was lying on a big wooden tray, entombed in about 400 pounds of ice and granite and zipped into several layers of body bags, she said.

Thursday morning, he was in refrigerated storage "just like anyone else would be," said Cervantes, who planned to move the body on Thursday afternoon to a room in the morgue where the thawing process would begin. She said she planned to place a basin underneath the table holding the soldier to collect the dripping water.

"We'll be thawing him out just like you would thaw anything else," she said.

The forensic anthropologist from the POW/MIA Accounting group who helped chisel the veteran out of the glacier was expected to arrive at the morgue late Thursday afternoon, when he and the coroner's staff would decide the extent of examination that should take place there.

Already, the coroner's investigators have X-rayed a portion of the remains in hopes of detecting dog tags. They found none.

Cervantes said she had never seen anything like the old, icy remains.

"It's amazing," she said. "He's been in the ice for 62 years. He's basically mummified."

The man's head, shoulders and upper arms protruded from the ice but were still frozen, she said. The skin covering his face and arms was black and looked like leather, but his head still sported dark blond hair, she said.

The man wore a green cable knit sweater over green thermal underwear, said Cervantes. "His arms are outstretched, like a bird almost."

He also wore an unopened parachute stenciled with the words, "U.S. Army Air Corps.," which preceded the formation of the U.S. Air Force in 1947.

"As coroners, this is a once-in-a-lifetime -- if ever -- opportunity, to recover someone like this," she said. "It's kind of what we live for here."

Already, Cervantes has received several phone calls from people who heard about the discovery and wanted to offer possible identities. One call in particular, from a woman in the Midwest, seemed promising, she said.

Another man contacted The Chronicle, saying that the remains could be those of a cousin, a military flight instructor from San Francisco who disappeared over the Sierra Nevadas.

"Marky flew off across the Sierras and was never heard from again," he wrote.

Investigators in Hawaii, too, have been combing the records of men lost during World War II. According to Troy Kitch, a spokesman for the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, between 25 and 30 military planes crashed on training missions in California during the war years. They narrowed down the list of possible identifications judging by locations of found wrecks and previously identified bodies.

Kitch said that regardless of what tests are done on the body in Fresno, the remains eventually would be flown to the unit's headquarters on Hickam Air Force Base in Oahu, Hawaii, home to the world's largest forensic anthropological lab.

The military unit was formed in 2003 and tasked with accounting for as many of the country's missing war veterans as possible. There are 88,000 war veterans reported missing. Of those, 78,000 are from World War II.

"It's just really an exciting opportunity. It's kind of what we live for here," Cervantes said. "We can't change what happened, but we can do good work and help someone."

E-mail Suzanne Herel at sherel@sfchronicle.com.

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No. 1056-05
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Oct 18, 2005

Airmen Missing from World War II Identified

The remains of three U.S. servicemen, missing in action since 1941, have been identified and are being returned to their families for burial with full military honors.

They are Army Air Forces 2nd Lt. Augustus J. Allen, of Myrtle Springs, Texas, Staff Sgt. James D. Cartwright, of Los Angeles, Calif., and Cpl. Paul R. Stubbs, of Haverhill, Mass.

On June 8, 1941, Allen, Cartwright and Stubbs departed France Field, Panama in an O-47A aircraft, en route to Rio Hato, Panama. When the aircraft failed to arrive at its destination, a search was initiated by both air and ground forces, but with negative results.

In April 1999, a Panamanian citizen reported to Panamanian Civil Aeronautics (PCA) he had discovered aircraft wreckage while hunting in the mountains of Panama Province, Republic of Panama. After a PCA search and rescue team visited the site, the wreckage was reported to the Joint Prisoner of War Accounting Command (JPAC). JPAC specialists surveyed the area in August 1999, and in February 2002 excavated the site where they recovered remains and crew-related artifacts. The crash site was along Allen's suspected flight path, and the aircraft was consistent with O-47A aircraft from the 39th Observation Squadron, their assigned unit. Additionally, the team recovered crew-related items at the site which helped confirm the identity of the airmen.

Scientists of JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Lab used mitochondrial DNA as one of the tools in the identification of the remains of Allen, Cartwright and Stubbs.

