On June 8, 1921, an Army captain wrote Mrs. Nora Grady of New York to report that officials had been unable to find the body of her brother, Thomas D. Costello, who had been killed in France during the late war.
The captain reassured Mrs. Grady that the search would continue. But "some time may yet elapse before definitive information can be given in this case."
On Monday, 89 years later -- and 91 years after Costello, a private in the 60th Infantry Regiment, was killed by German artillery in a patch of woods called the Bois de Bonvaux -- his remains were laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery.
He was buried at 11 a.m. on a hill beneath a freshly trimmed swamp oak, not far from his World War I commander, Gen. John J. "Black Jack" Pershing, who had led the "doughboys" to Europe in 1917.
A warm breeze rustled the leaves as a bugler played taps and a French Army colonel came by to pay his respects. "I wanted to show the gratitude of my country," said Col. Brice Houdet.
. . . Also present Monday was a Costello family descendant, Michael J. Frisbie, 43, a truck driver from Stockton Springs, Maine, who flew down for the funeral with his wife, Leanne, and daughter, Brittani. They sat in the green-covered graveside chairs reserved for family members.
Frisbie, who had no idea he was a relative until he was contacted about two years ago by a Pentagon genealogist, said he believes that Costello was his great-great uncle. But the distance of the connection "doesn't matter," Frisbie said. "He's a fallen soldier, and if I can honor him, that's great."
. . . Costello's body was discovered by members of Thanks GIs, a French group that seeks to honor the contribution of U.S. soldiers to France in World Wars I and II, according to Elisabeth Gozzo, who heads the organization.
Gozzo said that as soon as the remains were found, she notified a team from the POW/MIA accounting command that by coincidence was working nearby on the wreck of an American tank from World War II.
Investigators came a week later. Using sophisticated equipment and techniques, they uncovered bones and other remains in several days of excavation and took them away for identification, Gozzo said in a telephone interview from her home in nearby Corny-sur-Moselle.
"It is not the first time we've found the remains of soldiers who disappeared," she said. "We hope to find as many as possible, after all they did for us."
