Korean War Soldier Killed In 1950 IDed As 22-Year-Old Geneva Man

GENEVA, IL — A 22-year-old soldier who died in the Korean War in 1950 has finally been identified as a Geneva man, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency.

Army Sgt. Richard E. Crotty was a member of Easy Company, 2nd Battalion, 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division. He will be buried in Peoria on April 29.

Crotty was reported missing on Sept. 1, 1950, after his unit fought the Korean People's Army near Yongsan, South Korea, officials said in a news release Monday. Although there is no indication his remains were recovered in battle, and he was never recorded as a prisoner of war, the Army issued a presumptive finding of death on Dec. 31, 1953, and his remains were determined unrecoverable three years later.

Despite this, when a set of remains were recovered near Yongsan in July 1951, they were thought to be Crotty's. They were designated "X-1667 Tanggok" and buried in the United Nations Cemetery Tanggok later that month, officials said.

In March 1955, the Central Identification Unit Kokura in Japan began reexamining the remains, making several attempts until April when they were declared unidentifiable. Later, Crotty's remains were transferred with all unidentified Korean War remains and reburied as an unknown in the American Battle Monuments Commission's Courts of the Missing at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, also known as the Punchbowl.

In 2017, Crotty's next of kin asked the Army to disinter the remains of X-1667 Tanggok as a potential match to him. The remains were disinterred on Sept. 8, 2018, and transferred to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) Laboratory in Hawaii for analysis. To identify the remains, scientists from the DPAA used dental, anthropological and isotope analysis, while Armed Forces Medical Examiner System scientists used mitochondrial DNA analysis.

Now that Crotty has been identified, a rosette will be placed by his name on the Courts of the Missing to indicate he has been accounted for, officials said.