Remains from WWII battle on Tarawa found

[JJ_BPK]

Most of you don't know PFC James Bernard Johnson. He is a Marine. He is my
fathers younger brother and for whom I am named. He died during the assault
on Tarawa, Nov 1943. He was interned on Tarawa in what should have been a
temporary burial plot, as was the practice during WW II conflicts. After the
war was over, the military was supposed to move all the fallen to permanent
internment, or return the individuals to their family, for state side
burial. This did not happen.

A lot of small processes broke down on Tarawa.. It's a small island,, so
space was a premium.. It was a very costly island, one of the worst
casualties counts in the South Pacific.. Land was a premium and a runway was
needed, and barracks,, and a war needed to be fought.. The war still had
almost 2 more years to go..

Shit happens...

To this day there are thousands of Americans, and our allies, and our
opponents,, buried in the South Pacific,, in Europe,, in Korea,, and in
Vietnam who did not make it home..

Let me regress a bit,, Why am I telling you all this??

As happens to most FOGs, especially those that had military time,, they
start reminiscing. In this case I was doing a little work on documenting our
family's history and was trying to fill the void where my uncle's name fit
in. At this time and to my knowledge, there is know one left that has ever
met my uncle Jimmy.. Not a good starting point..

So,, I turned to GOOGLE with what little information I have.

Name: James B Johnson
Rank: PFC
Service: Marine
Place: Tarawa, Gilbert Island chain, South Pacific

After a while, I found an organization that is doing exactly what I could
not do. They are trying to find the graves of the Marines still on Tarawa.

And one of those individuals lives right here on Big Pine Key......

I would like to introduce you to two individuals that are trying to make a
difference,, and they are succeeding where there has been failure.

- Mark Noah, executive director of History Flight

- Ted Darcy, X-Marine and founder of WFI Research Group

I would also like to thank Mark and Ted and the rest of their team for a job
well done...

It is the dedication of individuals like Ted & Mark, that should put a
warm-fuzzy in all of us..

Here is their story...

Remains from WWII battle on Tarawa found, Florida group says By William R.
Levesque, Times Staff Writer, Tuesday, November 25, 2008

http://www.tampabay.com/news/militar...icle916251.ece

The Marines quickly buried their dead after the 1943 battle for Tarawa, one
of the bloodiest fights against the Japanese in World War II.

Then the bulldozers came to build runways. Markers were lost. In 1946, the
military went back to find those graves on the Pacific atoll.

They couldn't locate half of them.

But on Monday, a nonprofit group with headquarters in the Florida Keys
announced that it had helped locate the graves of 139 missing Marines and
sailors whose remains had long been presumed lost.

The group, History Flight, based in Marathon, worked with WFI Research Group
in Fall River, Mass., to confirm the location of the remains in eight burial
pits on the tiny atoll, 2,500 miles southwest of Hawaii.

The discovery is described by the groups as the largest ever of MIA remains
from any American war. The military could not confirm this.

"This is an incredible find," said Donald Allen, an Ohio author who wrote a
book, Tarawa - the Aftermath, about the battle. He is not affiliated with
WFI or History Flight.

"These were somebody's sons, brothers, fathers. It's extraordinarily
meaningful to know where they are," he said.

History Flight, which has not removed or disturbed the remains, said it will
notify the Marines and the Department of Defense, which is expected to
recover and attempt to positively identify the bodies.

All are presumed to be those of Americans, given the location and manner of
burial, History Flight said.

History Flight said 541 troops were eventually listed as missing after the
three-day battle in November 1943, one in a series of ever-bloodier fights
leading to the doorstep of Japan. Most who died on the atoll were Marines.

More than 1,600 Americans were killed in the battle. Of 4,500 Japanese
defenders on Tarawa, just 17 survived.

Tracing the history of those missing troops has proven a complicated
journey. It began in 1992, when WFI founder Ted Darcy, a Marine veteran who
served 20 years ending in 1989, started research.

"There's no closure until that body comes back," Darcy said.

When the troops were buried in 1943, most were undoubtedly identified by the
military, History Flight said. The graves were marked with the expectation
that after the war the bodies might be recovered and sent home.

But war construction on the atoll, including air strips, covered many of the
burials. After the war, the Army tried to locate the bodies.

But only 49 percent of the known bodies were found.

"They lost the bodies," said Mark Noah, executive director of History
Flight, which operates a flight museum and works on identifying lost
military personnel. "These Marines, each of them was somebody's son. They
all perished and were left behind. And their families were fed the fiction
that they were missing in action."

Capt. Mary Olsen, a spokeswoman for the Pentagon's POW/MIA office in
Washington, said she had no information about History Flight's work and
could not comment on the disposition of bodies on Tarawa.

