Posted on 11/23/2022 7:47:24 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A West Virginia soldier killed during World War II has been accounted for, the military said.
Army Cpl. Joseph H. Gunnoe, 21, of Charleston, was reported missing in action in November 1944 in Germany. He was declared killed in action after the war, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said Tuesday.
Gunnoe was assigned to Company G, 112th Infantry Regiment, 28th Infantry Division. His unit captured the town of Vossenack, Germany, in the Hürtgen Forest, on Nov. 2 but was forced to withdraw four days later.
Scientists used DNA, anthropological evidence and circumstantial evidence to identify the remains, the DPAA said.
Gunnoe will be buried Dec. 14 in Charleston.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
Life is nothing but heartbreak.
Pic here. R.I.P. at last.
https://www.stripes.com/veterans/2022-11-23/soldier-wwii-buried-wva-8159235.html
Most likely took a direct hit by artillery.
Thank you for your service to the Republic. R.I.P.
I’ve been to the Hürtgen Forest, and it is still nightmarish from the infantry perspective. The Hürtgen Forest cost the U.S. First Army at least 33,000 killed and wounded, including both combat and non-combat losses, with upper estimates at 55,000; German casualties were 28,000.
The battle was so costly that it has been described as an Allied “defeat of the first magnitude.”
Thanks Oldeconomybuyer.
Life is heartbreak, among many other things.
Ditto. Rest in peace soldier. You stood your post.
“Day is done, gone the sun, from the lake, from the hill, from the sky. All is well, Safely rest, God is nigh’’.
The Hurtgen Forest campaign was a costly and futile attack by the US Army that began in mid October of 1944. It was called off on December 14, 1944.
Two days later the supposedly beaten German Army launched the Battle of The Bugle and the American Army was in the fight of it’s life.
It was stupid to ever go in there. We should have gone around it where our superior mobility and complete air dominance would have played a much bigger role. These were both negated by fighting in that thick forest which suited the Germans just fine.
A thick forest with artillery and mortar rounds landing in the treetops, blowing lethal splinters down. And the mountains itself was covered with thin plates of slick oily shale that would not give traction. Daily gains could be measured in inches. Meanwhile, at the top, the Germans were in good reinforced positions.
And, in the midst of it all was the heaviest fog Europe had seen in over a hundred years.
It has been suggested that the planners did not know how to read a topographical map.
DPAA does such a good job. A real service to the families.
Reminds me of much of the fighting in Italy. Gen Clark and his desire for taking Rome to help his career.
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