Posted on 02/20/2009 9:13:14 AM PST by Stonewall Jackson
SOLDIER MISSING IN ACTION FROM THE KOREAN WAR 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 the Korean War, have been identified and will be returned to his family for burial with full military honors.
He is Sgt. Stanley E. Baylor, U.S. Army, of Webster, N.Y. His funeral will be held on Aug. 1 in Warsaw, N.Y. Representatives from the Army’s Mortuary Office met with Baylor’s next-of-kin to explain the recovery and identification process, and to coordinate interment with military honors on behalf of the Secretary of the Army.
Baylor was assigned to Company L, 3rd Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division. On Nov. 1, 1950, the 8th Cavalry was occupying a defensive position near Unsan, North Korea in an area known as the “Camel’s Head,” when elements of two Chinese Communist Forces divisions struck the 1st Cavalry Division’s lines, collapsing the perimeter and forcing a withdrawal. The 3rd Battalion was surrounded and effectively ceased to exist as a fighting unit. Baylor was reported missing on Nov. 2, 1950 and was one of the more than 350 servicemen unaccounted-for from the battle at Unsan.
Between 1991-94, North Korea gave the U.S. 208 boxes of remains believed to contain the remains of 200-400 U.S. servicemen. Accompanying North Korean documents indicated that some of the remains were exhumed near Chonsung-Ri, Unsan County. This location correlates with Baylor’s last known location.
Among other forensic identification tools and circumstantial evidence, scientists from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial DNA and dental comparisons in the identification of Baylor’s remains, which were turned over in 1993.
For additional information on the Defense Department’s mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.
:-)
Hugs.
Welcome home! Thanks for the ping, as it has given me a new tagline.
Thank you, sir, for the link to Bent Prop. I will be reading their reports with interest. And, will read their past expedition reports as well.
My father was a B-24 pilot in WWII, albeit in the ETO.
Semper Fi,
I have a great-uncle who commanded several different landing ships in the Pacific during the war, but he missed the Peleliu campaign. He touched sand on Tarawa (actually, his ship got hung up on the reef like everyone else), Saipan, Leyte Gulf, and Okinawa. When the war ended, he was on Admiral Nimitz’s staff, helping plan the invasion of the Japanese home islands.
Thank you for posting those photos of the Korean War Memorial. How moving, even eerie, to see the facial expressions. That was my Uncles war - he is still alive and is proud of his USAF service. BTW, welcome home to the newly identified soldier - RIP, brave warrior.
My dad and I went to Washington a number of years ago, just after the Korean War Memorial was completed, and it is one of the most amazing memorials I have ever seen.
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