More Belatedly Return
DPAA has identified and accounted for the following formerly-missing members of the US military.
From World War II
• CPT Elwood J. Euart , HQ 103rd Field Artillery Battalion, 43rd Infantry Division, US Army, was lost on 26 October 1942 in Vanuatu. He was accounted for on 11 May 2016.
• 1st Lt. Donald L. Beals, 494th Fighter Squadron, 48th Fighter Group, 9th Air Force, US Army Air Forces, was lost on 17 April 1945. The location of 1st Lt. Beals’ loss was not provided by DPAA; however, the 9th Air Force was assigned to the European Theater of Operations during World War II. He was accounted for on 10 May 2016.
Welcome home, elder brothers-in-arms.
Rest easy. You’re home now.
. . .
Over 73,000 US personnel remain unaccounted for from World War II; over 7,800 US personnel remain unaccounted for from the Korean War; and over 1,600 remain unaccounted for in Southeast Asia (SEA). Comparison of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from recovered remains against mtDNA from a matrilineal descendant can assist in making a positive ID for unidentified remains that have already been recovered, or which may be recovered in the future.
DPAA’s web site now has what appears to be a decent “Contact Us” page. The page doesn’t have instructions concerning who can and cannot submit a mtDNA sample or how to submit one, but the POCs listed there may be able to refer you to someone who can answer that question – or may be able to answer the question themselves. If you think you might possibly qualify, please contact one of those POCs for further information.
If your family lost someone in one of these conflicts and you qualify to submit a mtDNA sample, please arrange to submit one. By doing that you just might help identify the remains of a US service member who’s been repatriated but not yet been identified – as well as a relative of yours, however distant. Or you may help to identify remains to be recovered in the future.
Everybody deserves a proper burial. That’s especially true for those who gave their all while serving this nation.
Category: No Longer Missing
Captain Elwood J. Euart’s is a name familiar to folks in the Pawtucket, RI area. Many see it as they pass VFW Post 602. The post is named after him. He lost his own life saving others. In an unlikely scenario, this artillery officer saved men from a sinking ship, the transport craft PRESIDENT COOLIDGE. When he learned that men were trapped below, he grabbed a rope and went after them. One end of the rope he secured to the ship and the other to himself to anchor the lifeline. After the last man escaped, the ship went over with the captain within her.
If you would like to read the Distinguished Service Cross that Captain Euart was posthumously awarded for that action, here’s a link to it:
http://valor.militarytimes.com/recipient.php?recipientid=30906
Lieutenant Donald Beals of South Dakota was a fighter pilot. He flew a R-47 Thunderbolt (Serial #42-26372.) His squadron chiefly flew close support and cover and was in the air over Belgium, France, and Holland, as well as Germany. If you have ever viewed films of WWII US fighters strafing convoys, railroads and such, then you know what LT Beals was doing. On 17 April 1945, he was on a recon mission some 45 miles north of Dresden when he radioed that he had spotted some planes on the ground and was going to have a closer look. He and his squadron leader, Hobart Albright, turned to dive when, according to Albright’s report, the ground guns opened up on them. The intense flak prompted Albright to tell Beals to pull up but it was too late. Beals had been hit and went down. (One of his siblings, Meryl E. (Biaels) Tabner, passed away last month. A Veteran herself, she served in the Army Nurse Corps during WW II.)
I do not know how a P became an R. LT Beals flew a Republic P-47 Thunderbolt.
Rest in peace brothers.
Rest in peace in your home soil brothers. God be with your families now.
Rest In Peace, Fallen Warriors. You’ve earned your place in History and in Valhalla.