Remains of missing World War II soldier from NH to be buried in Northwood

May 23—The remains of a soldier from Northwood killed during World War II are headed back to New Hampshire, after being exhumed from the U.S. Military Cemetery in Algeria in 2022, U.S. Army officials announced Thursday.

The remains of Army Sgt. Richard G. Hammond will be interred May 29 at Northwood Ridge Cemetery, in Northwood. Purdy Memorial Chapel of Lee will perform graveside services ahead of interment.

A native of Northwood, Hammond was assigned to Company A, 601st Tank Destroyer Battalion, in the North African Theater as a crew commander of an M3 Gun Motor Carriage "half-track." He went missing in action Feb. 17, 1943, at the age of 24, after his half-track was hit by an enemy high-explosive tank shell while engaged in battle with German forces near Sbeitla, Tunisia.

Witnesses reported he was standing on the driver's side running board when a high explosive shell detonated near the vehicle The explosion threw Hammond several yards from the wreckage, officials said.

The area immediately came under heavy fire, forcing surviving crew members to retreat. Witnesses maintain that while leaving the area, "they looked back several times and did not see any movement from Hammond," the U.S. Army said in a news release.

He was declared missing in action, but the Germans never reported him as a prisoner of war. On June 1, 1949, with no evidence Hammond survived the fighting, he was officially declared non-recoverable.

Following the end of the war, the American Graves Registration Command (AGRC) began investigating and recovering missing American personnel in Africa. On Sept 9, 1943, AGRC personnel recovered a set of remains from an isolated grave near a destroyed half-track in the vicinity of Sbeitla.

At the time, AGRC personnel could not conclusively identify the remains, designated X-5137 El Alia (X-5137), and they were interred in the U.S. Military Cemetery in Constantine, Algeria.

While studying unresolved American losses in Tunisia, a Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) historian determined the M3 half-track information gathered by AGRS in the area potentially belonged to Company A, where Hammond was assigned.

DPAA and American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC) personnel, working closely with the government of Tunisia, exhumed the remains of X-5137 in Sept 2022, which were sent to the DPAA laboratory for analysis and identification.

To identify Hammond's remains, scientists from DPAA used dental and anthropological analysis, along with circumstantial evidence. Scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System used mitochondrial DNA analysis.

Hammond's name is recorded on the Walls of the Missing at North Africa American Cemetery, an American Battle Monuments Commission site in Tunis, Tunisia, along with the others still missing from World War II.

A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.