Donald L. Menken, age 21, from Kentucky, Letcher county.
Service era: Korea
Date of death: Wednesday, June 10, 1953
Death details: On February 2, 2022, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) identified the remains of Corporal Donald Louis Menken, missing from the Korean War. Corporal Menken entered the U.S. Army from Kentucky and served with Company K, 3rd Battalion, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division. On June 10, 1953, his unit defended “Outpost Harry” near Surang-ni, North Korea. That night, Chinese Communist Forces bombarded Outpost Harry with artillery before attacking the American lines at the outpost directly. While the CCF succeeded in taking the trenches in front of the outpost, U.S. troops prevented them from advancing further and forced their withdrawal a few days later. CPL Menken was killed in action on June 10 while defending Outpost Harry, and his remains could not be recovered at the time of his loss. In August of 1953, a Search and Recovery team recovered two sets of remains from near Outpost Harry. While one set was identified, the other could not be identified and was buried as an unknown at the Tanggok United Nations Cemetery before being moved the the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii. In 2019, a family request prompted the disinterment of this unknown set of remains, which were accessioned into the DPAA laboratory for identification. Laboratory analysis and circumstantial evidence established the remains as those of CPL Menken.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency