DNA helps identify Buffalo WWII soldier

PFC. Bartholomew C. Loschiavo – at the age of 24 when he was hit by an artillery shell during a battle against German troops near Grevenmacher, Luxembourg. – was buried in the European country as an unknown soldier, leaving his family members wondering for decades whether he might still be alive.

“The reason was he was missing in action in 1944,” said his great-nephew, David Loschiavo, of West Seneca.

PFC. Loschiavo was recently identified through DNA and other means. His body was to be returned Thursday evening to the Buffalo Niagara International Airport with full military honors, befitting a soldier killed in combat.

He will be buried next weekend in Western New York, after an 80-year saga that included his sacrifice, the kindness of the citizens he helped free from the Nazis and his loved ones determined to learn more about his comes out after the army first believed that Loschiavo was either captured or dead.

Born May 27, 1920, Loschiavo was the second youngest of 11 children of Sicilian immigrants Agostino Loschiavo and the former Concetta Caito. He grew up in Dante Place, an apartment building in Buffalo’s Canal District, where the Marine Drive Apartments are located today.

Everyone in the family – which today has more than 200 nieces, nephews and their children and grandchildren – heard the story from Uncle Bart, his great-nephew said.

David Loschiavo’s father, Augustine, was 6 years old when his uncle died.

“He remembers Uncle Bart picking him up and walking him around town every time he went to their house,” David Loschiavo said.

He said many family members would not accept that Uncle Bart died because one of his buddies, a fellow soldier who fought in the same battle, saw him get hit by a shell. and crawl to the side of a road near a hill. The enemy fire was so intense that his unit had to withdraw quickly. When they returned, they could not find him.

His body was found by residents of Grevenmacher, who buried him in a local cemetery in an unmarked grave.

The American army learned of his remains after the war and transferred them to the American cemetery in Luxembourg, still without knowing his identity.

Back in Western New York, his loved ones continued to wonder where he was. When they left town, Bart’s sisters would call and write to every Bartholomew Loschiavo they could find in the phone book, hoping to find their brother, David Loschiavo said. Bart’s brother jumped in a car in the 1950s and drove to California with a brother-in-law because they knew Bart was there.

“That whole generation, I think they all went to their graves thinking he was probably still alive,” the great-nephew said.

Augustine Loschiavo began investigating what happened to his uncle in 1996, knowing that there might be unmarked graves where American soldiers were buried. He didn’t go far.

Then, in 2020, his son, Donald – David’s brother – started looking online and found out how to get recordings on Bart.

He learned that his great-uncle had entered the Army on September 16, 1940, and served in Company A, 1st Battalion, 329th Infantry Regiment, 83rd Infantry Division, in the European Theater. He discovered the battle where he was injured. He read reports that an American soldier was buried in a local cemetery and transferred after the war to the American cemetery in Luxembourg.

Donald Loschiavo contacted the U.S. Department of Defense, which exhumed the soldier’s body, flew him to the United States, and asked the Loschiavo family to provide DNA samples.

Military investigators also checked dental records and x-rays before positively identifying Bart. They informed the family in April that they had confirmed a match.

A procession from the airport to Lakeside Memorial West Seneca Chapel on Thursday evening was scheduled to include Erie County sheriff’s deputies and members of the Patriot Guard.

Visitation will be held at the funeral home from 10-11:30 a.m. June 1, after which Pfc. Loschiavo, who traveled to Europe and returned, will be buried with his parents at Holy Sepulcher Cemetery in Cheektowaga.