The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) confirmed last month that it had identified the remains of a U.S. Army Air Forces pilot who was killed in action during World War II.
1st Lt. Morton Sher of Greenville, South Carolina, was a fighter pilot with the 76th Fighter Squadron, 23rd Fighter Group, 14th Air Force. He took off from Hengyang, China, on Aug. 20, 1943, in a P-40 Warhawk for a combat mission over Hunan Province. According to DPAA, he was shot down while intercepting an enemy aircraft over Hengshan County and was unable to bail out before the fighter crashed into a rice paddy and burned.
Although U.S. forces located and visited the area following WWII, Sher’s remains were not recovered or identified. The case was reopened in 2012, however, when a private citizen provided DPAA’s predecessor with a photograph of a marble memorial to Sher in Xin Bai Village that had been erected at some point after the end of WWII. That discovery prompted more than a decade of investigation, including a 2019 site survey and an excavation conducted from Aug. 7 to Sept. 11, 2024. Teams examined roughly 96 square meters during the 2024 recovery and found possible remains and life-support equipment consistent with those that would have been carried in a WW II aircraft.
DPAA brought the material into its laboratory in April 2025 for further scientific analysis. Using anthropological methods supported by circumstantial evidence, along with additional testing conducted by the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System, officials identified the remains as Sher’s.
The fallen WWII pilot is memorialized on the Walls of the Missing at the Manila American Cemetery, and DPAA said his remains will be buried in Greenville on a date to be determined.
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