Mortuary Affairs
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Graves_registration_service_2.gif/220px-Graves_registration_service_2.gif)
Mortuary Affairs is a service within the
The Air Force has a similar facility at
Until 1991, the army's mortuary affairs was known as the Graves Registration Service (GRS or GRREG).[1] The Graves Registration Service was created several months after the United States entered World War I.
The current Army
Responsibilities
Mortuary Affairs is responsible for retrieval, identification, transportation, and burial of American soldiers. Retrieval can be further subdivided into:
- Combat Recovery – Recovery while combat is still ongoing.
- Post-Combat Recovery – Recovery of the dead immediately after combat has ceased. Danger from mines and enemy snipers is still quite high. Until the 20th century, it was commonplace for combatants to call battlefield truces, in which combatants would temporarily cease fire to allow for the collection of their dead. This practice has ceased in modern warfare.
- Area/Theater Recovery
- Historical Recovery
The role of the Mortuary Affairs service is legally defined in 10 USC, subtitle A, Chapter 75, Subchapter I, section 1471.[2][3]
Mortuary Affairs has historically been tied with investigation of
The Mortuary Affairs Creed is 'Dignity, Reverence, Respect.'[5]
History
Pre-World War I
In the
During the Spanish–American War, the United States initiated a policy of returning soldiers killed on foreign soil back to next-of-kin in the United States, the first country in the world to do so. "Quartermaster General Marshall I. Ludington spoke words that became a harbinger of U.S. retrieval efforts in major world conflicts only a few years later. He said the efforts of the Quartermaster Corps in the Spanish–American War were most likely the first attempt of a nation to "disinter the remains of all its soldiers who, in defense of their country, had given up their lives on a foreign shore, and bring them... to their native land for return to their relatives and friends or their reinternment in the beautiful cemeteries which have been provided by our Government for its defenders."[7]
During the Philippine–American War, the Burial Corps and United States Army Morgue and Office of Identification had overlapping responsibilities for care of the dead.
World War I
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c2/WWI_42nd_Division_burial_party.jpg/220px-WWI_42nd_Division_burial_party.jpg)
The Graves registration service was created by
World War II
The Graves Registration Service ceased to exist during the Interwar period. This led to difficulties reactivating the service at the beginning of World War II. Despite these initial difficulties, by the end of the war, the Graves Registration service consisted of more than 30 active companies and 11 separately numbered platoons.[8]
At the end of World War II, the Graves Registration service was again effectively disbanded.
Korean War
The onset of the
Starting on
Vietnam War
Better transportation, communication, and laboratory techniques allowed a higher rate of body identification in the
Iraq War and War in Afghanistan
The 54th Quartermaster Company and 111th Quartermaster Company are the Army's only standing, permanent mortuary affairs units.[16] Mortuary affairs training takes place at Fort Lee, Virginia,[17] and lasts about seven weeks. These soldiers search areas for hasty or unmarked graves, unburied dead, personal effects, and identification media. They also assist in preparation, preservation, and shipment of remains.
The
Some of those who have volunteered to work with the dead will serve at collection points in Iraq and Afghanistan; others will work in the port mortuary at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. Another small group will work with the 246th or 311th Quartermaster Company from Puerto Rico, a Reserve Mortuary Affairs unit, in Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, at the Joint Personal Effects Depot (JPED). Here, soldiers will receive, inventory, process, clean, filter, and ship all items belonging to deceased or injured soldiers.
The 92Ms have cared for the majority of the more than 4,500 military casualties in
In 2008, the Department of Defense lifted its ban on media coverage (especially photographs) of the return of the remains of fallen service members. Currently, news media may be present if the survivors of the dead give their consent.[18] The ban had been in effect for 18 years, having been instituted in 1991, at the time of the Persian Gulf War.[18] However, the ban was waived on a large number of occasions, to the point that its existence only became widely known in 2004.[19] When the ban was enforced at that time, it was widely criticized as politically motivated.[20]
Health issues
Studies have shown that mortuary affairs personnel have some of the highest rates of
See also
Notes
- ^ Sledge, 43
- ^ Sledge, 13
- ^ U.S. Code collection – Forensic pathology investigations. Cornell University Law School
- ^ Sledge, 10
- ^ Director, Mortuary Affairs Center, "Ode to the Mortuary Affairs Specialist", 03 February 2011"
- ^ Sledge, 32–24
- ^ Sledge, 35
- ^ a b William G. Eckert. History of the U.S. Army Graves Registration Service (1917–1950s). American Journal of Forensic Medicine and Pathology, Volume 4, Issue 3. September 1983. pp. 231–243.
- ^ Major William R. White, Quartermaster Corps. Our Soldier Dead. The Quartermaster Review. May–June 1930. Reproduced by the Army Quartermaster Foundation.
- ISBN 978-981-10-7128-7.
- US Army Command and General Staff College. Archived from the original on February 22, 2014.)
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(help - ^ Lieutenant Commander John C. Cook, Quartermaster Corps. "Graves Registration in the Korean Conflict" Archived 2017-12-03 at the Wayback Machine. Quartermaster Review. March–April 1953. Army Quartermaster Foundation.
- Busan, South Korea, has the graves of 2,300 non-United States servicemen from United Nations Commandnations.
- ^ Sledge, 41
- ^ Dr. Steven E. Anders. "With All Due Honors: A History of the Quartermaster Graves Registration Mission". Quartermaster Professional Bulletin, September 1988. Reproduced by the Army Quartermaster Foundation
- ^ JMAC history. Joint Mortuary Affairs Center. U.S. Army Quartermaster Center and School.
- ^ "Joint Mortuary Affairs Center (JMAC) - Quartermaster School". www.quartermaster.army.mil.
- ^ a b Randall Chase, "Ban on Photos of War Dead Ends", Express (Washington, D.C.), April 7, 2009, p. 3.
- ^ Alexander Belenky, "Lifting the ban on photographing coffins of US soldiers at Dover is a victory for transparency", The Guardian, February 27, 2009.
- ^ E.g., Foon Rhee, "Political Intelligence: Pentagon ends photo ban on war dead return", The Boston Globe, February 26, 2009; Susan Donaldson James, "Grief for War Dead Shrouds Casket Photo Ban: Military Families Want Sons' and Daughters' Stories Told – but Privacy Respected", ABC News, February 17, 2009.
- ^ Sledge, 61
- ^ Grandjean, Guy; GuardianFilms, Source (October 13, 2008). "Former US marine reserve speaks about dealing with dead bodies". The Guardian – via www.theguardian.com.
References
- Sledge, Michael (2005). Soldier Dead: How We Recover, Identify, Bury, and Honor Our Military Fallen. Columbia University Press. OCLC 81452881.
- Dickon, Chris (2011). The Foreign Burial of American War Dead: A History. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co. OCLC 659753667.
Further reading
- Coleman, Bradley Lynn (January 2008). "Recovering the Korean War Dead, 1950–1958: Graves Registration, Forensic Anthropology, and Wartime Memorialization". S2CID 162230190.
- Jean-Loup Gassend (2014). Autopsy of a Battle: the Allied Liberation of the French Riviera August–September 1944. Schiffer Publications. ISBN 978-0764345807.
- Lee, Chungsun (15 Jun 2022). "Between Visible and Invisible Deaths of the Korean War: Re-envisioning Operation Glory (1954) at the United Nations Memorial Cemetery in Korea". International Journal of Military History and Historiography. Leiden: Koninklijke .