WW II Airmen's Remains Come Home

B R A D F O R D, Pa., Aug. 6 -- It had been 58 years since Elmer DeLucia’s last moment alone with his brother, and he did not want this one to go by too quickly.

When everyone else drifted away Saturday from the grave site ofStaff Sgt. Anthony “Bib” DeLucia, Elmer DeLucia stood silent and motionless, watching as his brother’s remains were lowered into theground. Elmer DeLucia had never expected to see his brother again,or even his casket.

On Aug. 31, 1944, “Bib” DeLucia was one of 10 Army Air Corpsairmen killed when their B-24 crashed after bombing Japanese shipsin the former Formosa, now Taiwan, in World War II. After years ofnot knowing what had happened, Elmer DeLucia decided his brother’sremains were lost for good.

But in 1996, Chinese farmers found wreckage of the plane whilesearching for herbs on 7,000-foot Kitten Mountain in Guangxiprovince. The Department of Defense has spent the time sinceidentifying each of the dead and returning the men’s remains totheir families.

Six of the other nine airmen will be buried Aug. 21 at ArlingtonNational Cemetery in Arlington, Va., and families of the threeothers are burying them privately.

Promises Kept

To keep a promise made to his mother before she died in 1968,Elmer DeLucia laid his brother to rest Saturday at the family’shillside plot in a cemetery near the church where the DeLucia boyswere baptized.

The Army, keeping a promise of its own to remember those whoserved, saw to it that DeLucia was buried with full honors. Theyincluded the presentation of a Purple Heart and an American flag toElmer DeLucia and another surviving brother, Auggie DeLucia, bothof whom received Purple Hearts of their own in World War II.

About 600 people in the DeLucia’s hometown of Bradford, about120 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, turned out to remember DeLuciaas a hearse carried his casket past factories and shops to hisfamily’s church in the center of the town, known for producingZippo lighters and oil.