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News Release

Press Release | Aug. 10, 2006

Soldier Missing In Action From The Korean War Is Identified (Blazejewski)

The Department of Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) announced today that the remains of a U.S. serviceman, missing in action from the Korean War, have been identified and returned to his family for burial with full military honors.

He is Cpl. Edward F. Blazejewski, U.S. Army, of Elizabeth, N.J. He is to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery near Washington, D.C. on Friday.

Blazejewski was assigned to Medical Company, 8th Cavalry Regiment, when his unit came under heavy artillery attack by Chinese forces near Unsan, North Korea on Nov. 1, 1950. During a hasty move to a previous defensive position, Cpl. Blazejewski and other soldiers who were killed were left behind where they died. A U.S. soldier who had been held as a POW by the North Koreans told debriefers that Blazejewski and others had been killed by a grenade explosion.

In August 1997, a joint U.S.-North Korean team, led by the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC) excavated a site in Pyongan Province believed to contain the remains of several U.S. soldiers. Remains representing four men were recovered, as well as an identification tag and a denture, neither of which were associated with Blazejewski.

The other three soldiers were identified and buried in 2000. Buried at Arlington were Sgt. James T. Higgins, Benham, Ky.; and Pfc. John L. Hoey, Philadelphia, Pa. Sgt. Andrew Ernandis, Brooklyn, N.Y. was buried in Hicksville, N.Y. Group remains representing all four soldiers will also be buried Friday at Arlington.

Among other forensic identification tools, scientists from JPAC and the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory also used mitochondrial DNA in the identification of Blazejewski’s remains, matching a DNA sequence from a maternal relative.

For additional information on the Defense Department’s mission to account for missing Americans, visit the DPMO web site at http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo or call (703) 699-1169.