Remains of Milwaukee soldier killed in WWII identified
All three boys in the Lochowicz family on Milwaukee’s south side fought in World War II.
Erwin Sr. served in the Army engineers in both Europe and the Pacific. Ray was in the Army Air Corps in Europe.
The youngest son didn’t have to enlist because both older brothers were already in harm’s way.
But Eugene Lochowicz wanted to serve his country.
Erwin and Ray returned home, got married, raised families and lived long lives.
Eugene, though, drowned when his assault boat overturned in the frigid, fast-rushing waters of Germany’s Roer River a few months before the war ended in Europe. His body was never found. He was 19.
His family held out hope that one day he would be identified.
That day came late last month when the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) announced his identification in a brief notice.
“We’re happy that they identified his remains, but it has been a long process,” said nephew Ken Lochowicz, the son of Erwin.
Eugene Lochowicz was the fifth of six kids, a friendly, happy guy who enlisted in the Army in the fall of 1943, two months after his 18th birthday. After boot camp he was assigned to Company A, 1st Battalion, 28th Infantry Regiment, 8th Infantry Division.
Ken Lochowicz has had difficulty piecing together his uncle’s service after starting his quest when his wife, Jane, created a shadow box of World War II medals for his father Erwin Sr., who died in 2004.
“She suggested we try to find information on my uncle,” said Ken Lochowicz, of Lake Geneva.
He doesn’t know when his uncle arrived in Europe, which battles his uncle participated in or where he served before his death. He was stymied by the massive loss of military records in a fire in St. Louis in 1973. But he persisted, finding information online, getting in touch with the mayor of a German town near where his uncle was lost and attending meetings DPAA officials scheduled for families of MIAs.
Ken Lochowicz also asked his uncle Ray, who died in 2012 at the age of 91, for details about Eugene.
“It’s hard to get veterans to talk about the war. Even my dad really didn’t want to talk about it,” Ken Lochowicz said in a phone interview Monday.
“My uncle Ray mentioned one time to me that the three brothers (when they were all stationed in Europe) talked about getting together when they got leave. But (Eugene) passed away, and that never materialized.”
Eugene Lochowicz died during a large-scale river crossing operation called Operation Grenade, when six divisions of troops from the Ninth Army and VII Corps of the First Army moved across the Roer River west of Cologne. The crossing had been planned earlier but the Battle of the Bulge from December 1944 through much of January 1945 halted the Allied advance in Germany.
Seven dams regulated the flow of the Roer River and its tributaries and as American troops closed in, the German Army destroyed each dam’s outlet valve to flood the area. Shortly before 3 a.m. on Feb. 23, 1945, men began crossing the
river in plywood assault boats.
At least half a dozen assault boats filled with 1st Battalion soldiers overturned midstream, dumping them and their equipment into the fast-moving, cold water.
Eugene Lochowicz was one of the first to attempt the crossing. He carried two bandoliers of ammunition around his skinny 5-foot-5 shoulders and a radio in addition to his rifle, helmet and pack.
He couldn’t swim.
Eugene Lochowicz’s body was never found. A three-paragraph story in one of his hometown newspapers featured his photo and the headline “Milwaukee Boy Presumed Dead.”
It’s unclear how his remains were discovered and officially identified last month.
The DPAA plans to update its public announcement once a briefing with next of kin is held.
Ken Lochowicz is not the next of kin; an older cousin is the point person, and Ken has not been able to get in touch with her. He doesn’t know when or where his uncle will be buried.
But he’s happy to know he’s finally coming home.