More than 70 years later, a Colorado teenager disappeared in a brutal Korean War battlehis remains were eventually identified as John A. Spruell.
According to official information, the American teenager disappeared while fighting abroad in the Korean War, but at the time, due to the condition of his body, he could not be identified, but modern forensic methods finally allowed the US Army to United States identify his remains.
John A. Spruell was declared missing in action on December 6, 1950the military said in a news release. He disappeared in the middle of a brutal battle that lasted more than two weeks in a remote, icy mountain range in North Korea, and although the remains of some of those killed in that area were eventually returned to the United States, for decades no one knew if the Spruelle’s body was among them.
Remains that military scientists did not confirm belonged to him until 2023 were buried in a grave labeled “unknown.” at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.
Days before Spruell was declared missing, his unit, a field artillery branch, had fought in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, a notoriously violent conflict that American historians have since called “a nightmare.”
This moment marked a turning point in the war in general, when hundreds of miles of soldiers from the newly involved People’s Republic of China launched an unexpectedly massive attack on the United States and its allies as they attempted to expel United Nations forces from North Korea.
The Battle of Chosin Reservoir is remembered as one of the most treacherous ever recorded, because the freezing weather and rugged terrain in which it took place were so extreme and because there were many casualties. Military officials say Spruell disappeared after heavy fighting near Hagaru-ri, a North Korean village at the lower end of the reservoir where U.S. forces had established a base.
It was unclear what exactly happened to Spruell after the battle, as “the circumstances of his loss were not immediately recorded,” according to the military, and there was no evidence to suggest he had been captured as a prisoner of war.
An international agreement later allowed American officials to recover the remains of some 3,000 Americans who had been killed in Korea, but none could be definitively linked to Spruell.
In 2018, the unidentified remains of hundreds of murdered soldiers that were unearthed from the Honolulu Military Cemeteryalso called Punchbowl, and were re-examined using advanced methods that did not exist until long after the Korean War.
Spruell’s identity was confirmed in August. He will be buried in Cortez at a date that has not yet been determined, according to the military. The announcement about Spruell came around the same time the Army confirmed that another American teenager had been found after being declared dead in the Korean War in December 1953. Forensic evidence identifies the remains of Richard Seloover, a corporal in the US Army from Whiteside, Illinois, in January. Seloover was 17 years old when he was killed.
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