Of the 88,000 Americans missing in action from World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War, the Vietnam War, and Desert Storm, 78,000 are from World War II.

For additional information on the Department of Defense's mission to account for missing Americans, visit the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) Website at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo, or call (703) 699-1169.

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09/12/2005
MICHAEL RUBINKAM
Associated Press

ALLENTOWN, Pa. - The remains of a Korean War veteran from Pennsylvania who was listed as missing in action nearly 55 years ago have been identified, a funeral home said.

Army Cpl. Edwin C. Steigerwalt, 22, of Lehighton, will be buried in Allentown on Friday with full military honors, according to the Heintzelman Funeral Home, which is handling arrangements.

Steigerwalt was last seen Nov. 30, 1950, as his unit fought Chinese forces near Chosin Reservoir in North Korea. After his remains were turned over by North Korea in 1993, they were sent to a military laboratory in Hawaii for DNA analysis.

Steigerwalt's remains were identified March 16, said Erika Ruthman, spokeswoman for the U.S. Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command in Hawaii. She said she did not know why it took so long for the remains to be identified...

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No. 750-05

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Jul 22, 2005

Korean War Missing In Action Serviceman Identified

            The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from the Korean War, have been identified and are being returned to his family for burial with full military honors.

            He is Cpl. Leslie R. Heath, of Bridgeport, Ill.  His interment is scheduled for Aug. 20 in Bridgeport. 

            On the morning of April 23, 1951, Heath and more than 80 members of 'A' Company, 1st Battalion, 5th Regimental Combat Team were captured by Chinese Communist forces.  They were held in a temporary POW camp known as Suan Camp Complex, in North Hwanghae Province, North Korea.  A former American POW who was

returned to the U.S. through Operation Little Switch recounted that Heath died in June 1951 while imprisoned.

            On July 16, 1993, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea returned 17 boxes of remains to the United States from the Korean War.  One of the boxes contained remains of several individuals and two of Heath's identification tags. Scientists of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) conducted years of forensic examinations of the remains and associated evidence until they made an identification two months ago.

            Information provided by the North Koreans about the recovered remains was consistent with the approximate location where Heath was believed held captive and died.  Artifacts in the boxes were those of a soldier in the U.S. Army infantry at the time of the war.

            JPAC submitted skeletal remains on 11 occasions to the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory for analysis.  Heath's mitochondrial DNA sequence matched that of two of his maternal relatives.

            Of the 88,000 Americans unaccounted for from World War II, the Korean War, the Cold War, the Vietnam War and Desert Storm, more than 8,100 are from the Korean War.  More than 2,000 of those were held as prisoners of war.

            For additional information on the Department of Defense's mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO Web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.

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No. 661-05
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jun 30, 2005
Korean War Missing in Action Serviceman Identified

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a U.S. Army soldier, missing in action from the Korean War, have been identified and are being returned to his family for burial in Schererville, Ind.

He is Pfc. Lowell W. Bellar of Gary, Ind. He is to be buried on July 15, the date of his birth in 1931.

In November - December 1950, Bellar's unit, Company M, 31st Infantry Regiment, was surrounded and overrun by Chinese Communist forces near the Chosin Reservoir in northeast North Korea. Elements of his unit joined other U.S. forces in the breakout and fighting retreat to relative safety further south to an area near the village of Hagaru. Regimental records compiled after the battle indicate that Bellar was killed in action Dec. 1, 1950. More than 1,000 men, primarily Marines and Army soldiers, are still missing in North Korea from the Chosin campaign.

Joint U.S.-North Korean recovery teams, led by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) excavated a site in North Korea in September 2001, and again in October, that was believed to be the location where American soldiers were buried. They recovered remains believed to be those of 12 individuals, some of which were la ter identified as those of Bellar.

Laboratory analysis of the remains by forensic scientists at JPAC led to Bellar's identification. Comparisons of Bellar's mitochondrial DNA data with samples from his family were key factors in their finding.

Of the 88,000 Americans unaccounted for from all conflicts, approximately 8,100 are from the Korean War. Remains believed to be those of more than 220 American servicemen have been recovered in joint operations in North Korea since 1996.

