News-Info-Alerts

Re: Blood Samples Give Hope

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: November 20, 2003

"Blood samples give hope to MIA's family
By Dennis W. Sowers, Of The Press Staff

The family of Sgt. Loyd Alumbaugh has waited more than 50 years for a funeral service that would bury his remains, but not his memory.

Two of Alumbaugh's siblings gave blood this week with the hope of bringing that day closer. Mary Meyer, sister, and Jim Alumbaugh, brother, had blood taken by Pat Simons of Paramedical Services at Meyer's home east of Carthage.

The blood was packed and flown to the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville, M.D. Eventually, the Alumbaughs hope for a match with Sgt. Alumbaugh's DNA that would bring him home to his family.

"It's a waiting game now," Meyer said. "They have some bones over there. We may hear in a week, or maybe never."

Sgt. Alumbaugh was a member of the Ambulance Company, 7th Medical Battalion, 7th Infantry Division of the U.S. Army during the Korean War. He was reported killed in action on Nov. 28, 1950. As a medic, he was evacuating battle casualties when he was ambushed.

Meyer said that the U.S. government has been calling for five months to get blood samples from Sgt. Alumbaugh's siblings.

"Normally, we try to find family members because the blood line to family members is dying off," said Shari Lawrence, deputy public affairs officer for the U.S. Army Human Resources Command. She said the maternal blood lines were most important.

"We set it up for Bill (the oldest), but he couldn't do it," Meyer said, "and John was in Texas fishing. I knew I could get a hold of Jim any time.

"I think we're getting closer now. I really do. If they find 18 (soldiers) a month now, they'll probably find my brother."

Lawrence said there were no remains for which to match the blood. She said there was "nothing pending" at the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command in Hawaii.

"I wish we could tell you that we have remains," she said. "We can't say they don't have remains."

Lawrence did promise one thing.

"It's going to be as if he died yesterday," she said, once the announcement and burial date were finalized.

Lawrence remembered one case where the wife of a deceased veteran had never remarried and had Alzheimer's. She tried to tell the family that the wife was the one to be concerned about. And the day finally came.

"She knew exactly what was going on," Lawrence said. "She knew exactly who was in that casket."

Lawrence also said that once a soldier's remains were found, it would be as if they died on active duty. "They deserve the honor," she said.

The public affairs officer said five teams research a crash or recovery site with strict instructions on what to search for.

"They will go out knowing full well what they're looking for," she said. "They don't just start digging up."

Lawrence said it was just like an archeological dig where teams go back several times to the site. She said scientific and circumstantial documentation are collected and presented to an Armed Forces Identification Review Board for evaluation and determination of soldier identification.

"The families are pretty receptive to what we give them," Lawrence said. "The families get a very thorough briefing."

She said that once an identification is made, the funeral is conducted as if the soldiers died in battle today. She said that she worked on a team that went into Canada to find bodies of soldiers killed in the War of 1812. Those soldiers are not buried in a Veterans Administration Cemetery in Bath, N.Y.

"We take this seriously," she said. "It's a very hard, very emotionally charged job to do it.

"Hopefully, with this family, they're going to bring them home, too."

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