Kansas City, Mo. - February 2, 1947 - Colonel Michael A. Quinn, Commanding Officer of the Kansas City Quartermaster Depot, announced today that the preliminary operational schedules for the Return and Final Burial of World War II Dead, prepared by the Office of The Quartermaster General, contemplates that those who fell at Pearl Harbor and other armed forces personal who now rest in seven cemeteries in Hawaii will reach the San Francisco Port of Embarkation about August 18. Those who are buried in the Henry Chapelle temporary cemetery in Belgium are scheduled to arrive at New York about August 25.Only the remains of those whose return is requested by next of kin will be brought back to the United States for burial in either a private cemetery or a national cemetery. Major General T. B. Larkin, the Quartermaster General of the Army, said in announcing the tentative schedule.
The schedule is based on the assumption that present casket manufacturing requirements will be met, that full scale deliveries of caskets will begin in May, 1947, and that deliveries will continue without interruption until all orders have been filled. Current estimates are that 80 percent of the recovered remains will be returned to the United States or the 20 per cent will be interred permanently overseas. The accuracy of these estimates will not be known, however, until all next of kin have responded to letters of inquiry which are to be mailed by the Office of The Quartermaster General.
Colonel Quinn also announced that each deceased veteran passing through the Distribution Center at the Kansas City Quartermaster Depot will be covered by an American flag during the homeward journey. At the present time the Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot is employing 90 women who are turning out the largest single order of American interment flags in the nation's history.
At the Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot, expert seamstresses are hard at work on an assignment that calls for the production of 169,000 additional copies of the stars and stripes, which are to be used to drape the caskets of fallen heroes of World War II.
The interment flags, made of high grade mercerized cotton, duplicate in size the regulation United States storm flag which floats over American military posts, camps, and stations, government buildings and American embassies all over the world. The flag is five feet wide, nine feet, five inches long. All of the stripes of the flag and the stars of the field are individually sewn.
It is anticipated that 240,000 flags will be required. About 70,000 storm flags are now available and the remainder are under the process of manufacture.
Among the World War II casualties from Comanche County who were returned to the USA for burial are 1st Lt. Johnnie Casteel, U.S. Army, Warren Petty, Private 1st Class, US Army and CPO Alfred Seidel, US Navy.
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