Eight More Are Home
DPAA has identified and accounted for the following formerly-missing US personnel.
From World War II
WT2c Clarence M. Lockwood, US Navy, assigned to the crew of the USS Oklahoma, was lost at Pearl Harbor, HI, on 7 December 1941. He was accounted for on 6 September 2018.
FM3c Robert J. Bennett, US Navy, assigned to the crew of the USS Oklahoma, was lost at Pearl Harbor, HI, on 7 December 1941. He was accounted for on 6 September 2018.
RM3c Bruce H. Ellison, US Navy, assigned to the crew of the USS Oklahoma, was lost at Pearl Harbor, HI, on 7 December 1941. He was accounted for on 10 September 2018.
S1c James W. Holzhauer, US Navy, assigned to the crew of the USS Oklahoma, was lost at Pearl Harbor, HI, on 7 December 1941. He was accounted for on 10 September 2018.
Pfc Leonard A. Tyma, USMC Reserve, assigned to Company E, 2nd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, Fleet Marine Force, was lost on Tarawa on 20 November 1943. He was accounted for on 4 September 2018.
TSgt Robert J. Fitzgerrell, US Army, assigned to I Company, 3rd Battalion, 311th Infantry Regiment, 78th Infantry Division, was lost in Germany on 30 January 1945. He was accounted for on 7 September 2018.
SGT Eugene G. McBride, US Army, assigned to I Company, 3rd Battalion, 311th Infantry Regiment, 78th Infantry Division, was lost in Germany on 30 January 1945. He was accounted for on 12 September 2018.
PFC Fred W. Ashley, US Army, assigned to C Troop, 2nd Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, 2nd Cavalry Group, was lost in Czechoslovakia on 4 May 1945. He was accounted for on 29 August 2018.
From Korea
None
From Southeast Asia
None
Welcome back, elder brothers-in-arms. Our apologies that your return took so long.
Rest easy. You’re home now.
. . .
Over 72,000 US personnel remain unaccounted for from World War II; over 7,600 US personnel remain unaccounted for from the Korean War; over 1,500 remain unaccounted for in Southeast Asia (SEA); 126 remain unaccounted for from the Cold War; 5 remain unaccounted for from the Gulf Wars; and 1 individual remains unaccounted for from Operation Eldorado Canyon. Comparison of DNA from recovered remains against DNA from some (but not all) blood relatives can assist in making a positive ID for unidentified remains that have already been recovered, or which may be recovered in the future.
On their web site’s “Contact Us” page, DPAA now has FAQs. The answer to one of those FAQs describes who can and cannot submit DNA samples useful in identifying recovered remains. The chart giving the answer can be viewed here. The text associated with the chart is short and can be viewed in DPAA’s FAQs.
If your family lost someone in one of these conflicts and you qualify to submit a DNA 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
Welcome home, men.
Rest well.
Welcome Home Warriors. Peace and closure to the Families who have waited all of these years. Thanks again, Hondo, for these posts. Anxiously awaiting, “The Rest of the Story.”
Fair winds and following seas to all. Welcome home.
More info:
WT2c Clarence M. Lockwood
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=15657
FM3c Robert J. Bennett
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=365541
RM3c Bruce H. Ellison
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=123046
S1c James W. Holzhauer
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=119958
Pfc Leonard A. Tyma
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=361887
TSgt Robert J. Fitzgerrell
https://www.fieldsofhonor-database.com/index.php/nl/american-war-cemetery-henri-chapelle-f/53478-fitzgerrell-robert-j
SGT Eugene G. McBride
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=82170
PFC Fred W. Ashley
http://www.honorstates.org/index.php?id=34185
As Jonn would always say, “Welcome Home”.
Thanks again, Skyjumper, my earlier Thanks dropped out some how or another, this machine is glicking a bit now & again. Probably operator error. I pour over this additional links, putting that face to these names.
Yes, the minutes it takes to learn something about these men honors them and enriches us. So many were so young, called from their homes and thrust into a war from which they would not return alive. They aren’t numbers or even names. They were men who loved and were loved. They were men who were grieved and sorely missed. And they were, all of them, heroes.
The very least we can do and it’s still not enough. Cause at the end of the day, there but for the Grace of God/whatever higher power/luck some one believes in, goes us/we/you/I. During our times, dust offs, semi decent food, equipment, and a semi short tour. They were in it for the duration + or death/wound. Whatever came first.
Welcome Home.
On 30 January 1945, Eugene McBride was all of 20 and a long way from his Nebraska home. He was already a seasoned combat veteran and a sergeant in the infantry. His unit was pushing into Germany and regularly meeting fierce resistance in a scatter shot fashion. One solitary paragraph from “Lightning: The History of the 78th Division,” may vaguely describe the action in which he fell: “During the morning hours of the 30th, the 3d Battalion of the 311th , a mile to the north, had smashed through defenses around Huppenbroich and by 1100 had entered the village. Company I had been held up when it ran into enemy fortifications…”
There is only one McBride family listed in the 1940 census for Lancaster county, Nebraska. That family consisted of a Dad, a Mom, and their four children, a 15-year old boy named Eugene and three younger ones, all girls. Most likely this was SGT McBride’s family but certainty is elusive. Eugene McBride. Forever 20. Welcome home.