=================
No. 650-05

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Jun 27, 2005

Korean War Missing in Action Serviceman Identified

 

            The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced

today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from the Korean War,

have been identified and are being returned to his family for burial in Fergus

Falls, Minn. on Wednesday.

            He is Cpl. John O. Strom of Fergus Falls, Minn.

            On the night of Nov. 1, 1950, Strom's unit, 1st Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, came under attack by Chinese communist forces near the village of Unsan in North Korea.  His battalion sought to escape the larger Chinese unit, and evacuated along a route well documented in U.S. records.

            The fighting raged on for several days, and by Nov. 4, those men able to escape withdrew to friendly lines south of the Kuryong River, though more than 380 soldiers of the 8th Cavalry Regiment were unaccounted for.

            In July and August 2002, a joint team of U.S. and North Korean specialists investigated a site near Unsan where a villager had reportedly reburied remains believed to be those of a U.S. serviceman from another location.  The team, led by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), excavated both sites and found human remains as well as a few pieces of non-biological evidence.  The team was also given Strom's military identification tag found by the villager.....

 

======================

NEWS RELEASE from the United States Department of Defense

 

No. 617-05

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Jun 17, 2005

WWII Missing in Action Soldiers Identified

 

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of two Army soldiers missing in action from World War II have been identified and returned to their families for burial.

            They are Sgt. John T. Puckett, Wichita, Kan., and Pvt. Earnest E. Brown, Bristol, Va. Puckett will be buried tomorrow at the Ardennes American Cemetery, Neupre, Belgium.  Brown was buried last week near Bristol, Va.

            On Jan. 15, 1945, during the Battle of the Bulge, Puckett and Brown were searching for German soldiers in a wooded area near Elsenborn, Belgium.  They were ambushed and came under intense enemy machine gun and mortar fire. Eyewitnesses indicated they were killed, but their bodies could not be recovered due to enemy activity.

            Following the war, remains of American soldiers were recovered and identified, but not those of Puckett and Brown.  Then in 1992, two Belgian nationals located and excavated an abandoned fighting position in the forest east of Elsenborn.  They recovered remains and other evidence and turned them over to U.S. authorities in Europe.

            Scientists of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory used mitochondrial DNA as one of the forensic tools to identify the remains as those of Puckett and Brown.

            Of the 88,000 Americans missing in action from all conflicts, 78,000 are from World War II.

===============

Posted on Wed, Jun. 08, 2005

She'll bury beloved brother, 60 years after he died BY KATHERINE LEAL UNMUTH The Wichita Eagle For years after Sgt. John Puckett of Wichita went missing in action in the Battle of the Bulge in 1945, his younger sister clung to hope he was alive. "It took me some years to believe that he wasn't coming back," said Joann Bowman of her brother, known as Jack, who was 21 when he died. "He was my hero in the sense that because he was older I looked up to him as having the knowledge to help me." More than 60 years after his death during World War II, she will finally get closure. On Tuesday, Bowman, 78, will travel from her home in Pasadena, Calif., to the Ardennes American Cemetery and Memorial in Belgium to bury some of her brother's remains. With a blood sample from Bowman, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command in Hawaii identified Puckett's bones through DNA testing this spring. The bones were originally recovered in 1992 by the 99th MIA Project, a group of American and Belgian volunteers who seek to recover the remains of missing soldiers. Bowman decided it was best to bury her brother where his remains had rested for so many years. The Battle of the Bulge took place in the Ardennes region in December 1944 and January 1945, as the Germans attempted to divide the Allied forces with a massive counteroffensive. Thousands were killed.......

===============

May 20, 2005
Release No. 047

AFPC: Keeping the faith

By Maj. Gen. Tony Przybyslawski
AFPC commander

RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas -- This Memorial Day the Air Force will lay to rest, Capt. Troy Cope, a Korean War veteran; his family will find peace at last, and the Air Force Personnel Center missing persons team will close the case of another unaccounted-for Airman.

Although Captain Cope's F-86 crashed more than 50 years ago near the China/North Korea border, his country never gave up its efforts to bring him home.

