Promote & Preserve stories of U.S. fallen soldiers/sailors
Mitchell K. Daehling, age 24, from Dalton, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Spouse: Married
Service era: Afghanistan
Schools: Wahconah Regional High graduate
Date of death: Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Death details: Died of wounds suffered when enemy forces attacked his unit with an improvised explosive device. Killed were Sgt. 1st class Jeffrey C. Baker, Spc. Mitchell K. Daehling, Spc. William J. Gilbert and Pfc. Cody Towse.
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Michael R. II Demarsico from North Adams, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Service era: Afghanistan
Military history: 1st Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigae Combat Team, Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.
Date of death: Thursday, August 16, 2012
Death details: Died in Panjwa’l, Afghanistan of wounds suffered when he encountered an enemy improvised explosive device.
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Stephen Michael Wells, age 29, from North Egremont, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Hht 4Th Squadron, 3D Armored Cavalry Regiment Fort Carson, Co 80913
Date of death: Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Death details: Habbaniyah, Iraq
Source: Department of Defense
Daniel Henery Petithory, age 32, from Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Company A, 3D Battalion, 5Th Sfg (Airborne), Fort Campbell, Ky 42223
Date of death: Wednesday, December 5, 2001
Death details: Hostile; Khaneh Gerdab, Afghanistan
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Peter Allan Cook, age 20, from North Adams, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Service era: Vietnam
Date of death: Thursday, May 7, 1970
Death details: Hostile, South Vietnam
Cemetery: Southview
Source: National Archives, North Adams Transcript (1970)
James Roque Fahey, age 20, from Berkshire County Pittsfield, Massachusetts .
Parents: James P. Fahey
Service era: World War II
Schools: Saint Joseph’s High graduate, Cranwell School
Date of death: Monday, August 6, 1945
Death details: Killed aboard USS Bullhead SS-332 when it was sunk by air attack near the Lombok Strait.
Source: On Eternal Patrol, Bershire County Eagle (1946)
Bernard J. Calvi from Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Thursday, July 16, 1942
Death details: Following the Allied surrender on the Bataan Peninsula on April 9, 1942, the Japanese began the forcible transfer of American and Filipino prisoners of war to various prison camps in central Luzon, at the northern end of the Philippines. The largest of these camps was the notorious Cabanatuan Prison Camp. At its peak, Cabanatuan held approximately 8,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war that were captured during and after the Fall of Bataan. Camp overcrowding worsened with the arrival of Allied prisoners who had surrendered from Corregidor on May 6, 1942. Conditions at the camp were poor, with food and water extremely limited, leading to widespread malnutrition and outbreaks of malaria and dysentery. By the time the camp was liberated in early 1945, approximately 2,800 Americans had died at Cabanatuan. Prisoners were forced to bury the dead in makeshift communal graves, often completed without records or markers. As a result, identifying and recovering remains interred at Cabanatuan was difficult in the years after the war. Corporal Bernard J. Murphy entered the U.S. Army Air Forces from Nebraska and served with the 34th Pursuit Squadron of the 24th Pursuit Group in the Philippines during World War II. The 34th was stationed at Del Carmen Field on Luzon Island when the Japanese attacked U.S. military bases in the Pacific in December 1941. After the Japanese destroyed the unit’s aircraft on the ground at Del Carmen, the men of the 34th served as infantry during the Battle of Bataan. When U.S. troops in Bataan surrendered to the Japanese on April 9, 1941, they were forced on the Bataan Death March. They went first to Camp O’Donnell in Tarlac Province and from there to the Cabanatuan Prison Camp in Nueva Ecija, where Corporal Murphy died of malaria on July 16, 1942. He was buried in a communal grave in the camp cemetery along with other deceased American POWs; however, his remains could not be associated with any remains recovered from Cabanatuan after the war. Today, Corporal Murphy is memorialized on the Walls of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines.
Cemetery: Manila American Cemetery
Source: National Archives, American Battle Monuments Commission, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
Roman Walter Sadlowski, age 18, from Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Berkshire county.
Parents: Valentine Sadiowski
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Sunday, December 7, 1941
Death details: Killed aboard the USS Oklahoma. Accounted for December 4, 2018
Source: National Archives, Berkshire Eagle (1944)