Press Release | July 30, 2024

Pilot Accounted for from WWII (De Jarnette, J.)

Washington  –  

The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) announced today that U.S. Army Air Force 1st Lt. Joe A. De Jarnette, killed during World War II, was accounted for June 20, 2024.

In spring 1944, De Jarnette was assigned to the 732nd Bombardment Squadron, 453rd Bombardment Group, 2nd Combat Bomb Wing, 2nd Air Division, 8th Air Force in the European Theater. On April 8, De Jarnette, the pilot onboard a B-24H “Liberator” Little Joe, was killed in action when his plane was shot down by enemy fighter aircraft fire while on a bombing mission to Brunswick, Germany. Airmen aboard other aircraft flying in formation with Little Joe did not report seeing any crewmembers exiting the aircraft before it crashed in the vicinity of Salzwedel. The crash site could not be located by Allied forces during the war, and the remains of all nine crewmembers, including De Jarnette, were unaccounted for following the war.