A proper burial for WWII vets

At the World War II Memorial in Washington, the elegant stone and bronze tribute to those who served in the bloody fight against tyranny, there is a constant refrain that “America Will Never Forget.”

Some 16 million members of the U.S. armed forces were part of those war years from 1941-45, including more than 400,000 Americans who died. They were all part of The Greatest Generation. As President George W. Bush said when the Memorial opened in 2004, “By giving their lives in the cause of freedom, these heroes have protected and inspired all Americans.”

But in some cases, we did forget those who served. That’s why what happened last week in Freeport is so noteworthy.

The cremated remains of six WWII veterans and the spouse of one — which languished unclaimed for decades inside a Freeport funeral home storage closet — were finally interred during a ceremony at the Long Island National Cemetery in Farmingdale. A seventh urn was returned to that vet’s family. It is a shame that these urns were somehow forgotten for so many years. More importantly, once this error was realized, credit must be given to those who insisted on doing the right thing in honoring their memory.

When the remains were found by the new owners of the Hungerford & Clark Funeral Home in Freeport, they alerted Long Island National Cemetery officials, searched through available records, and tried to find distant surviving relatives. “They were part of such a great generation,” explained Michael Carpinone, one of the new owners.

As the funeral home owners learned, each of these veterans had his own personal story about service to his country, poignant in its own way. There were limited records, but enough to imagine what they might have faced. Thorwald Otto, originally from Rockville Centre, enlisted in the Army in 1942 at the age of 40. He served for two years. Shortly after he joined the Army, Thorwald married and the couple eventually had a son.

Another forgotten veteran, William J. Daube, was a police officer who enlisted in the Army in 1942. That year, Americans rallied to the government’s call to serve following the Dec. 7, 1941 attack by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor in the Pacific and as Hitler’s Nazi armies swept through Europe.

The remains of Otto, his wife Florence, and Daube were joined at Tuesday’s Long Island National Cemetery interment ceremony by the urns containing other Army vets — Willard Thomas Burkett Jr., William Kuttler, and Jack Zvaleko — as well as Otto Schilling of the U.S. Navy.

This story of seven urns reminds us once again of the sacrifice of so many who did serve in the U.S. military. We always must be careful stewards of their remains and do whatever we can to make sure that they are never forgotten.