===========

April 20, 2005

Navy divers search for remains of downed WW II fliers

By Christopher Munsey
Times staff writer

Seventeen members of Hawaii-based Mobile Diving and Salvage Unit One are using their diving skills to help find remains of American fliers lost in a World War II bombing raid in the Pacific.

The recovery team is searching the wreckage of a B-24J Liberator bomber lost to Japanese anti-aircraft fire during a raid Sept. 1, 1944, in the Palau island chain.

The recovery team was sent out by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, said spokeswoman Army Maj. Rumi Nielson-Green.

The four-engine bomber was shot down with 11 crew members, crashing offshore between the islands of Koror and Babelthuap. Three crew members were captured and later executed by the Japanese, while it’s believed that eight went down with the aircraft, Nielson-Green said.

Wreckage of the aircraft is strewn across an area offshore in water ranging from 34 to 54 feet deep, she said.

“If we didn’t have the MDSU guys involved, it’d be difficult for us to run this operation,” she said.

The work will run until late May, she said.

MDSU-1 previously assisted with a recovery off the coast of Vietnam, she said.

=========================

No. 352-05

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Apr 12, 2005

WWII Missing in Action Serviceman Identified

 

            The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of an Army Air Forces crewman have been identified and are being returned to his family for burial with military honors.

            Staff Sgt. Robert W. McKee of Garvey, Calif., will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery April 12.

            On Dec. 17, 1944, McKee was an aerial gunner on an 11-member crew of a B-24L *Liberator* that took off from Pantanella, Italy, on a mission to bomb enemy targets near Blechhammer, Germany.  The aircraft crashed over Hungary, near the small towns of Böhönye and Felsosegesd, with the loss of two crewmen including McKee.  The other nine were able to safely parachute from the aircraft.  Following the war, the remains of the other unaccounted-for crewman were found in a cemetery in Felsosegesd.
            Following the war, remains from an American aircraft crash near Vienna, Austria, were found buried with McKee’s military identification tag.  But the remains were identified as those of another flyer.  Further analysis revealed that McKee had flown on the same plane and had lost his identification tag, most likely on that aircraft.

            In 1992 an undertaker recovered remains believed to be those of an American in the Böhönye, Hungary, cemetery but they could not be associated with a specific incident.  DPMO analysts obtained information from a Hungarian researcher which indicated that the remains might be associated with McKee’s loss.  Aerial gunner’s wings were found in the grave, as well as other items worn by U.S. bomber crews in 1944.
            Scientists of the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory used a number of forensic tools including mitochondrial DNA to confirm McKee’s identity, matching his DNA with that of two known maternal relatives.

            Of the 88,000 Americans missing from all conflicts, 78,000 are from World War II.

=======================

Posted on Thu, Apr. 07, 2005

Local soldier who died in WWII coming home The remains of Cpl. Curtis Longenberger, who died in 1942, were found in 1999. By BONNIE ADAMS badams@leader.net BERWICK – Cpl. Curtis Longenberger’s late mother added a spare bedroom onto her home with his life insurance money, believing her missing son would someday return from World War II. After 63 years, his remains are coming home. Longenberger was among those identified in the wreckage of a B-17 bomber that a villager discovered in the jungles of Papua New Guinea in 1999. He was a tail gunner on the plane, which crashed in October 1942. Since then, he had remained among the more than 78,000 service members still unaccounted for in the second World War......

 