“The war here is just about over, and boy am I glad.” That is a line from a letter written by Fred Ashley to his family. It would be the last one received from him. The war in Europe would end a few days later with Germany’s surrender, but Fred would not be among the celebrants. He was shot in the back when his unit was surrounded by Germans on 4 May 1945. Incredibly, Fred did make it home. When his body was recovered, he was first laid to rest as a unknown casualty in Belgium, beside another, a pilot named Richard Lane. In 1948, following the Lane family’s request to have the remains of Richard, a body was exhumed and sent stateside. It was actually that of Fred Ashley, not Lane. The error, suspected by a private individual in the 1990s but rejected by the DPAA’s predecessor agency, has now been confirmed. And the families of both LT Lane and PFC Ashley are glad. And so are we.
Robert J. Fitzgerrell, you may have noted, was with SGT McBride in Germany and fell on the same date as McBride. Same unit. Same company. same action. Before the war, Fitzgerrell was a drummer in a swing band. Said a fellow musician about him, “[He]was the best drummer I ever worked with in my life. He was the softest-talking, meekest, mildest little guy and would get behind those drums and turn into a tiger.”
Welcome home.
PFC Leonard Tyma was among the Marines in the first wave at Tarawa (i.e., Beito). He was born in Dyer, Indiana on 27 May 1922 and was raised in Chicago. The finding of his remains, and those of his fellow Marines, were the results of the wonderful efforts of History Flight. (If you are unfamiliar with History flight, do yourself a favor and check it out: http://historyflight.com/nw/
Welcome home, Marine.
I wonder, when reading of the Marines who died at Tarawa, and are being returned to their nation and families, if any ever rode in my wife’s uncle’s Amtrak. Her uncle was a vehicle commander in the 2nd Amtrak Battalion, he was wounded at Tarawa.
He’s on the left, middle row, in the pic at the top of the page. At least he came home from there.
http://www.tarawaontheweb.org/amtrac2ndbatt.htm
“Both the 2d Battalion, 2d Marines and the 2d Amphibian Tractor Battalion suffered greater than 60 percent casualties, in addition to the deaths of both battalion commanders. The amtracers also lost 90 of their 125 LVTs.”
Here’s the link to a great (and I mean great) bread on Tarawa:
https://www.mca-marines.org/gazette/tarawa-ultimate-opposed-landing
Welcome Home.
2/17 AC, again Brother some fine additions. Sent the post to nephew in law in Nebraska, maybe he can get us some more on McBride; He and the spousal unit got to Lincoln on a regular basis. Go Huskers! IIRC the action that he and Fitzgerrell were in was part of the ‘Cross the Rhine Campaign, where the 9th(?) Army Group US was in support/attached to the Brits and Canucks. Have a pretty good reader or that from the Brit side, can’t put my hands on it now. Monty was again lording over every one and pissing off the US Command. One thing that was holding it all up was the massive amounts of supplies he wanted to stockpile. This being right after the Bulge fight our Commanders (Patton) was wanting to hit hard and fast while the krauts were reeling. The whole delay thing gave them more time to dig in and re-equip which caused more casualties. Who knows, if we hadda pushed quicker/harder, maybe these fellows woulda made it. At that point in time, the Germans were were contesting every clump of dirt and blade of grass. My Papa was in a lot of that Rhine Drive, C Battery 741st FA. Saddest part of Fred Ashely, 4 days away from the total surrender, and most of the Germans were in that whole let’s surrender to the Americans 1st chance we get mode. Ashley and his boys just happened to be up against either the last of the die hards, or possibly some of the youngsters that were just scared silly. Maybe the warrior creed for him, killed on the last day of the last war by the last bullet fired. Can’t help but get a little pissed at our gubmint when I see again how folks like the Honor Flight and other groups have to keep pushing, or do the job that gubmint is supposed to do. Who was it, Pershing(?), that said, “The only land we want is enough to bury our dead”. We all signed that blank check, the least we can do is honor, remember,… Read more »
This inscription on a wall in the visitor’s center at Normandy American Cemetery is attributed to General Mark Clark:
“If ever proof were need that we fought for a cause and not a conquest, it could be found in these cemeteries. Here was our only conquest: All we asked… was enough soil to bury our gallant dead.” The quote was taken from Clark’s memoir, in which he actually wrote, “If ever proof were needed that we fought for a cause and not for conquest, it could be found in these cemeteries. Here was our only conquest: all we asked of Italy was enough of her soil to bury our gallant dead.”
Incredibly, despite the existence of the internet at the time, Colin Powell receives credit for that message. He swiped it from Clark during a talk and gave no attribution.
And now you know the rest of the story…
Thanks Brother. Help keep me straight. I was leaning toward Pershing and WWI from some excerpts I read a long time back when he was supposedly having a conversation with French Commander Ferdinand Foch. Foch and the British Commanders wanted the “Rainbow Division” incorporated into their ranks under their commanders. It was also alluded to Pershing during a Monument Dedication to the 151st Machine Gun Battalion that was from the local area. Colin Powell. Yeah I think a lot of us lost some respect for him, when he and Bush 1 stopped The Bear about a week too soon back in ’91. YMMV
4MAY1945? DAMN, DAMN, DAMN. So close, so very close. Welcome home, Warriors. I am humbled by your extreme sacrifice.
Rest easy, all my brothers.
Welcome home, brothers.
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