SAN FRANCISCO—Missing for more than seven decades, the remains of WWII United States airman Charles A. Gardner, of San Francisco, has been recovered and will be returned to the US and buried with full honors.
Gardner, along with 11 others, took off from the Texter Strip at the Nazdab Air Field in New Guinea. Flying in a B-24D Liberator, Gardner and his fellow airmen were on a mission to strike an anti-aircraft site at Hansa Bay, but their plane was shot down over Madang Province, located on the island nation’s northern coast.
Following the war, the Army Graves Registration service searched the surrounding area, recovering the bodies of three of the airmen.
In 2001, the wreckage of Gardner’s plane was discovered, identified by tail numbers that matched those of the missing B-24D Liberator. Following a lengthy excavation of the site, the remains of Gardner and his fellow airmen were recovered.
Using circumstantial DNA evidence, their bodies have now been individually identified. Thursday, Gardner, along with his fellow fallen airmen, will be buried with full honors in Virginia’s Arlington National Cemetery.
By Joseph Wilhelm
