Corporal Francis D. Knobel comes home

Hondo told you back in December that Corporal Francis D. Knobel’ s remains had been identified by the Department of Defense last December. This week the good corporal will finally rest in Arlington cemetery. The LaCrosse Tribune pieces together the bits available about his life;

He was born in 1930. His father is listed in city directories as a laborer; his mother worked at the Electric Auto Lite factory. His name does not appear in city high school yearbooks.

Knobel enlisted when he was 19. About five months later he went overseas and took part in the battle of Inchon, the invasion that led to the recapture of South Korea, according to a story in the La Crosse Tribune when he was declared missing.

Knobel’s father died in 1952. His mother and sisters later moved to Arizona.

According to the Department of Defense, they’ve had his remains for decades, but only now had the technology to identify them;

[C]ommunist forces turned over 25 boxes of remains that were believed to be American servicemen who were recovered near where Knobel was lost. The remains were transferred to the U.S. Army’s Central Identification Unit (CIU) in Kokura, Japan, for analysis. From the 25 boxes transferred to the CIU, 17 servicemen were identified; one box was believed to contain a Korean national, and the last seven boxes of remains could not be identified. When all attempts to associate the unidentified remains to American servicemen were unsuccessful, a military review board declared the remains to be unidentifiable and the remains were transferred to the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, commonly known as the Punchbowl.

In 2014, with advances in technology, the Department of Defense re-examined records from the CIU and concluded it was possible to identify the remains. The remains were exhumed and analyzed.

To identify Knobel’s remains, scientists from DoD and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory (AFDIL) used circumstantial evidence, radiographs, and dental comparison.

Julie Houx, the corporal’s next of kin, along with her children, will accompany her uncle to his final rest and receive his decorations at Arlington;

Houx had to decide where her uncle should be buried.

“My first thought was Hawaii is so beautiful and he’s been there, why don’t we just rebury him there,” she said.

A few days later she called back and asked if he could be buried in Arlington.

“He paid the ultimate price,” she said. “I think he deserves the ultimate tribute.”

Category: We Remember