Dayton National Cemetery remembers the fallen and missing in action during Memorial Day 2024 ceremony

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs holds commemoration ceremonies at more than 130 national cemeteries across the United States on Memorial Day. Dayton National Cemetery, one of five National Veterans Administration cemeteries in Ohio, is the final resting place for nearly 60,000 military personnel.

“A few months ago, our team lost one of our own,” Ledbetter said, remembering U.S. Army veteran Jay Rothweiler, who worked at the Dayton National Cemetery.

“Jay and I have had many conversations over the years. He told me several times that this cemetery and his work here saved his life. Jay was passionate about serving our veterans and families,” Ledbetter said.

The Memorial Day speech featured Staff Sgt. Igor Pogrebnyak, Russian language interpreter and noncommissioned officer in charge of the analytical cell of the Defense POW/MIA accounting agency. He is currently researching and analyzing data to explain the disappearances of American personnel during the wars of World War II, Vietnam, Korea, and the Cold War.

“There are nearly 81,000 U.S. personnel missing in action from past conflicts dating back to World War II, and approximately 38,000 are currently considered recoverable,” Pogrebniak said.

While those numbers may seem overwhelming, he said, they speak to the importance of their agency's tasks in finding and repatriating the remains of those personnel.

“With each discovery, we move closer to fulfilling our promise to these brave men and women and their families,” Pogrebnyak said.

The agency had 158 military personnel over the past year, he said.

“We remain committed to achieving the most complete accounting possible for our missing service members and to providing comfort to their family members,” Pogrebnyak said.

Two Ohio service members whose remains were found, identified and returned included Second Lt. James Marrah, 22, of the U.S. Army Air Force, of London, and First Lt. Dan Corson, 27, of Middletown, who were both killed in World War II, Pogrebnyak. said.

Monday's Memorial Day ceremony also included a wreath-laying ceremony, during which Albert Brown, who had been a prisoner of war during World War II, laid a wreath. The family of James P. White, Jr., killed while serving in the U.S. Army in 2006 during Operation Enduring Freedom, also laid a wreath in his memory.