This WWII Marine can finally come home – nearly eight decades after his death
CINCINNATI – A Marine from Cincinnati who died during the Battle of Tarawa was accounted for in July, nearly 77 years after he was killed, according to the U.S. Department of Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA).
Marine Corps Reserve Pfc. Frank L. Athon, Jr. will come home to the continental United States where he'll be buried this November, the release states.
Athon was a member of Company A, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, Fleet Marine Force, which arrived at the island of Betio in the Tarawa Atoll of the Gilbert Islands in November of 1943 during World War II, the release states. Their mission was to secure the island.
Athon died on the third day of battle, according to the release, on Nov. 22, 1943. He was 29.
The Cincinnati Enquirer, part of the USA TODAY Network, announced Athon's death on Christmas Eve in 1943. The article noted Athon was survived by his wife Marcella Athon in Cincinnati, where his parents also lived.
Athon's family published notes memorializing him in The Cincinnati Enquirer in the years following his death. He was known as "Bud," the family wrote.
During the week of his one year death anniversary, Athon's sisters published the following note in The Enquirer:
We often think we see your smiling face
As you bade your last good-by –
And left our home forever,
In a distant land to die!
Always Loved and Remembered by Your
Two Sisters, Helen and Mary
Approximately 1,000 Marines and sailors were killed during the Battle of Tarawa, and more than 2,000 others were wounded. The Battle of Tarawa was over in four days and marked an early American victory in the U.S.'s Central Pacific Campaign against Japan.
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Declared 'non-recoverable' in 1949
Officials said Athon was buried in Row D of the East Division Cemetery. That burial site was later renamed Cemetery 33.
But when the 604th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company centralized American remains found on Tarawa for repatriation, nearly half of the known casualties were never found. The release states Athon, alongside others whose remains could not be located, was declared "non-recoverable" in October of 1949.
Sixty years later, a nonprofit organization entitled History Flight, Inc., discovered a burial site on Betio Island believed to be Cemetery 33. The site has undergone numerous excavations since 2009, and last March excavations west of Cemetery 33 revealed a forgotten burial site now identified as Row D, according to the release.
Remains recovered at Row D were transferred to a DPAA Laboratory in Hawaii. There, scientists were able to identify Athon's remains through dental and anthropological analysis, as well as circumstantial and material evidence.
Athon was memorialized in the Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, according to the U.S. Department of Defense. A rosette will now be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.
Officials said Athon will be buried in Philadelphia on Nov. 21.
The following excerpts are some of the messages Athon's family published in previous issues of The Cincinnati Enquirer.
A birthday remembrance published June 11, 1944:
He is not really lost to us
Though he has passed away,
In memory that never fades
He'll live for us each day,
And in the knowledge that he went
Bravely without regret;
We'll know he went to God content
To do the task he meant.
His spirit will live on with those
Who fought for liberty,
And he will be forever young
Who died to keep men free.
A birthday remembrance published June 10, 1945:
Loving and kind in all his ways,
Upright and just to the end of his days;
Sincere and true in heart and mind,
Beautiful memories he left behind.
An "In Loving Memory" message published Nov. 24, 1946:
November brings sad memories,
Three years have gone, my precious son,
Since God called you away.
Killed in action came the message
That came crashing into my life–
Meaning you had met the challenge,
Had made the supreme sacrifice.
You were one of the heroes as brave and true,
Who gave up your life for the red, white and blue.
Follow Madeline Mitchell on Twitter: @maddiemitch_
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This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: WWII Marine who died in Battle of Tarawa accounted for 76 years later
