WWII soldier from Minnesota laid to rest more than 80 years after his passing

On a pristine Saturday afternoon, there was a Blackhawk helicopter flyover, and American flags were everywhere.

“It was hard today in some ways,” Scott Torpey said quietly. “But it was also a joyous occasion that we got to bring him home.”

At the New Ulm City Cemetery, it was a long-awaited homecoming as U.S. Army Captain Willibald Bianchi — ‘Uncle Bill’ to his family — was laid to rest with full military honors.

“You know, the sense of closure,” says Steve Marti, one of Bianchi’s nephews. “Who would have thought, after all these years, we get the call that guess what? They’ve identified his remains.”

Bianchi, 29 years old, previously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, was killed on a POW transport ship when it was bombed and sunk by an American plane in January 1945.

His remains were buried in a mass grave in a military cemetery in Hawaii.

For decades, Bianchi’s family didn’t know if he would ever be formally identified.

“He was lost to the war,” explains Joseph Marti, another nephew. “He was Uncle Bill, who left and never came back.”

Until a phone call last September: the Defense POW-MIA Accounting Agency had painstakingly searched through remains in the cemetery and used family DNA samples for a match.

“My cousin Scott, my Aunt Mary Louise, his sister and another cousin donated DNA, and they used that to use some of his bones to extract mitochondrial DNA and get the match,” Joseph Marti explains.

After a dignified transfer at MSP, Bianchi’s remains were brought to New Ulm.

Dozens and dozens of people from across the country — brothers, sisters and cousins attended the burial ceremony.  

The American flag on Bianchi’s coffin was given to his family.

“They gave it to my sister Sue, who was so deserving,” Steve Marti says. “She’s done so much to keep Uncle Bill’s legacy alive in our home, here in her home.”

For years, family members had passed down Bianchi’s story.

Now, they say, it has an ending befitting his service, and after an 80-year journey, Bianchi is now at honored rest.

His family says their hearts, once empty, are now full.  

“So, to have him back home, I think, is so special for everybody associated,” Joseph Marti exclaims. “We’re overwhelmed and humbled.”