The family of a sailor killed in WWII waited decades for his return
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Navy sailor Jerome Mullaney. Photo: Courtesy of Navy Office Of Community Outreach
Two decades ago, Mary Louise Brambilla and her husband visited the beaches of Normandy as a way to connect with her uncle's soul.
Why it matters: The family has searched for answers about the long-lost Pennsylvania sailor, who died at sea during World War II, for more than 80 years — until now.
Driving the news: Jerome Mullaney is finally coming home. The sailor will be buried in the same Scranton cemetery as his parents, during a Sept. 3 ceremony with full military honors.
Catch up quick: Mullaney — who came from an Irish family of 10, including four other brothers who serve in the military — had to persuade his parents to allow him to enlist in the Navy at 17 years old.
- Mullaney was serving aboard the USS Glennon, a Navy destroyer involved in D-Day operations, when a mine exploded near the ship's stern, sending 16 sailors into the water.
- German forces eventually sank the ship. And Navy officials learned Mullaney was killed in the blast, which occurred two days after the Allies invaded Normandy.
- He was awarded medals for his service, including a Purple Heart.
Flashback: Back home in Newark, New Jersey, Mullaney's mother, Mary Graff, heard a knock at the door and intuitively knew one of her sons, whose pictures she had hung in the window, was gone.
- Inconsolable, she initially refused to answer when she saw the Navy insignia on the messenger's uniform, Brambilla tells Axios.
After that, Graff removed the surviving brothers' pictures from the window sill, thinking it was "bad luck" to keep them up while they were still fighting, per Brambilla.
- Jerome's baby-faced photo, snapped in the family's backyard before he shipped out, stayed up in memory.
Zoom in: It's a story the family has kept alive for decades.
- Relatives passed on, and their heartbreak lingered: Mullaney's remains were never found.
Fast forward: In 1957, a local diver found remains in pieces of the USS Glennon that they discovered off the French coast of St. Marie du Mont.
- But forensic technology lagged and Navy officials couldn't identify them. The remains were eventually entombed at the Ardennes American Cemetery in Neupré, Belgium.
- Those remains went unidentified until this March, after they were exhumed and matched to the DNA of Mullaney's late sister.
The bottom line: Brambilla never met her uncle but knows his soul is finally at rest — and the hole in her heart she felt in Normandy is filled.