WWII vet's remains found Edwin Alford family members sought by Navy BY BOB ANN BRELAND THE DAILY NEWS BOGALUSA -- A Bogalusan is among seven World War II Navy aviators whose remains have been recovered from the side of a volcano in the Aleutian Islands. Petty Officer 3rd Class Elwin Alford, who enlisted in the U.S. Navy in New Orleans on May 21, 1941, is identified as one of the crewmen. They were aboard a twin-engine PBY-5A amphibious reconnaissance aircraft when it was shot down June 14, 1942 on Kiska Island, which Japanese forces occupied during part of World War II. The crash site was at the 2,750 level of the northwest face of Kiska Volcano. He was born Oct. 11, 1922 in Bogalusa and his parents were Warren E. Alford and Belle H. Alford. They are reportedly buried in Hurricane Creek Baptist Church Cemetery in Sandy Hook, MS. "It is of the utmost importance that we find these families, because our mission is to make sure no stone is left unturned in resolving these cases," said Navy Lt. Robert Sanchez, with the POW/MIA Branch of the Navy Personnel Command in Memphis, TN. According to military records, an American search team first found the wreckage in 1943 and buried the crewmen in a common grave at the crash site. Attempts were also made in 1946 and 1947 to recover the remains, but heavy snow prevented the search team from reaching the site. An associate professor of biology at a university in Canada found the wreckage site while doing research on the island in 2001. The crash site had a cross with the words "Seven U.S. airmen." The recovered bodies include those of Warrant Officer Leland Davis, pilot; co-pilot Ensign Robert F. Keller, Petty Officers 3rd Class Albert L. Gyorfi, Robert A. Smith and Elwin Alford, Petty Officer 2nd Class John H. Hathaway and Seaman 2nd Class Dee Hall. The crew was assigned to Patrol Squadron 43. The Navy wants to find Alford's family members in order to return his remains for proper burial with honor. They have found four families of the crewmen so far and are still searching for the rest. John Cloe, a historian for the Alaskan NORAD Region and Alaskan Command at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska listed the crew members in his book, "The Aleutian Warriors," a History of the 11th Air Force and Fleet Wing 4. Cloe's account of the mission is in this book, with information coming from the naval history of Patrol Air Wing 4. The pilot and crew headed into the flak-filled skies over Kiska and their plane was hit by Japanese anti-aircraft fire. The records say the plane suddenly came apart in a violent explosion and pieces of burning metal fluttered down to the hillside below. Cloe said Pilot Davis was the last casualty of what was called the Kiska Blitz, the consistent bombing of Japanese targets in Kiska Harbor. The recovery team consisted of nine specialists who used DNA from a maternal line blood sample to compare DNA from a bone fragment of a deceased service member. This comparison can lead to the identification of remains and is used in 50 percent of the cases. Family members of unaccounted-for service people are encouraged to submit a reference DNA sample to go on file. Records indicate there are more than 78,000 Americans unaccounted for from World War II, 8,100 from the Korean War and 1,800 from the Vietnam War. There are also 120 service members missing from the Cold War and one from the Persian Gulf War. Anyone with any knowledge of any of Alford's family members are asked to contact Lt. Robert V. Sanchez toll free at 1-800-443-9298, by e-mail at robert.v.sanchez@navy.mil or by fax a 901-874-8854 DSN 882.

NEWS RELEASE from the United States Department of Defense

 

No. 304-05

IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Mar 31, 2005

Cold War Missing In Action Aviator Identified

 

          The Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) has announced that the remains of the co-pilot of an aircraft shot down in China during the Cold War have been identified and will soon be returned to his family.

 

            He is Robert C. Snoddy of Roseburg, Ore.

 

            Snoddy and his pilot, Norman A. Schwartz, took off from an airfield near Seoul, South Korea, on Nov. 29, 1952, with two other crewmembers to extract a CIA operative from China.  The mission in the Jilin province of northeast China was planned to pick up the agent on the ground with an airborne extraction system.

 

            Unfortunately, the Chinese had compromised the agent on the ground, and when the C-47 aircraft flew over the pickup point it was shot down by hostile ground fire.  Snoddy and Schwartz were reportedly killed, and two other

crewmembers, Richard G. Fecteau and John T. Downey, were captured by the Chinese and held until 1971 and 1973, respectively.....

==============================

Deseret Morning News

March 17, 2005

 

WWII Utah airman finally home

Leigh Dethman, Deseret Morning News

It seemed Sgt. Mac S. Groesbeck had long been forgotten.

His B-17 bomber crashed decades ago, and the entire eight-man crew had been given up for dead and presumed drowned in the Pacific.

Yet since that fateful 1942 bombing mission, the Utah airman's family never gave up hope. It took more than 62 years to finally bring Groesbeck home for a proper burial.

