A Naval petty officer from Albany killed during the attack on Pearl Harbor has been accounted for. The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency says Navy Metalsmith 1st Class Leonard Smith was accounted for in April. The agency says the family only recently received a full briefing on his identification, which why the announcement was just made. In December 1941, Smith, who was 29 at the time, was assigned to the USS Oklahoma, which was attacked by Japanese aircraft. The ship capsized, resulting in the deaths of 429 crew members.
From 1941 until 1944, Navy personnel recovered the remains and interred them in area cemeteries. The remains were later disinterred for identification, but in 1949 those who could not be identified, including Smith, were buried in Honolulu. In 2015, the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency exhumed the remains for analysis and identification.
The agency says Smith will be cremated on September 1.
