TIFFIN, Ohio — The remains of a U.S. Army private from Ohio who died in Germany during a World War II offensive have been identified, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency announced Thursday.
The agency confirmed the positive identification last year of Army Pfc. William L. Groh, Jr., 22, of Tiffin.
Groh's unit was part of the Hürtgen Forest offensive when he was reported wounded in action on Nov. 13, 1944, the last day his unit saw him, the agency said.
German forces never listed Groh as a prisoner of war and the government presumptively declared him dead the following year. His remains were declared unrecoverable in 1947.
Groh was identified after a historian with the accounting agency studying unrecovered losses from Hurtgen determined that a set of remains found by a forester and buried at Ardennes American Cemetery might be Groh.
Scientists from the accounting agency and the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System identified Groh with dental and anthropological analysis, circumstantial and material evidence, and mitochondrial DNA analysis.
Groh will be buried in Phoenix.
