Remains of California airman killed in World War II identified by Defense Department

Photos of Donald V. Banta, 21, of Los Angeles, whose plane was shot down over Germany on February 24, 1944. (DPAA)

A Los Angeles man who died serving his country during World War II will return home for burial after being successfully identified by the U.S. Department of Defense.

The remains of U.S. Air Force Technical Sergeant Donald V. Banta were formally identified and recovered last September, and his surviving family members have just been officially notified of the case.

Banta was assigned to the 703rd Bombardment Squadron, 445th Bombardment Group, Eighth Air Force in the European theater, according to the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA), an agency within the Department of Defense whose mission is to recover and identify the remains of service members who were prisoners of war or missing in action from past military conflicts around the world.

Banta was working as an engineer and gunner on a B-24J “Liberator,” DPAA said. He died Feb. 24, 1944, when his plane was hit by anti-aircraft fire after taking off from an air base in England on a bombing mission against enemy targets near Gotha, Germany.

“During the mission, this aircraft was damaged by an enemy fighter attack and exploded in mid-air near Leimbach, Germany,” officials said.

Banta was one of nine crew members on board when the plane crashed. Two of them managed to parachute out before being captured by German troops; the other seven, including Banta, died in the crash. He was 21 at the time.

The remains of one of his crewmates were recovered by German soldiers and buried in a local cemetery, but those of Banta and the others who died were never found, authorities said.

But in 1952, years after the end of World War II, an American organization that was searching for and recovering the remains of fallen American servicemen in Europe received the unidentified “mixed” remains of several men buried at the Bad Salzungen cemetery in central Germany.

It was speculated at the time that the men's remains were linked to the downed Banta plane, but it was impossible to positively identify them at the time.

Instead, their remains were buried in the Ardennes American Cemetery in Belgium.

Decades later, in June 2021, historians from the DPAA and the American Battle Monuments Commission exhumed the remains of these men and transferred them to a laboratory for identification.

With the help of modern scientific analysis and technology, scientists were able to confirm that one of the remains was that of Banta.

His name is currently listed on the “Tablets of the Missing” at the Henri-Chapelle American Cemetery in Hombourg, Belgium. A rosette will now be placed next to his name to indicate that he was finally found and returned home.

Banta will now be buried at Riverside National Cemetery in Riverside. A date has not yet been determined, but anyone seeking funeral or family information can contact the Army Casualty Office at 800-892-2490.

To learn more about Banta's story, visit his biographical page on the DPAA website.