HARRISBURG (TNS) — A Pennsylvania teenager killed during the Korean War has finally been identified and will be buried in his hometown this fall.
The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said today that U.S. Army Pfc. Edward J. Reiter, 17, of Northampton, was accounted for on June 21; however, his family “only recently received their full briefing on his identification.”
“In July 1950, Reiter was a member of K Company, 3rd Battalion, 34th Infantry Regiment, 24th Infantry Division. He was reported missing in action on July 7 after his unit sustained heavy casualties while defending against the North Korean army’s advance near Ch’onan, South Korea.
His body was not recovered because his unit was forced to retreat, nor were any remains found that could be identified as Reiter. The Army declared him non-recoverable in January 1956 and issued a presumptive finding of death after the end of the war.
The agency said in May 1951, two sets of human remains were recovered north of Ch’onan. The remains were unidentified and “buried as Unknowns at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, also known as the Punchbowl, in Honolulu, Hawaii.”
Years later, in November 2019, Reiter’s remains were among those disinterred as part of the agency’s Korean War Disinterment Project, ”as part of the planned exhumation of all 53 burials originating from the United Nations Military Cemetery Taejon and the Taejon area, and transferred to the DPAA Laboratory at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii for analysis.”
To identify Reiter’s remains, 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 mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysis.
Reiter’s name is recorded on the Courts of the Missing at the Punchbowl, along with the others who are still missing from the Korean War. A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.
The agency said Reiter will be buried in his hometown this fall.
According to the agency, Reiter’s unit, the U.S. 34th Infantry Regiment, was “among the first U.S. ground troops to arrive in South Korea following the North Korean Peoples Army (NKPA) invasion on June 25, 1950.
The 34th, which had been on garrison duty in Japan, was undermanned and under-equipped and had little field experience.
It’s mission was to delay the NKPA’s surge to the south as long as possible so that reinforcements could arrive. On July 6 the NKPA attacked the 1st and 3rd Battalions of the 34th Infantry north of the town of Chonan, South Korea.
{p class=”krtText”}The U.S. troops withdrew slowly back to Ch’onan, and established defensive lines there.
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