Long-Lost WWII Soldier: U.S. Air Force Pilot Identified 80 Years After Mysterious Disappearance

The remains of U.S. Army Air Forces 2nd Lt. John E. McLauchlen Jr., a World War II soldier from Detroit, have been identified after being missing in action for 80 years. McLauchlen, 25, was piloting a B-24J Liberator bomber on Dec. 1, 1943, when his plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire while on a mission from Panagarh, India, to the Insein Railroad Yard north of Rangoon, Burma. The plane caught fire and disappeared below the clouds without being heard from again.

The crew’s remains were not recovered during the war and were declared missing in action. In 1947, the American Grave Registration Service (AGRS) recovered remains from a B-24 Liberator crash near Yodayadet, Burma. Despite being unable to identify them at the time, they were interred as unknowns in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.

Recently, after a family request for disinterment, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) exhumed these remains and conducted analysis to identify them using anthropological analysis and mitochondrial DNA analysis. McLauchlen’s remains were finally identified on Jan. 25, 2024 and now he will be laid to rest at Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery in Kansas on July 8th ,2024 . Graveside services will be performed by Belden-Larkin Funeral Home following the interment honoring this brave soldier and his crew after all these years of uncertainty with closure