After nearly three-quarters of a century, the body of Warren Nelson has finally been laid to rest in its rightful place in Lakota, North Dakota, according to the Bismarck Tribune.
The Lakota Lutheran Church held a memorial and burial for Nelson on June 10. The church had initially memorialized him in January 1944.
Nelson died in November 1943 while serving in the Marines in the Pacific theater of World War II. He was hit by sniper fire in the Battle of Tarawa — one of the deadliest battles in Marine Corps history.
His body was thought to be lost forever until the nonprofit History Flight found the bodies of 35 dead Marines on Betio Island in June 2015. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency identified one of the bodies as Nelson.
“For the first time, in some ways, it made me think of all those young men who are still over there, waiting to come home,” U.S. Navy Chaplain Mike Madsen, who presided over the funeral service, told the Bismarck Tribune.
More than 70,000 American soldiers remain unaccounted for from World War II. Nelson is one of many soldiers to be recovered from places like Betioand
Bairoko Harborand buried on American soil in recent years.
