Spring 2000

Extract from the Spring 2000 Edition of the Waddelow Society Magazine

GI's Body Going Home To Family

by Bill Smith, (September 1987)

Pilot Knob, Mo - More than 42 years after his death on the battlefield in France, a young soldier his family called "Demp" is finally coming home. Homer Dempsey Wadlow was a 19 year old infantryman in World War II when he was reported missing on 16th January 1945. he will be buried Saturday morning alongside his parents and a brother in a family plot at Huff Cemetery. near the town of Glover, Mo - in Iron County.

Army officials have told relatives that two men using a metal detector to search for war artifacts in France found Wadlow's remains in March in a shallow grave. His family learned of the discovery just last week.

Wadlow's sister, Dixie Jo Shunk said "God had to do it _ that's the only way Demp could have been found". Shunk is from Middlebrook, also in Iron County, which lies about 90 miles south of St Louis. Stanley "Tobe" Wadlow, a brother from Middlebrook, said, "I knew my brother was dead, but you always wonder what happened".

"We were close", Stanley Wadlow said, "I still think about him all the time" Details are still sketchy, but Army officials told family members last week that Wadlow's skeleton had been found largely intact, buried beneath about 2 feet of earth in a hilly area just north west of Strasbourg, France. An Army helmet, Army dog tags, buttons, pair of galoshes and a cup were with the body. In addition, searchers discovered a broken shovel, candy wrapper and a wallet inscribed with Wadlow's name. His brothers and sisters have been told that a letter found inside the wallet was still legible.