Smisek, Lada
Navy Reserves Machinist’s mate

Lada Smisek, age 42, from Cleveland, Ohio, Cuyahoga county.

Spouse: Encarnacion Smisek

Service era: World War II

Date of death: Monday, September 28, 1942
Death details: On August 19, 2019, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) identified the remains of Chief Machinist’s Mate Lada Smisek, missing from World War II. Chief Machinist’s Mate Smisek entered the U.S. Navy from the Philippines and served at the Naval Ammunition Depot and Submarine Base at the Cavite Naval Yard in the Philippines. He was captured on Corregidor Island following the American surrender on May 6, 1942, and was interned at the Cabanatuan Prisoner of War Camp on Luzon in Nueva Ecija Province. He died there of dysentery on September 28, 1942. He was buried in a communal grave in the camp cemetery along with other deceased American POWs. In 1946, Common Grave 437 was disinterred, and five sets of remains were recovered from it. Two sets of remains were identified, while the other three sets were determined unidentifiable and reburied as “unknowns” in the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial. Due to the known commingling of remains between common graves on Cabanatuan, in 2016, the ‘unknowns’ associated with Common Grave 437 were disinterred and accessioned into a DPAA laboratory for reexaminations. One set of remains was identified as those of CMMP Smisek.
Cemetery: National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (2021). Originally buried at Cabanatuan Camp Cemetery, then interred as “unknown” in Mania American Cemetery before he was identified in 2019.

Source: National Archives, KITV, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency