MOUNT OLIVE, Illinois - A U.S. Army Soldier who made the supreme sacrifice in the European theater during World War II has returned home and been buried with military honors. A funeral service for Sgt. John Radanovich was held on Aug. 12 at Union Miners Cemetery in Mount Olive, Illinois.
Radanovich, who grew up in White City, Illinois, enlisted in the U.S. Army in November 1942. Two years later, he was serving under First Army with the 4th Infantry Division in the Hürtgen Forest near the German-Belgian border in a five-month offensive that represented one of the longest U.S. battles of the war. It was part of First Army’s attempt to halt German forces, who were aiming to reinforce the city of Aachen.
Despite continued progress, the Allies suffered heavy losses under enemy artillery and artillery fire. On Dec. 1, 1944, a German counterattack struck Radanovich’s company, and he was reported missing. Fierce fighting prevented fellow Soldiers from looking for him and Radanovich’s remains were among the dozens of unidentified ones that officials recovered from the forest in the years after the war.
In 2018, a historian studying unresolved cases analyzed the remains identified as X-2754A. Three years later, the Department of Defense and the American Battle Monuments Commission exhumed the remains and transferred them to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, where identification was confirmed this year on May 11. He was repatriated and then buried with honors in his hometown.
Present for the ceremony were Radanovich's nephew and niece, Paul Kaganich and Maire Grandame.
“It’s fantastic. It’s good for the community, it’s good for us,” Kaganich said. “The only thing I wish was that his mom and dad and sisters and brothers would have got to see it.”
Grandame said her mother, Louise Kaganich, always held out hope that he was alive, up until she died at age 101 in 2020.
“I don’t think she really accepted that he passed,” Grandame said. “She always had hope since they had no dog tags, no nothing. She was always hopeful that he maybe was injured, had amnesia, never regained his faculties, and thought that he was living somewhere out there.”
While the finding brings closure, Grandame wishes other family members could have had it as well. “That’s all they always wanted, was to know if he was still alive," she said.
During the ceremony, First Army historian, Capt. Kevin Braafladt, recounted the Hürtgen Forest Campaign and explained the meaning of Radanovich's medals that were presented to Grandame and Kaganich.
Patriot Guard Riders were present to honor his memory and service, and flag-waving well-wishers lined the mile-long funeral procession route to Radanovich's final resting spot, where the American hero was given a fitting burial.
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