"It's amazing," his younger brother, Les Groesbeck, said. "We never thought he would come back home."

On Nov. 1, 1942, the crew embarked on a pre-dawn World War II mission to bomb Japanese shipping installations near Faisi Island in the Solomon Islands. It was supposed to be one of the last missions the crew would face before heading home.

Military experts believe the plane never made it to its target. Scattered thunderstorms dotted the skies, and the B-17 slammed into the northern side of a ridge line. At first, the military told the crew's families that they were missing in action.

No one knew what had happened to the plane. The thick brush of the Papua New Guinea jungle safeguarded the B-17 "Flying Fortress" from the outside world for more than 56 years. 

It wasn't until a villager stumbled upon the wreckage on Feb. 24, 1999, that the answers to the many unanswered questions finally came to light. The hunter brought a curious Red Cross worker to the crash site, and the pair found dog tags, a watch, a comb and other personal items at the scene. 

Military authorities first visited the site soon after in 1999 and then sent crews from the Army's Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii to excavate the site in May 2001. After two months of digging, the remains were sent back to the laboratory in Hawaii. DNA testing identified six of the eight members of the crew, including Groesbeck.......

=============================
03/2005
Remains are not pilot's in China spy mission

Louisvillian Schwartz shot down in 1952
By Sheryl Edelen
sedelen@courier-journal.com

The Courier-Journal

U.S. military investigators analyzing materials from the site of a plane crash in China that killed a Louisville pilot on a CIA mission in 1952 have identified remains found there as those of his co-pilot.

The family of pilot Norman Schwartz, who grew up in the Camp Taylor area, had thought the remains might be his.

Erik Kirzinger, Schwartz's nephew who lives in North Carolina, said by telephone last night that he was notified by a CIA casualty officer that the remains were those of Robert Snoddy of Roseburg, Ore.......

=============

Remains of missing U.S. soldier found in China to be returned.

 BEIJING, Feb. 28 Kyodo

 

  The remains of a U.S. Air Force pilot shot down in the Korean War have turned up in China and will be sent back to the United States for burial with full military honors, the U.S. Embassy in Beijing said.

  Capt. Troy Cope was identified in October after a U.S. government investigation conducted following the 1995 discovery of his dog tag in a Chinese military museum, the embassy said in a statement.

  On Sept. 16, 1952, Cope, flying an F-86 Saber Jet near the Yalu River on the China-North Korea border, was apparently downed in a dogfight with six North Korean Air Force MiG-15s flown by Russian pilots......

================

http://www.myplainview.com/APTexas/parsed/stories/D88JJ1GG1.shtml

World War II soldier´s remains found in Germany
The Associated Press
March 3, 2005

A military funeral is planned next week for Pfc. Preston "Pug" Harris, a World War II soldier whose remains were recently discovered and returned to Texas.

In 1944, the 23-year-old soldier from Greenville was part of the 405th Infantry Regiment, 102nd Infantry Division that was fighting along the heavily fortified Siegfried Line near the German-Netherlands border.

Records show that Harris was killed Nov. 22, 1944, near Beeck, Germany. Harris was officially listed as killed in action, but the location of his body was unknown. The family was told that he might have been buried in an unmarked grave at a military cemetery in the Netherlands....

================

Missing Korean War Serviceman Identified

DoD Press Release
2005-02-25

The Department of Defense announced today that the remains of a U. S. Air Force pilot, missing in action from the Korean War, has been identified and will soon be returned to his family for burial with full military honors.

Air Force Captain Troy “Gordie” Cope of Norfolk, Ark., will be buried in Plano, Texas, on May 31.

On Sept. 16, 1952, Cope and his wingman, both flying F-86 Saber Jets from Kimpo Air Base in South Korea, encountered six MiG-15s of the North Korean Air Force. Cope was flying near the Yalu River, separating North Korea from China, on combat air patrol in an area known as “MiG Alley.” In the ensuing aerial dogfight, Cope lost contact with his wingman and was never seen again......

