![\"\"](\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635533906063841104-air-gardner-burial05jpg.jpg\")
Soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Regiment conduct a burial service for Sgt. Charles A. Gardner at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Va., on Dec. 4.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n Photo Credit: Mike Morones\/Staff<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n Four of the crewmen were able to parachute from the aircraft, but were reported to have died in captivity, officials said. The others were reported missing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After the war ended, the Army Graves Registration Service recovered the remains of three of the airmen. It concluded in May 1949 the remaining crew members were unrecoverable, the release said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A U.S.-led team surveyed the area again in 2001 and located wreckage of a B-24D that matched the tail number of the aircraft shot down almost 60 years prior. Teams excavated the site and recovered remains of the eight airmen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Along with Charles Gardner, of San Francisco, they were: Army Air Forces 1st Lts. William D. Bernier of Augusta, Montana; Bryant E. Poulsen of Salt Lake City and Herbert V. Young Jr. of Clarkdale, Arizona; Tech. Sgts. Charles L. Johnston of Pittsburgh and Hugh F. Moore of Elkton, Maryland; Staff Sgts. John E. Copeland of Dearing, Kansas, and Charles J. Jones of Athens, Georgia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gardner was identified through circumstantial evidence along with DNA from his maternal niece and nephew, the release said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Theodore said he’s felt closer to Charles and his story the last few years. He visited Charles’ siblings before they passed away and that brought the whole family closer together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I had more opportunity to ask them about him, and what he was like … and was given the opportunity to read some letters he sent over … before he was sent out [to the South Pacific],” said Theodore, who was an Army first lieutenant during the Korean War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gardner is the fourth of the eight airmen to be buried, but the first to be buried at Arlington, said Air Force Lt. Col. Melinda Morgan, a spokeswoman for the Defense POW\/Missing Personnel Office. Bernier and Moore were buried on Sept. 19 near their hometowns; Young was buried Oct. 15 near his hometown. Two burials are scheduled for 2015, and a group memorial is being planned for next year at Arlington, Morgan said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Remains recovered, identified at 1944 South Pacific crash site<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":65521,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":67,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[16,67],"tags":[],"coauthors":[1640],"class_list":["post-34661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-your-air-force"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"XRVGFL3R3BC3JCB7ZC6HVFGLME","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-air-force\/2014\/12\/05\/wwii-airman-finally-laid-to-rest\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n