A Minnesotan who was considered missing in action during World War II is coming home.
The family of U.S. Army Captain Willibald Charles Bianchi found out in September that his remains were identified, thanks in part to DNA samples provided by family members.
Steve Merti is Bianchi's nephew, and he spoke Sunday in a ceremony in Brown County.
"Never would we ever have guessed that after 80 years they would identify his remains, so we were stunned when my sister got that message," Bianchi said.
U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar spoke at Sunday's ceremony in Bianchi's home town of New Ulm, Minnesota.
"As we reflect today on the debt of gratitude we owe him in his service, our state and this family looks forward to finally welcoming him back home."
Captain Charles Bianchi was a prisoner of war for two years and posthumously received the Congressional Medal of Honor following combat in the Philippines in 1942. He was on a prisoner transport ship that was sunk by an American plane in 1945.
His remains were buried in a mass grave at the Punchbowl National Cemetery in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Family members say Bianchi will be re-interred in New Ulm.
The Congressional Medal of Honor Society describes the circumstances of Bianchi's heroism that earned him the Medal of Honor:
When the rifle platoon of another company was ordered to wipe out two strong enemy machine-gun nests, 1st Lt. Bianchi, voluntarily and of his own initiative, advanced with the platoon leading part of the men. When wounded early in the action by two bullets through the left hand, he did not stop for first aid but discarded his rifle and began firing a pistol. He located a machine-gun nest and personally silenced it with grenades.
When wounded the second time by two machine-gun bullets through the chest muscles, 1st Lt. Bianchi climbed to the top of an American tank, manned its antiaircraft machine gun, and fired into strongly held enemy position until knocked completely off the tank by a third severe wound.