About two weeks ago a subscriber to The Collectors Newsletter (http://www.tias.com/newsletter) suggested that the 235,000 newsletter readers might help the Navy find living relatives of the Kiska crewmen. The online newsletter runs a column that helps people find missing relatives and friends. The column had been quite successful in the past, so it was ideally suited to assist the Navy in their search for Robert Kellers' family. This week, with the help of readers of The Collectors Newsletter, the Navy found the sister of Robert Keller in Denver, Colorado. http://www.clickpress.com/releases/Detailed/1027005cp.shtml 04/20/2005 ==================================== Navy wants to return World War II pilot’s remains to his family   By Travis M. Whitehead The Monitor   MISSION, February 20, 2005 — The U.S. Navy is trying to locate the family of a Navy crewman killed during World War II after his remains were recovered from the barren slope of a volcano in Alaska.   The remains of Seaman 2nd Class Dee Hall, a Mission native, were found almost four years ago on the northwest face of Kiska Volcano in the Aleutian Islands of western Alaska. He was found along with six other crewmen who were in a twin-engine Navy PBY-5A amphibious reconnaissance aircraft when the Japanese shot it down June 14, 1942.   The U.S. Navy would like to return Hall’s remains to his relatives but is having trouble locating them.   “It’s of the utmost importance that we find them, because our mission here is to make sure that no stone is left unturned in resolving these cases,” said U.S. Navy Lt. Robert Sanchez, POW/MIA officer for the POW/MIA Branch of the Navy Personnel Command in Memphis, Tenn.   No one in Mission seems to remember Hall or know the whereabouts of his family. Mary Alice Martin, the granddaughter of John Conway who founded the city, was attending college in Austin during World War II but she remembers that many young men from here left to serve.   “Every fellow felt like it was his duty to go,” said Martin, 81. She recalls another Mission native who served in World War II and who disappeared: Robert Landry, the brother of the late Tom Landry, the legendary football coach of the Dallas Cowboys.   “We always thought his bomber exploded over the Atlantic Ocean,” Martin said. His remains were never found.   Sanchez is thankful that won’t be the fate of Dee Hall. The Pacific edition of Stars and Stripes ran a story July 28, 2003, stating the remains of seven Navy aviators, including that of Hall, had been found. The plane, the story said, went down on Kiska Island, which Japanese forces occupied during part of World War II.   The Stars and Stripes article said that an American search team found the aircraft wreckage in 1943 and buried the crewmen in a common grave at the crash site. The article quoted Ginger Couden, spokeswoman for the U.S. Army Central Identification Laboratory in Hawaii, as saying that teams tried to recover the fallen servicemen in 1946 and 1947 but “could not reach the site due to heavy snow.”   Ian L. Jones, an Iowa-born associate professor of biology at the Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada, found the wreckage in 2001 while conducting field research on rats living on the island, the Stars and Stripes article said.   The gravesite, Sanchez said, had a cross with the words, “Seven U.S. airmen.”   Those seven airmen haven’t been lost to history. The Stars and Stripes article said John Cloe, historian for the Alaskan NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command) Region and Alaskan Command at Elmendorf Air Force Base, wrote about the incident in a book called The Aleutian Warriors. In the book, Cloe says the plane “headed into flak-filled skies over Kiska.”   “Suddenly, the PBY came apart in a violent explosion,” the article said. “Pieces of burning metal fluttered down on the hillside below.”   Cloe lists the crew of the PBY-5A, assigned to Patrol Squadron 43, as pilot Warrant Officer Leland Davis, co-pilot Ensign Robert F. Keller, Petty Officers 3rd Class Albert L. Gyorfi, Robert A. Smith and Elwin Alford, Petty Officer 2nd Class John H. Hathaway, and Hall.   In the article, Cloe says pilot Davis “was the last casualty of what was called the Kiska Blitz,” the consistent bombing of Japanese targets in Kiska Harbor.   At the time the aircraft was shot down, the Japanese had just bombed nearby Dutch Harbor on June 3 before taking Kiska Harbor two days later and then Attu Island. Both Kiska and Attu islands are located at the western end of the Aleutians.   Retired U.S. Army Col. Frank Plummer of McAllen said the Aleutian Islands were not a major theater of military operations, but the Japanese invasion created some concern for the Americans.   “They’d just started the Lend-Lease program and they were moving supplies, equipment, armor, ammo, bullets, food through the Aleutians to Vladivostok,” he said. “Then it was shipped on the Trans-Siberian Railway, so the U.S. didn’t want to have any threats to our shipping.”   Vladivostok was located in the far eastern part of the Soviet Union. The Lend-Lease program allowed the United States to provide Allied nations defense supplies in World War II. The U.S. gave Lend-Lease aid to Great Britain, the Soviet Union, China, and about 35 other nations.   The Japanese saw the Aleutians as a place where they could put even more pressure on the United States, said Prof. Michael Faubion of the University of Texas-Pan American.   “It was the only U.S. territory occupied,” Faubion said. “It was embarrassing. They only sent 9,000 troops; they were trying to distract us. And they tied down 90,000 U.S. and Canadian troops at one point. They were keeping a close eye on them.”   The Japanese were pushed out of the Aleutians the following year, but the remains of the seven crewmen were never recovered until now.   Since the discovery in 2001, the remains have been recovered and taken to Hawaii where the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command is attempting to identify the remains through dental and skeletal forensics.   “From what I understand, they are going to be able to ID these people,” Sanchez said. “If that doesn’t work, they’ll do DNA. The good part of the job we do here is that we get to resolve cases that have been unsolved.”   Sanchez said only one man’s family has been located; he’s working on the others, including Hall.   Anyone with information about Hall or his family should call Sanchez at (901) 874-2666 or e-mail him at robert.v.sanchez@navy.mil

