Promote & Preserve stories of U.S. fallen soldiers/sailors
Scott Alan Miller, age 20, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Parents: Bob Miller and Suzi Miller
Service era: Iraq
Schools: Natrona County High (2004)
Military history: Hhc, 5Th Battalion, 20Th Infantry, Fort Lewis, Washington; Enlisted in 2004.
Date of death: Saturday, June 9, 2007
Death details: Hostile; Baqubah, Iraq
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times, findagrave.com
Jason Jarrard Corbett, age 23, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Company D, 1St Battalion, 501St Infantry, Fort Richardson, Ak
Date of death: Monday, January 15, 2007
Death details: Hostile; Balad, Iraq
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Robert Lawrence Lucero, age 34, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Hhc 4Th Infantry Division Rear Area Operations Center, Casper Wy 82604
Date of death: Thursday, September 25, 2003
Death details: Baghdad, Iraq
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
Brendon Curtis Reiss, age 23, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: Iraq
Military history: Hqsvc Co, 1St Bn, 2D Mar, 2D Mardiv, 2D Meb, Camp Lejeune, Nc
Date of death: Sunday, March 23, 2003
Death details: Hostile; An Nasiriyah, Iraq
Source: Department of Defense, Military Times
James Raymond Gore, age 23, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Parents: Jack Lee Gore
Service era: Vietnam
Schools: Natrona County schools
Date of death: Tuesday, June 23, 1970
Death details: Died in Vietnam when the helicopter he was a passenger in crashed
Source: National Archives, Casper Star Tribune (1970)
Robert Eugen Cooke from Midwest, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Monday, December 18, 1944
Death details: He was aboard the destroyer USS Hull as it operated as part of the Fast Carrier Strike Force in the Philippine Sea. On December 17, 1944, the Hull was participating in refueling operations when the ships of its fueling group were engulfed by Typhoon Cobra. The Hull lost its ability to steer amid the enormous waves and began taking on water. The Hull eventually took on too much water to stay afloat and rolled and sank shortly before noon, on December 18. Sixty-two crew members were rescued, but a little more than two-hundred crew members were lost in the sinking.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
Jack Earl Hill, age 21, from Casper, Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Monday, November 22, 1943
Death details: On August 24, 2021, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) identified the remains of Private First Class Jack E. Hill, missing from World War II. Private First Class Hill, who joined the U.S. Marine Corps from Colorado, served with Company D, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division. From November 20 through 23, 1943, the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy conducted a large-scale amphibious assault on the Japanese-held atoll of Tarawa as part of Operation Galvanic, the Allied capture of the Gilbert Islands. Over several days of intense fighting at Tarawa, approximately 1,000 Marines and Sailors were killed and more than 2,000 were wounded, while the Japanese were virtually annihilated. Pfc Hill died on the third day of battle and was reportedly buried in Row D of a military cemetery later called Cemetery 33, but attempts to locate his remains in 1946 were unsuccessful. In 2009, History Flight, Inc., a nonprofit organization, discovered a burial site on Betio Island believed to be Cemetery 33, which has been the site of numerous excavations ever since. In March 2019, excavations west of Cemetery 33 revealed a previously undiscovered burial site that has since been identified as Row D. The remains recovered at this site were transferred to the DPAA Laboratory at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii. Laboratory analysis and the totality of the circumstantial evidence available established one set of these remains as those of Pfc Hill.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
Claude W. Herron from Wyoming, Natrona county.
Service era: World War II
Date of death: Thursday, July 9, 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. Private Claude W. Herron entered the U.S. Army from Wyoming and served with the 194th Tank Battalion in the Philippines during World War II. He was captured in Bataan following the American surrender on April 9, 1942, and died of dysentery on July 9, 1942, at the Cabanatuan Prison Camp in Nueva Ecija Province. 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, Private Herron is memorialized on the Walls of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines.
Source: National Archives, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency