Remains Of Fallen Korean War POW To Be Buried

ArmyTimes.com - Springfield, VA, USA

Staff report
Posted : Tuesday Mar 17, 2009 19:18:34 EDT

Sgt. 1st Class Patrick J. Arthur was captured in Korea in 1951 by Chinese forces, northeast of the Hongch’on River, and died in a prisoner of war camp two months later.

On May 1, his remains will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery, according to a news release from the Defense Department’s POW/Missing Personnel Office.

Arthur was a member of Headquarters Company, 2nd Battalion, 38th Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division.

In mid-May 1951, elements of the 2nd ID were securing their positions on the No Name Line south of the Soyang River, South Korea, when the Chinese Army launched a major counter-offensive, the release said.

The 2nd ID soldiers were forced to withdraw south to a more defensible position north and east of the Hongch’on River.

On May 18, during the withdrawal, Arthur, of Broken Bow, Neb., was captured by the enemy and forced to march into North Korea, where he died of malnutrition and disease in July.

He was buried at the Suan Mining POW Camp near Pyongyang, the release said.

Between 1991 and 1994, North Korea gave the U.S. 208 boxes believed to contain the remains of up to 400 U.S. servicemen. Accompanying some of the remains were Arthur’s military identification tag and a denture fragment bearing his name.

Among other forensic identification tools and circumstantial evidence, scientists from the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial DNA and dental comparisons in identifying some of the remains as Arthur’s, the release said.

Representatives from the Army’s Casualty and Mortuary Affairs Office met with Arthur’s next-of-kin to explain the recovery and identification process on behalf of the secretary of the Army.