 

January 29, 2005
By RUSS BYNUM, Associated Press Writer

 

VIDALIA, Ga. - Pvt. Odell Sharpe returned home to Georgia in a flag-draped casket on Friday, nearly 60 years after he was presumed killed in action along the Belgian-German border during one of the biggest battles of World War II .......   

The military stunned Sharpe's family last month with word his remains had been found in September 2003 by a Belgian search team in what appeared to be a foxhole. A shaving kit, a broken comb and dog tags were with his skeleton, and forensic specialists made sure the bones and teeth matched Sharpe's records.

=======================

WWII Soldier's Remains to Head to Texas

Sun Jan 23, 4:01 PM ET   U.S. National - AP
 
EAGLE PASS, Texas - More than 60 years after his plane disappeared during World War II on a mission to raid a Japanese base, an Army Air Corps soldier's remains are coming home.    

First Lt. James Walter Carver will be buried with full military honors Saturday at the foot of his mother's grave in Eagle Pass, the family said.

Carver's remains were identified through DNA testing using a blood sample taken from his niece, Kathryn Cunningham, whose mother, June Carver Hansen, 86, is Carver's only remaining sibling.

"When I told her he'd been found, my mom had a look of pure joy," said Cunningham. "None of us ever expected it."

A navigator, Carver had just turned 22 when his plane disappeared while en route to Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, after a night raid on a key Japanese base. Seven other men were on board.

Carver's parents received a telegram in November 1942 telling them their son was missing in action. "They always said they were hopeful that maybe he was in a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp," Cunningham said.

==================

January 17, 2005, 102 AM

MONROE, Mich. (AP) -- Pfc. Henry D. Mathus no longer is missing.

The remains of the Monroe resident, who was last seen Nov. 1, 1950 -- the day he was to have been sent home from Korea -- will be sent to the United States in March. The casket, along with a uniform and Mathus' posthumous medals, will be buried with full military honors in his hometown of Bowling Green, Ky.....  Henry Mathus, 19, was among those listed as missing in action after invading Chinese overran an outnumbered Army battalion near the North Korean village of Usan..... A joint command representative visited Robert last week and presented him a book documenting the agency's search, the history of Henry's unit and a photo of the recovered remains. "There are some bones, of course, including part of a cheekbone, I think, and some larger bones," Robert said. "There were no dog tags, but they found a button and a chin strap and two helmets that were buried." Robert was told that of the 262 members of Henry's unit reported as missing, his brother was among only 14 whose remains have been recovered.

MORE Remains Returned from WWII and the Cold War