During World War II, the Marines recorded where bodies were buried and
created rosters identifying many of the dead.

But overwhelmed by the need to find 72,000 missing troops after the war, the
military didn't do enough research to locate the dead and quickly abandoned
the effort, Noah said.

"The war was over and people wanted to move on," Noah said. "The records
pertaining to the burials were kept classified until the 1970s. By then,
most of the Marines' parents were dead."

History Flight said it spent $88,000 to locate the graves using the
military's own records. It then confirmed the number of dead using
ground-penetrating radar this month and in October. The graves have not been
disturbed, Noah said.

He said funding was provided by Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American
Legion, among other groups.

Given the roster of the burials, Noah is confident that the military will
ultimately identify many of the remains. Confirmation may be made using DNA
matches with relatives.

Noah said most of the remains will be recoverable, even if they are buried
under residential areas where people don't realize they live atop graves.

In fact, through the years, a few of the remains have been unearthed by
residents digging sewer lines or even tending gardens.

Darcy, the Marine veteran who began the search for the remains 16 years ago,
said he is still in touch with families who want to know what happened to
missing kin. None could be reached for comment on Monday.

"In the Marines we were taught . to never leave any man behind," Darcy said.

The three-day Battle of Tarawa was one of the most brutal of World War II.
The main island was only 600 yards at its widest and 21/2 miles long, but it
was defended by about 4,500 Japanese in sand-covered concrete bunkers,
leading a Japanese commander to brag that "a million men cannot take Tarawa
in a hundred years." On the morning of Nov. 20, 1943, the United States
began its first major amphibious assault. The American victory provided a
crucial airfield to launch planes to bomb new Japanese targets in the
Pacific Theater.

1,670 Approximate number of Marines and sailors killed in the battle

2,300 Approximate number of U.S. troops injured

4,500 Approximate number of Japanese defenders

17 Japanese survivors

[Ret10Echo]

Let's hope the Defense Department makes things right, for these men who sacrificed so much and those who went before and have done so since.

Thanks for the link JJ..


R10

[ZonieDiver]

Originally Posted by Ret10Echo

Let's hope the Defense Department makes things right, for these men who sacrificed so much and those who went before and have done so since.

Thanks for the link JJ..


R10

Great post, JJ. Thanks. Good luck in your search. I am doing the same type of thing and fully appreciate how rewarding, and frustrating, it can be.

[glebo]

Great information. May all those soldiers, sailors and marines make it back home to rest.

RIP

[RB]

Great post JJ!

RIP and thank you to our Marines and let's bring them home now...

[greenberetTFS]

JJ BPK, My dad said that he arrived in Tarawa, 2 weeks after the Marines took the island. As you know he was a combat medic in the army. He said it was his first experience in support of the medical personal needed after the battle. Have they given you any info on your uncle recently?

GB TFS

[JJ_BPK]

After I sent this note to all and everyone,, I received a call from a young reporter from AP. Spent about a hour on the phone,, talking about this and a couple other topics.

I expected and asked for no involvement, but I knew she was hunting for the side story..

Anyway, her notes were almost correct.. She had me in SF in Nam,, I was with the 1st Cav Div,, small unintentional error, I think, she has no military back ground,, very embarrising...

I have already sent a correction request, I fear it will disappear..

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT



ignosce,, mihi permitte..

[RTK]

Originally Posted by JJ_BPK

After I sent this note to all and everyone,, I received a call from a young reporter from AP. Spent about a hour on the phone,, talking about this and a couple other topics.

I expected and asked for no involvement, but I knew she was hunting for the side story..

Anyway, her notes were almost correct.. She had me in SF in Nam,, I was with the 1st Cav Div,, small unintentional error, I think, she has no military back ground,, very embarrising...

I have already sent a correction request, I fear it will disappear..

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories...MPLATE=DEFAULT



ignosce,, mihi permitte..

Looks like it was corrected on the web site. Great work by some selfless people in honoring our veterans.

[JJ_BPK]

Originally Posted by RTK

Looks like it was corrected on the web site. Great work by some selfless people in honoring our veterans.

Yes,, The article was corrected,, but I am still embarrassed..

[vsvo]

Great story. Thanks, JJ.

RIP Marines

[JJ_BPK]

The Story Continues...

I have been working with Mark Noah, the last couple months. Mark collected around 500 graves registration cards and I had the privilege of scanning them into images that will be attached to his report. It's a very small part, nuff said..

If you have never seen one, it's a multi-part form, hand typed on both sides, carbon paper, OLD SCHOOL, by Company Clerks (see attached example).. Needless to say, after 60 years,, they are "lacking"..

One of the survivor's of Tarawa, Leon Cooper and Mark were interviewed.
The resultant video has been turned into a 1 hour show that will premiere Friday night at 10PM on the Military Channel.

