FORT KNOX, Ky. — The remains of a Soldier killed during World War II will be interred May 1, at Saint Michael Orthodox Cemetery, Portage, Pennsylvania. Graveside services for U.S. Army Air Forces Tech. Sgt. John Holoka Jr. will be performed by Mark A. Serenko Funeral Home preceding the interment.
A native of Cresson, Pennsylvania, Holoka was an engineer with the 844th Bombardment Squadron, 489th Bombardment Group (Heavy), Eighth Air Force. He was serving aboard a B-24H Liberator when it crashed after being hit by anti-aircraft June 22, 1944, following a bombing raid on a German airfield in Saint-Cyr-l’École, near Versailles, France. He was 25 years old.
Despite the damage to the plane, the pilot was able to nurse the aircraft until it was over the English coast, where he ordered his crew to bail out. Seven of the airmen parachuted successfully while the other three crew members, including Holoka, were still on board. Two of the crew witnessed the aircraft crash into a farm in West Sussex, England.
In November 1947, investigations with the American Graves Registration Command, Army Quartermaster Corps, tasked with recovering missing American personnel in the European Theater, searched the area of the crash site, but were unable to recover any remains. Holoka was declared non-recoverable May 10, 1950.
Decades later, a June 2021 recovery mission executed by the U.S. Department of Defense found possible human remains and material evidence.
Holoka was accounted for by the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency Jan. 24, 2023, after his remains were identified using material evidence as well as dental, anthropological, mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosome (Y-STR) analysis.
His name is recorded on the Walls of the Missing at the Cambridge American Cemetery, an American Battle Monuments Commission site, in Cambridge, England, along with others still missing from World War II. A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.
For additional information about Tech Sgt. Holoka, read the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency release.
To learn more about the Department of Defense’s mission to account for Americans who went missing while serving our country, visit the DPAA website, follow on Facebook or call (703) 699-1420/1169.
Media interested in covering and/or obtaining more information about the funeral and interment should contact the Army Casualty Office at (800) 892-2490 and/or Mark A. Serenko Funeral Home, (814) 736-4441.
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