U.S. Marine Killed in Bloody WWII Battle Returns to Blue Island Home

After seven decades, a U.S. Marine killed in an infamous World War II battle in the Pacific is finally home.

Pfc. Charles E. Oetjen died Nov. 3, 1943, on the first day of the Battle of Tarawa between the U.S. and Japanese forces, according to a Sauk Valley report. His remains were discovered in a mass grave on the small central Pacific atoll.

"The tiny atoll became the grave of 6,000 troops killed in just 76 hours of combat — more than 1,000 Americans and nearly 6,000 Japanese," reported the Chicago Sun-Times. "With thousands of corpses strewn across an island barely 800 meters across at its widest point, military leaders hurriedly buried Oetjen and his fellow Marines in ditches, hoping to abate the clouds of flies that covered the battlefields."

Oetjen's remains were reburied in Alsip last weekend near Oetjen's hometown of Blue Island. He received full military honors. Watch the Sauk Valley news video below for additional background on the story.