If your not doing anything special...

http://military.discovery.com/tv-sch...127598.37681.0

[JJ_BPK]

Originally Posted by Stras

JJ_BPK,

There was a special on the History Channel or Military Channel on Tarawa.

Stas

That History Channel show of the graves recovery effort, is a direct result of the work by Mark Noah, executive director of History Flight and Ted Darcy, of WFI Research Group.

Last June, Mark invited me to participate in the effort and go on the recovery mission. I declined.

I haven't had an update from Mark on the latest effort, but he was sure they would run tests in the area we suspect my uncle was buried in.

I moved the away from the POW / MIA Bracelets thread,, not needed..

http://www.professionalsoldiers.com/...270#post361270

[Magnolia]

My grandfather was a Marine Corps infantry officer that landed in the initial invasion of Tarawa. He received a Silver Star and Purple Heart for his actions there before he was carried off the island like so many others. My father is named for two of his fellow Marines that were killed under his command.

Sometimes I think about just how close he came to never making it off that island and some of the things he must have seen there. Puts the daily grind in perspective.

Best of luck in your search.

[JJ_BPK]

UPDATE:

Received a call from Mark Noah(c ref above).

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Histo...866254?fref=ts

It looks like they have recovered my uncle Jimmy.

Last year the History Flight finally found and was able to excavate "division cemetery 3" on Betio, Tarawa, Gilbert Islands, Republic of Kiribati.

It's a bit convoluted, but here goes:

They have identified one of several marines in one of the Betio plots, using his dog tag. It was completely rusted, but they were able to us metal forensics to "raise" the stampings.

That Marine, by virtue of the burial records, SHOULD be next to uncle Jim. They buried the Marines in a trench, side-by-side, head to foot.

The dental records of the next Marine look like a very good match for my uncle.

They now want a DNA sample from me to verify. As there are no females alive in the blood line, they will use advanced DNA test to map his to mine. So it may be a while before they can confirm the ID. If the next Marine in the plot matches the records it will be even more proof.

Because of the area on the island where the plot is, tidal water has washed the remains for some 70yrs. SO some are in very poor condition, some have their dog tags other don't.

The only salvation was the Navy CB's SCREWED UP,, They built a parking lot over the graves, with a 18inch base of coal dirt and black-top. It kept the graves from being disturbed. Some, but not all, of the graves are very well preserved..

The custom of the day was to bury Marines wrapped in their ponchos with the gear they had on. So, Some were buried with personal items, along with the standard TO&E.

Last year there was a movie of Betio and the recovery effort: "Return to Tarawa", 46 minutes long.. http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/return_to_tarawa

Side bar: While looking at some of the posted pictures on FB, I spotted this fellow with that funny looking hat. Some of you may know Paul Schwimmer.

[Beef]

Originally Posted by JJ_BPK

UPDATE:

Received a call from Mark Noah(c ref above).

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Histo...866254?fref=ts

It looks like they have recovered my uncle Jimmy.

Last year the History Flight finally found and was able to excavate "division cemetery 3" on Betio, Tarawa, Gilbert Islands, Republic of Kiribati.

It's a bit convoluted, but here goes:

They have identified one of several marines in one of the Betio plots, using his dog tag. It was completely rusted, but they were able to us metal forensics to "raise" the stampings.

That Marine, by virtue of the burial records, SHOULD be next to uncle Jim. They buried the Marines in a trench, side-by-side, head to foot.

The dental records of the next Marine look like a very good match for my uncle.

They now want a DNA sample from me to verify. As there are no females alive in the blood line, they will use advanced DNA test to map his to mine. So it may be a while before they can confirm the ID. If the next Marine in the plot matches the records it will be even more proof.

Because of the area on the island where the plot is, tidal water has washed the remains for some 70yrs. SO some are in very poor condition, some have their dog tags other don't.

The only salvation was the Navy CB's SCREWED UP,, They built a parking lot over the graves, with a 18inch base of coal dirt and black-top. It kept the graves from being disturbed. Some, but not all, of the graves are very well preserved..

The custom of the day was to bury Marines wrapped in their ponchos with the gear they had on. So, Some were buried with personal items, along with the standard TO&E.

Last year there was a movie of Betio and the recovery effort: "Return to Tarawa", 46 minutes long.. http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/return_to_tarawa

Side bar: While looking at some of the posted pictures on FB, I spotted this fellow with that funny looking hat. Some of you may know Paul Schwimmer.

Great news, JJ! It is wonderful to hear that they've found your uncle and the other Marines in his plot. I had seen an article in "The Drop" on those guys, featuring Paul. I cut it out. That's going to be my retirement "job" in about 4 years. Maybe sooner, since I can make some of their 10-14 day trips now.