A World Conflict II Marine Raider from Cincinnati who went lacking throughout a brutal jungle assault within the Solomon Islands 83 years in the past will lastly return residence after the Protection POW/MIA Accounting Company confirmed his identification.
DPAA introduced March 4 that Pfc. Norton V. Retzsch, 25, of Cincinnati, was accounted for on April 1, 2025. The company used dental information, anthropological evaluation and mitochondrial DNA sequencing to substantiate his id, lastly bringing closure for a household that has waited a long time for solutions. His burial is scheduled for April 13 in Marana, Arizona.
Becoming a member of the Marines and Delivery to New Georgia
A 1937 graduate of Hughes Excessive Faculty in Cincinnati, Retzsch joined the Marine Corps in September 1941 on the age of 23.
He shipped out to the Pacific with Firm C, 1st Marine Raider Battalion, 1st Marine Raider Regiment, one of many Corps’ elite items constructed for amphibious raids and jungle warfare behind enemy traces. On June 30, 1943, American forces launched Operation Toenails, a multi-pronged marketing campaign to grab the Japanese-held island of New Georgia within the central Solomon Islands.
Col. Harry Liversedge’s Northern Touchdown Group, constructed across the 1st Marine Raider Battalion and two Army infantry battalions, went ashore at Rice Anchorage on July 5 and commenced hacking by way of dense jungle towards the enemy garrison at Enogai.
On July 9, Firm C pushed towards Japanese positions close to Enogai Level. The Marines walked right into a ready ambush. Retzsch and two different Raiders from the corporate by no means got here again from the battle. Within the weeks that adopted, a Marine patrol working on the close by Dragons Peninsula encountered an enemy soldier carrying Retzsch’s canine tag.
In response to an account from the battalion chaplain, Father Paul Redmond, a voice from the jungle answered a problem with “Rites,” prompting the patrol to open hearth. Retzsch had at all times insisted his surname was pronounced “Reetz,” and the mispronunciation gave the Japanese soldier away.
A long time of Useless Ends
After the conflict, the 604th Quartermaster Graves Registration Firm searched the Bairoko Harbor and Enogai Inlet space from November to December 1947 however discovered no hint of Retzsch. The navy declared him non-recoverable in 1949 and inscribed his identify on the Tablets of the Lacking on the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial within the Philippines.
What the navy didn’t know on the time was that Retzsch’s stays had doubtless already been recovered. In December 1943, unidentified stays buried on the Enogai Cemetery have been exhumed and transferred first to a New Georgia cemetery, then to Finschhafen, Papua New Guinea, the place they have been designated as Unknown X-182. After a number of failed identification makes an attempt, X-182 was interred on the Manila American Cemetery in 1950.
The case remained dormant for many years till DPAA turned its consideration again to New Georgia. Company researchers flagged a gaggle of unidentified stays from the Enogai and Bairoko space as doable matches for lacking Raiders, and in January 2019, X-182 was pulled from the Manila cemetery and despatched to the DPAA laboratory.
Lastly Coming Residence
The identification hinged partly on a DNA pattern submitted to the navy in 2006 by Kim Opitz, Retzsch’s great-niece. Opitz, a contract author in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, instructed KARE 11 News that her household by no means stopped hoping.
“My mom by no means, by no means allow us to overlook about him,” Opitz stated. “We by no means thought that we might know what occurred. It was simply at all times going to be a thriller.”
When DPAA contacted her in 2025 to substantiate the identification, the information was surprising.
“It was like elation, like I’ve by no means felt so spiritually excessive,” Opitz instructed the station. “He’ll be introduced residence with honors.”
Retzsch’s household remembered him as a lifeguard with a romantic streak who had married solely half a yr earlier than heading off to conflict. His spouse Margaret responded to his loss by becoming a member of the battle herself, enlisting within the Marine Corps Ladies’s Reserve and rising to the rank of sergeant earlier than her honorable discharge.
Margaret remarried after the conflict. She handed away in 2005.
The Manila American Cemetery has since up to date its Tablets of the Lacking with a rosette beside Retzsch’s identify, signifying that the Marine is not unaccounted for.
Opitz urged different households of lacking service members to achieve out to DPAA.
“Should you’re nonetheless wanting, there’s nonetheless an opportunity,” she stated.
