Widdis, James Wesley Jr.
Air Force Lieutenant colonel

James Wesley Widdis Jr. from Newark, New Jersey.

Date of death: March 23, 1969
Death details: On October 18, 1996, Joint Task Force–Full Accounting (JTF-FA, now DPAA) identified the remains of Major James Wesley Widdis Jr., missing from the Vietnam War.

Major Widdis entered the U.S. Air Force from New Jersey and was a member of the 609th Special Operations Squadron. On March 23, 1969, he piloted an A-26A Invader (tail number 64-17667, call sign “Nimrod 24”) that took off from Nakhon Phanom Airfield, Thailand, on a night armed reconnaissance mission over Khammouan Province, Laos. Shortly after making a pass on an enemy anti-aircraft gun position, this aircraft was hit by enemy fire and crashed in the target area, killing Maj Widdis. Visual and electronic search efforts were unsuccessful and Maj Widdis’ remains could not be recovered at the time. In 1994, a joint U.S./Laotian investigation team visited the crash site and recovered human remains and pieces of aircraft wreckage and personal artifacts, and in 1995, investigators were able to identify Maj Widdis from these remains.

Sources: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency