1950’s Michigan Soldier Lost At War in North Korea
Going to war is one of the scariest things for the soldier and their family to endure. Soldiers leave their families not knowing how or if they'll ever return. Meanwhile, their family is wondering all of the same things, knowing there's nothing they can do but wait.
It's not common that soldiers never return back to their families, more often than not they return in a casket with an American flag draped over it, they return physically healthy and then have to deal with the side effects of being at war, or they are a prisoner of war and kept overseas for information on the US. One family in Michigan has experienced something that no other family quite possibly has before: their soldier never returned, but was not a KIA or POW.
Army PFC Raymond Meyers Jr. was from Oakland County, Michigan, and will go down as one of the most interesting stories in Michigan's military history. Meyers fought and served as a part of the G Company, 2nd Battalion, 32rd Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division. Meyers and many other members of this crew would get into a battle with the Chinese as they were trying to push them off the Triangle Hill Complex. This would be the last time many of them were heard from or seen.
The most unfortunate part of this whole scenario is that none of these families received their loved ones' bodies, remains, personal items, dog tags, or anything else because they didn't find their bodies during the post-war search. Almost their entire division is listed as missing in action, including Meyers, except his case is a little different than many others.
Meyers and a handful of his division members have a slightly different missing-in-action case than the rest of their division. Meyers and the rest of these members are missing in action because no one knows what happened to them, they weren't seen being taken as prisoners of war, they weren't killed by a mortar, gunshot wound, or grenade, and they hadn't fallen off a cliff either. They simply just disappeared.
Raymond Meyers Jr, left his home in Oakland County, Michigan knowing that he may never see his friends, family, or home ever again. He bravely traveled to another country to fight for the freedoms that we exercise every day but didn't make it back home to enjoy those freedoms. His family has to live on knowing that his remains were never found and they don't know anything more.
Could Raymond Meyers Jr still be alive? Could Meyers still be living in a foreign country some thousands of miles away from his home? Is Meyers even alive? The questions could continue to come about for hours on end, but ultimately his family will never know anything more than he didn't die, isn't a prisoner of war, but he never returned to America.