Williamston TWP. – family members and others met on Saturday May 3 to prohibit the remains of a Webberville man infamous Batan Death March During the Second World War, to die in a Japanese war prisoner for months later.
US Army Air Corps SGT. James Swartz Remains were identified 80 years after the war in August 2024, and returned to Michigan for burial in the canton of Williamston.
The Defense POW / MIA accounting agency announced the identification of Swartz in November 2024.
Swartz was put to rest to Summit cemetery, With around 40 people representing five generations of his family, according to Lori Byrnes.
The service includes an honor guard.
How Swartz ended up being buried in the Philippines
Swartz was a member of the 17th Squadron of the Pursuit, 24th prosecution group, When Japanese forces invaded the Philippine Islands during the Second World War.
Unity, activated in the Philippines on October 1, 1941, With two attached squadrons equipped with P-35 and P-40 aircraft. At the end of December, the field staff were absorbed by infantry units and certain pilots were evacuated to Australia. The remaining pilots continued operations in the Philippines with the few planes that have been left, according to the Army Air Corps Museum.
US Army Air Force SGT. James W. Swartz, who died as a prisoner of war during the Second World War, will be buried in the canton of Williamstown in April 2025.
Intense fighting led to the delivery of Allied troops Batan Peninsula on April 9, 1942 and Island correction On May 6, 1942, the POW / MIA Defense accounting agency said.
He was reported captured when American forces in Batan went to the Japanese.
The soldiers captured were subjected to the death march of Batan of 65 miles, then held at the Cabanatuan Pow N ° 1 camp, where more than 2,500 prisoners of war perished during the war, Swartz among them, said the accounting agency.
When is Swartz dead?
According to the penitentiary camp and other files, Swartz died on September 23, 1942 and was buried in the room Cabanatuan camp Cemetery in the common tomb 434. He was 21 years old.
“Although landed as a stranger in (Manilla American Cemetery and Memorial), the tomb of Swartz has been meticulously maintained in the past 70 years by the American Battle Monuments Commission”, “ The accounting agency said in a press release. “Today, the SGT. Swartz is commemorated on the walls of the missing in the cemetery and commemorating from Manila American in the Philippines. A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate that he has been taken into account.”
How were Swartz's leftovers identified
In April 2019, as part of ProjectDPAA exhumed the remains associated with the Grave Commune 434 and sent them to the DPAA laboratory for analysis.
“Working systematically in the archives of the unknowns which had been initially buried in more than 300 common tombs, the project proposes to dismiss groups of unknown people according to the evidence surrounding their associations of engraving municipalities of origin. Due to many orders, the Ministry of Defense collects the reference samples on DNA for more than 2,700 relaxations of the camp, both resolved and not resolved,” said the accumulated agency.
Scientists have used dental and anthropological analysis, as well as circumstantial evidence, to identify the remains of Swartz. THE Armed forced medical examiner system also used mitochondrial DNA analysis (MTDNA).
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: James Swartz died in the Philippines during the Second World War. Now it rests in the Summit cemetery
