Younge, Henry L.
Army Sergeant
Henry L. Younge, age 20, from Suffolk County Copiague, New York .
Parents: Florence Younge
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Saturday, May 26, 1945
Death details:
On August 14, 2025, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency identified the remains of U.S. Army Air Forces Sgt. Henry L. Younge, missing from World War II.
Younge entered the U.S. Army Air Forces from New York and served in the 30th Bombardment Squadron, 19th Bombardment Group. On April 24, 1945, he was the tail gunner on a B-29 Superfortress aircraft on a bombing mission against enemy installations in Kawasaki, Japan. During the mission, the aircraft was shot down and crashed in Chiba Prefecture. Younge survived the crash but was captured and imprisoned in Tokyo. On May 26, 1945, during a massive U.S. incendiary air raid on Tokyo, a fire engulfed the Tokyo Military Prison, killing all U.S. prisoners of war held there, including Younge. Following the war, American Graves Registration personnel recovered 65 sets of remains from the Tokyo Military Prison, but none could be identified as Younge. Thirty-nine unidentified remains associated with the fire were interred as Unknowns at Fort McKinley Cemetery, now the Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines. In 2022, DPAA disinterred these Unknowns and transferred them to the laboratory for analysis. Using modern forensic techniques, scientists individually identified Younge.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency, Newsday (1945)