The remains of a Massachusetts airman who died as a prisoner of war during World War II have been accounted for, military officials said Wednesday.
U.S. Army Air Forces Pvt. 1st Class Bernard J. Calvi, 23, was a member of the 17th Pursuit Squadron, 24th Pursuit Group when Japanese forces invaded the Philippines in December 2021, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency said in a news release. Intense fighting ensued and continued until the surrender of Bataan peninsula and Corregidor Island in spring 1942.
During that period, thousands of American and Filipino service members were captured and held at prisoner of war camps, the DPAA said.
Calvi was among those reported captured when forces in Bataan surrendered. He, and thousands of others, were subjected to the 65-mile Bataan Death March and then held at a prisoner of war camp where 2,500 prisoners died during the course of the war.
Calvi died on July 16, 1942, according to prison and historical records, just months after the surrender of the peninsula. He was buried in a mass grave, known as Common Grave 316.
That grave and others at the camp were exhumed by the American Graves Registration Service after World War II ended. The remains from the graves were brought to a temporary U.S. military mausoleum that had been constructed in Manila, the Philippines’ capital city.
