Gerald M Kight

White Salmon, Washington

September 1944?

Welcoming Home Our Hero, Click photo below:

May 18, 2012

For Some Memorial Service Snapshots, Click photo below:

May 19, 2012

The 3 Dutch Men Visit Gravesite, Click photo below:

September 23, 2013

World War II soldier Gerald 'Mike' Kight's remains returned, almost 68 years after he died in battle
Published: Tuesday, May 01, 2012, 5:30 PM Updated: Wednesday, May 02, 2012, 9:23 AM
By Mike Francis, The Oregonian
For years, the family of Gerald "Mike" Kight has wondered: What happened to the handsome 23-year-old who went to war with his three brothers and one brother-in-law, but never came home? He lives on in old photographs and family lore, but he disappeared following a battle along Wylerbaan Road in the Netherlands, between Groesbeek and the little town of Wyler, Germany, in World War II. He was one of 39 Americans who were never found following clashes in the area with German troops in late September 1944. 

The mystery, at last, will be laid to rest at West Klickitat Cemetery in White Salmon, Wash., on May 19, following a noontime memorial service at Gardner Funeral Home. 

Operation Market Garden was a setback for the Allied troops, which lost almost 12,000 soldiers in a series of engagements intended to capture Germany's Ruhr Valley. The Allies succeeded in driving the Germans out of the Netherlands, but failed to strike the decisive blow that might have ended the war. 

Thanks now to the detective work of the Defense Department's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam and the Army's Past Conflict Repatriation Branch at Fort Knox, Ky., Kight's descendants know something about his place in those momentous events. 

A Dutch farmer was turning the soil in his cornfield last September when he saw bones jutting from the ground. That brought out the Royal Netherlands Army's Recovery and Identification Unit, which unearthed two sets of human bones, in what apparently were two depressions about 100 yards apart. 

The remains in one depression, which may have been formed when a shell landed in the battle, were so fragmentary and so incomplete that they haven't yet been identified. The remains in the foxhole were more complete. They belonged to a man lying on his back with his knees elevated -- and they rested with the dog tags of Gerald Kight. 

"This was an easy one," said Michael Mee, chief of identification for the Past Conflict Repatriation Branch. A single set of remains in a single foxhole, with dog tags, a partial jaw and a wallet meant that no DNA match was necessary. 

The Accounting Command report said Pfc. Kight, who belonged to the Headquarters Company of the 3rd Battalion of the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division, was among those killed when German tanks overran the American position. Every American but one was killed or captured in that battle, and Kight was apparently firing from his foxhole. The single survivor told investigators afterward he saw Kight "severely wounded." 

The Army's search for next of kin led to a phone call to the Southeast Portland home of Frances and Robert Hembree. The series of questions made her suspicious. 
"I was pretty leery," said Frances Hembree, 70, Kight's niece. "I was thinking, 'Is this a scam?' There are so many scams." 

But over time, she understood the reason for the call. And that brought Mee and a casualty assistance officer from the Oregon National Guard to the Hembrees' doorstep. Mee was carrying neatly labeled plastic bags, each with something found in the foxhole. Two small wallets, a tin of "wound pills" in a case marked "Upjohn" and the dog tags, three of them. 

Frances Hembree is the oldest of five extended family members connected to Gerald Kight. She is the only one old enough to have shared an embrace with him. She has a photo of the tall, slender blond man holding a toddler in the shade of a tree. The toddler is she.

She was also very close to her grandmother, Gerald's mother. Until she died about 20 years ago, she talked about how she missed being able to bury her son. 
"My grandma always said he will come home one day," Hembree said, her eyes filling. "I'm the one who's supposed to be here to take him home." 

So on May 19 at the cemetery in White Salmon, the cremated remains of Gerald Kight will be buried with full military honors alongside the remains of his mother and father and one of his brothers. 

"I'm not a buff of any kind about the wars," Hembree said. "But I guess now I'm rather proud of my relatives who did go and fight for us. 

"Particularly Mike." 

