Pearl sailor buried on Memorial Day

Ninety-eight-year-old WWII Navy veteran Sherwin Callander rose from his seat at a Limestone County, Ala., church funeral and saluted the flag-draped casket containing the remains of Edgar David Gross. On Memorial Day, more than 77 years after his death in the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, a family and nation came to say final farewells to the WWII sailor. Gross had only recently been identified from forensic DNA obtained from family members by the Defense Department’s POW/MIA Accounting Agency in Hawaii. “Years from now … you may be able to tell your … grandchildren, even your great-grandchildren, you were there when our country returned a fallen sailor to the red clay of north Alabama,” said Gross’ great-nephew Tom Gross. “It took a nation and a military that did not forget a sailor from humble roots.” A water tender aboard the battleship USS Oklahoma, the 40-year-old seaman maintained pumps and valves on one of the ship’s 12 oil-fired boilers when the attack began. Within 20 minutes of being hit by nine torpedoes, Oklahoma capsized. Only 35 people on the ship were positively identified. The remaining unidentified was buried in mass graves labeled “UNKNOWNS” at the National Memorial Cemetery in Honolulu. On Sept. 7, 2018, DPAA and Armed Forces Medical Examiner System identified Edgar Gross using mitochondrial DNA, dental and anthropological analysis from three relatives. (Source: Decatur [Ala.] Daily 05/28/19)