Remains of a fallen serviceman from Brunswick are coming home nearly 82 years after he was killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor that drew the United States into World War II.
U.S. Naval Aviator Stanley Willis Allen will be laid to rest at 1 p.m. Tuesday, July 18, in Maine Veterans Memorial Cemetery in Augusta.
Stanley Willis Allen, who was identified as a casualty of the Pearl Harbor attack. Courtesy of Eugene Hughes and the Naval History and Heritage Command
Allen died on the USS Oklahoma on Dec. 7, 1941, along with 387 other servicemen. Many of their remains were recovered but impossible to identify until scientists at the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency launched an effort in 2015 to conduct DNA testing and reference dental records to put names to the remains.
The Navy found Allen’s distant cousin, Beverly Gelwick, 91, of Harpswell, who had no idea she lost a family member at Pearl Harbor. Gelwick could not speak with The Times Record due to health issues, but her daughter Jennifer Gelwick-Luecke shared her thoughts.
“We were amazed,” Gelwick-Luecke said. “My mother was so excited. She started researching him and now keeps his photo in her home. We are honored. We are thrilled he is coming home to Maine.”
After sitting down with Navy officials, Gelwick-Luecke said she learned what an “amazing person” Allen was.
“He went to Bowdoin College,” she said. “He was only 25 when he knew what he wanted to do with his career and became a naval aviator. He must have had nerves of steel to go through all that. It’s a piece of our history that we can claim, and we didn’t even know it.”
Gelwick-Luecke said cousins on both sides of Allen’s family will attend his burial.
“Being able to recover and identify the remains of sailors offers closure for the families,” Timothy M. Hunter, director of Navy Casualty, said in a press release. “And it is especially important to the Navy to honor these sailors who paid the ultimate sacrifice and gave their lives for our country.”
Allen was awarded the Purple Heart, Combat Action Ribbon, American Defense Service Medal (Fleet Clasp), Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal (Bronze Star), World War II Victory Medal and the American Campaign Medal.
This April 1938 photo shows the USS Oklahoma in 1938. Scientific testing that was started a few years ago on remains of men whose bodies were pulled from the USS Oklahoma after the attack has led to the identification of nearly 400 servicemen. U.S. Navy via Associated Press, File
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