Gerald 'Mike' Kight rejoins his family almost 68 years after his death in World War II
Published: Saturday, May 19, 2012, 9:33 PM Updated: Saturday, May 19, 2012, 10:53 PM
By Mike Francis, The Oregonian

WHITE SALMON, Wash. -- Flags snapped, an honor guard fired three volleys and three World War II-era spotting planes flew the missing man formation as the ashes of Gerald "Mike" Kight were laid to rest Saturday afternoon in this cemetery in the Columbia Gorge. After almost 68 years away from home, his ashes joined the remains of a mother who never lost hope he would be found. 

"She always, always said 'He will come home one day,' and she never lost sight of that thought," said Frances Hembree of Portland, Mike Kight's niece and the last living relative who had contact with him. "We feel privileged to bring him home." 

His ashes were contained in a gold-colored urn, which was buried with ceremonial coins, carnatians and tulips sent from the three men who found Kight's bones in a cornfield in the Netherlands. 

About 45 members of the Patriot Guard Riders joined about 70 family members and friends for Saturday's services that, however belatedly, honored the service and sacrifice of a young man who never came home from World War II. 

The ceremonies closed a circle almost 68 years around. Kight fought with 3rd Battalion of the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division. His regiment took heavy losses in the fighting that saw it capture Nijmegen bridge over the Waal near Groesbeek, close to the German border. But the larger Market Garden offensive faltered when the Allies failed to capture Arnheim to the north and were driven back. This action gave the title to the book and movie "A Bridge Too Far." 

"Mike" Kight's long journey home started last fall in a farmer's field near Groesbeek. A 33-year-old Dutchman named Paul Geutjes was scanning the field with his two friends, Mario Wijnhoven and Rick Hermsen. Their hobby was hunting with metal detectors for evidence of the World War II fighting that raged there during Operation Market Garden. 

"In Mike's case, we found shells and a .30 ammo box," Geutjes wrote by email. "After that we found a small neck bone and after seeing the upper leg, we realized this was a field grave. Stunned, we stopped digging and informed the Dutch Army and police. They professionally excavated the remains." 

That's when the searchers found Kight's dog tags and other belongings that clearly identified him as the missing 23-year-old from White Salmon. He had been killed when German tanks overran the American position in a rout that left only one uncaptured survivor. That survivor later said he saw Kight severely wounded, but still firing. The chaplain at Saturday's burial said Kight's bones were found with 150 spent shell casings -- and no unspent rounds. 
The Dutch searchers notified the Defense Department's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, which notified the Army's Past Conflict Repatriation Branch, which traced Kight's family tree and then got in touch with Frances Hembree of Southeast Portland to see if she was, indeed, "Mike" Kight's closest surviving relative. 

It was a startling discovery for Hembree, who treasures a picture of her uncle Mike holding her under the shade of a tree when she was 2 years old. She grew up knowing of her grandmother's ache for her missing son. And she and her husband Robert and "Mike" Kight's other, younger nieces have been through an emotional whirlwind since the news arrived. 

The news of Mike's recovery is "a sign that prayers are answered," said another niece, Peggy Jo Kight Vermaas of Beaverton. And she said she and the Kight family are mindful that the story of Mike Kight is also the story of many others. Some 73,000 U.S. troops remain missing since World War I, the chaplain noted. 

One of Mike Kight's nieces is Sharon, who lives in Brussels with her husband, Mike Dolan. When they got word, they rushed to the field where Kight's remains were found. Being there, Dolan wrote, "meant a lot to my wife." 

Mike and Sharon Dolan weren't in White Salmon Saturday, but they will attend this year's annual Memorial Day service at the Netherlands American Cemetery at Margraten. Mike Kight's name is listed on the Tablets of the Missing, Mike Dolan said. Soon, a rosette will be added to his name, showing that he has been recovered and returned to his family. 

The rosette closes a long-held family mystery with a spot of color and a note of grace. And it helps to seal the friendship between America and the Dutch who remember how they fought and died in an effort to free them from the Germans' repression. 

"I'm happy that the family can have a proper funeral," wrote Geutjes, "and Mike can finally rest in peace in his homely ground."