Honoring Fallen Troops When They Return Home

The news no military family wants to hear arrived Dec. 23, 1944, for relatives of WWII Staff Sgt. Joseph Ralph Sanchez: He was missing in action.

Since that day, generations of Sanchezes have searched for him, wondering where he was and if he could still be alive. His absence left a hole that couldn’t be assuaged over time. Even nieces and nephews born after he disappeared joined the search.

Recently, Sanchez's family finally received the closure it longed for when an Army genealogist matched his DNA to a bone fragment found in Germany. On a bittersweet day two months ago, Sanchez’s remains were flown home to his family in Whittier so he could be honored in and finally laid to rest.

As she had done more than a dozen times before, Los Alamitos resident Laura Herzog was there to help the family honor and mourn Sanchez. Herzog, a former spokeswoman for the Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base, has made it her mission to ensure fallen soldiers are recognized for their sacrifices and military families have support as they grieve.

In an era when American service members die quietly in distant wars, Herzog formed the nonprofit Honoring Our Fallen to make sure the community pays tribute.

Herzog discovered this calling during the 14 Hero Missions she helped coordinate while working at JFTB.

Seeing the family and community’s mutual grief and appreciation for her help told her such assistance is not just valuable, it is necessary. Among other things, Herzog frees families from worrying about logistics when a fallen relative returns. The Hero Missions create a strong emotional bond between Herzog and grieving families, a role she decided to continue after being  laid off from the JFTB.

“I had to figure out how I could keep working with these Hero Missions,” she said.

With the Sanchez family, Herzog helped coordinate a Hero Mission that was long overdue, and helped to end generations of grief and exhaustive research.

Carol LeSauvage, Sanchez’s niece, said the family spent 67 years seeking answers, flying to Joint POW/MIA meetings, speaking with historical researchers and calling other POW/MIA families.

All that was found of Sanchez’s body was a 7-inch wrist bone that a German civilian had saved. The Army was given the remains after conducting in-person interviews with locals as part of its efforts to locate missing service members.

An Army-hired genealogist made the DNA match. Sanchez died during the Battle of the Bulge, and his remains were found in Ahrweiler, Germany. During the battle, he was working as gunner on a B-26 Marauder with the Army Air Force.  At the time of his death, he was 20 and had been in the service two years. During his lifetime, LeSauvage said, he was “kind and highly regarded.”

Sanchez graduated from Whittier High School in 1942 with honors, and served as eighth-grade class president. He also enjoyed playing the saxophone.

His Hero Mission ceremony took place on March 17. Two days later, he was buried with his mother at Rose Hills Cemetery in Whittier, a decision the family said it made to put both he and his mother at peace.

Aside from finding Sanchez’s remains, part of what helped his family move on was the way he was honored by both the military and civilian communities at his Hero Mission. LeSauvage said she owes a lot of that to Herzog.

Candida Torre, a Gold Star mother, joined Herzog’s board after experiencing Herzog's work first-hand. Torre's son, Jose, was killed Jan. 15. Soon after Torre was notified of her son's fate, Herzog contacted her and took over the Hero Mission, coordinating the details.

“Laura amazingly appeared and everything fell into place and in a matter of 20 minutes my worries were over,” Torre said. “My son’s homecoming was an honoring experience for us and she made that happen.”

For more information about Honoring Our Fallen, visit www.honoringourfallen.org. Donations are accepted, but HRG said donors won’t be able to receive the organization’s tax identification number until its 501-c3 status is finalized.