NY Army Guard Soldiers provide funeral honors for World War II pilot

ROSE, New York – New York Army National Guard Soldiers laid a World War II pilot declared missing-in-action in 1943 to rest on Saturday, May 20 in the Rose Cemetery in this hamlet between Syracuse and Rochester.

A ten-Soldier detail from the New York Military Forces Honor Guard provided full honors to Army Air Forces 1st Lieutenant John B. Thomas, following a funeral service at the Farnsworth-Keysor Funeral Home in nearby North Rose.

Thomas enlisted in the Army Air Corps in Rochester, but was a native of Rose, according to family members.

Thomas was killed on August 1, 1943, during Operation Tidal Wave, a bombing attack on the oil fields in Ploiești, Romania. His B-24 was one of 177 which took part in the raid and 55 which did not return.

The Honor Guard conducted 9,824 funeral services across the state in 2022, mostly for retired military personnel, said Sgt. 1st Class Charles Gabriel, the honor guard non-commissioned officer in charge.

But providing military funeral honors for a Soldier killed during World War II is unusual, Gabriel said.

“To conduct them for a service member who died in combat nearly 80 years ago is very unique, and we are lucky to be a part of it,” he added.

John Thomas was buried next to the grave of his twin brother George, who served in the Marines in World War II and survived the sinking of the aircraft carrier USS Wasp and service on Guadalcanal.

New York Army National Guard Col. Christopher Cronin, chief of the joint staff for the New York National Guard Joint Force Headquarters, presented the casket flag to the family.

“With a U.S. Army Air Corps World War II B-24 Liberator pilot and navigator also in my family’s lineage, it was a privilege and honor to be a part of the ceremony,” Cronin said.

In 2021, New York Army National Guard Soldiers provided military funeral honors for another service member who had been missing in action, Cpl. Robert Agard who was killed in July 1950 during the opening days of the Korean War.

By law, any American who was honorably discharged from the military is entitled to military funeral honors at their death. This normally entails a two-person details who presents a folded flag to the family and sounds taps.

Personnel killed in action, like Thomas, are entitled to honors which include movement of the remains, and a firing party, as well as taps and the ceremonial presentation of the colors to the family.

In this instance, the New York National Guard also received the remains at the Frederick Douglas Greater Rochester International Airport and transported them to the funeral home in North Rose on May 12.

Thomas was 23 years old when his plane – nicknamed “Aire Lobo”—was shot down. He was one of 660 Airmen who died during the mission and received the Distinguished Flying Cross posthumously for his actions in the raid.

At that time Romania was an ally of Nazi Germany.

His remains were interred by the Romanians, along with those of other unidentified Americans in the Hero section of the Civilian and Military Cemetery of Bolovan in Ploiesti.

At the end of World War II his remains were transferred to an American military cemetery in Belgium and his name was listed on the Tablets of the Missing at the Florence American Cemetery in Impruneta, Italy.

In 2017, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency began exhuming unknowns in Belgium in search of unaccounted-for airmen involved in Operation Tidal Wave and bringing them to the DPAA Laboratory at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, for examination and identification.

Using various methods, including dental, anthropological and DNA analysis of a sample provided by Thomas’s nephew Edwin Thomas in 2018, his remains were identified on September 30, 2022.

“It was something that most of our family never thought would happen,” Edwin Thomas said. “But the fact that the Army, the Department of Defense, and all these other agencies made this extended effort to do so is very humbling.”

“For all these years, Uncle John has been a memory on the wall. Now, we finally have closure,” he said.

Seventy members of the extended Thomas family, along with veterans and community members, attended the memorial service on May 20, the birthday of both Thomas and his twin.

“This is the biggest and best family-reunion we’ve ever had, and it is fitting that Uncle John is the one who brought us together,” Edwin said during the service.

As the remains of Thomas began the journey to the cemetery, hundreds of Rose residents lined the streets to pay their respects as the procession passed through town.