The remains of an US Army soldier have finally been identified after 76 years of being recorded as missing in action. Sergeant Larry S. Wassil, then a 33-year-old from Bloomfield, New Jersey, disappeared in December 1944 while leading a three man reconnaissance team in the Hürtgen Forest area. Finally identified after decades of anonymity, his remains will be reburied in Arlington National Cemetery thanks to the work of an interested historian.
With the Army during some of the worst fighting of 1944
Sgt. Wassil was assigned to Company K, 3rd Battalion, 13th Infantry Regiment, 8th Infantry Division of the US Army during the brutal winter fighting of 1944.
His unit took part in the Battle of Hürtgen Forest, one of the worst American disasters of the Second World War and a prelude to the massive German Ardennes Offensive, also known as the Battle of the Bulge.
American troops of the US First Army under General Omar Bradley attempted to break into Germany proper by pushing through the defensive Siegfried Line.
A series of attacks against positions held by troops under the command of Walter Model, Germany’s great defensive strategist, resulted in minimal gains for the allies and casualties nearly twice as high as those suffered by their German opponents.
Sgt. Wassil was leading a three-man scouting mission to gain intelligence on enemy positions near Bergstein after offensive operations had died down in the area on December 28.
The squad came under German machine gun fire and scattered to take cover. The other two men were unscathed and looked for Wassil but in the densely forested area they were unable to locate any sign of him. His name was never found in prisoner of war records kept by German forces.
Identified after 75 years on the MIA list
Larry S. Wassil was recorded as presumed dead by the War Department a year later. His remains were declared non-recoverable in 1951 after multiple searches of the area in which he went missing.
Only one year after that declaration, German woodcutters working in the area came across a set of remains which they reported to the American Graves Registration Command, the body responsible for recovering the remains of lost American military personnel.
Until 2019 those unidentified remains were interred in the Ardennes American Cemetery and Larry S. Wassil was listed on the Walls of the Missing at the Netherlands American Cemetery.
A Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency historian examining soldiers who had gone missing in the Hürtgen Forest area came across Wassil and the unidentified remains and suspected a connection.
After being disinterred and examined for dental and anthropological evidence, DNA testing finally confirmed that the remains belonged to Sgt. Wassil.
Along with an honorable reburial in Arlington National Cemetery, Wassil will have a rosette placed next to his name on the Walls of the Missing in the Netherlands to show that he has finally been found.
