History
Remains of soldier, airman killed during WWII identified
Stars and Stripes
May 26, 2024
U.S. Army Pvt. 1st Class Mose E. Vance, 21, of Bradshaw, W.Va., killed during World War II, was accounted for Jan. 5, 2024. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency)
• U.S. Army Pvt. 1st Class Mose E. Vance, 21, of Bradshaw, W.Va., killed during World War II, was accounted for Jan. 5, 2024.
Shortly before midnight on New Year’s Eve 1944, German forces launched a major offensive in the Vosges Mountains in Alsace-Lorraine, France, known as Operation Northwind. The German attack surged through Allied defenses along the France-Germany, and the battle enveloped two U.S. Corps along a 40-mile-wide front.
In the summer of 1943, Staff Sgt. George E. Davies was assigned to the 345th Bombardment Squadron (Heavy), 98th Bombardment Group (Heavy), 9th Air Force. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency)
In the summer of 1943, Davies was assigned to the 345th Bombardment Squadron (Heavy), 98th Bombardment Group (Heavy), 9th Air Force. On Aug. 1, 1943, the B-24 Liberator bomber on which Davies was the assistant engineer was hit by enemy anti-aircraft fire and crashed during Operation Tidal Wave, the largest bombing mission against the oil fields and refineries at Ploiesti, north of Bucharest, Romania. His remains were not identified following the war. The remains that could not be identified were buried as Unknowns in the Civilian and Military Cemetery of Bolovan, Ploiesti, Prahova, Romania.
The AGRC disinterred all American remains from the cemetery for identification. The AGRC was unable to identify more than 80 unknowns from Bolovan Cemetery, and those remains were permanently interred at Ardennes American Cemetery and Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery in Belgium.
In 2017, DPAA began exhuming unknowns believed to be associated with unaccounted-for airmen from Operation Tidal Wave.
Scientists from DPAA used dental and anthropological analysis, as well as chest radiograph comparison and circumstantial evidence. Additionally, scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used Y chromosome DNA (Y-STR) analysis.
Davies’ name is recorded on the Tablets of the Missing at the Florence American Cemetery, an American Battle Monuments Commission site in Impruneta, Italy. A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.
Davies will be buried in Portland, Ore., on June 21, 2024.