They lost their uncle in WWII. Now the pilot’s remains are coming home.

There are 73,057 service members unaccounted for from World War II.

Lt. John Dean Armstrong of Hutchinson is no longer on that list, thanks to two of his nieces and their 13-year quest to find their uncle and bring his remains home.

Armstrong was a member of the American Volunteer Group known as the Flying Tigers who flew P-40 fighter planes for the Chinese air force in the fight against Japan.

He was killed during a training flight on Sept. 8, 1941, when he collided with another pilot’s aircraft. Armstrong was the first member of the Flying Tigers to die in World War II.

He was initially buried in the Airmen’s Cemetery at St. Luke’s Anglican Church in Toungoo, Burma, which is now Myanmar.

More than 63 years later, two of Armstrong’s nieces – Lynn Evans and Karen Beauprie – were sitting around the dinner table in Evans’ Texas home when they realized no one had claimed Armstrong’s Distinguished Flying Cross award.

Beauprie said once they had the award, they found out that Armstrong wasn’t buried in Hutchinson with their grandparents.

“That’s when we stepped off the plank and said, ‘Let’s get him home,’ ” Beauprie said. “We didn’t really have any idea what we were getting into. We just knew, for our grandparents’ sake, he should come home. It was wrong that he was left behind.”

What ensued, she said, was 13 years of attending family update meetings for military members missing in action, writing hundreds of letters and e-mails and making even more phone calls.

Beauprie said they even had a Burmese tour guide and Canadian graduate student who was living in Thailand visit the original burial site to search for Armstrong and send pictures of the cemetery.

“It was a mess,” Beauprie said. “Tombstones were scattered, and everything was crushed.

“So we were getting discouraged. It was kind of like we were treading water, it seemed like.”

Then, in 2015, a historical analyst named Ken Tilley contacted them from Hawaii.

“He started comparing our family files to the unknown soldier files,” she said. “He called us and said, ‘I think (Armstrong) is in an unknown soldier grave in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu.’ ”

Unidentified remains of military personnel are given an X-number, and a file is created containing all of the paperwork related to that case.

There were three unknown X files – X633, X634 and X635 – that Beauprie and her cousin had to look over to determine which was most likely their uncle’s.

Based on Armstrong’s military records and their knowledge of his accident, Beauprie said they were able to determine which file was their uncle’s.

“We guessed he was X file 633, and it turns out that we were right,” she said.

In April 2016, Armstrong was disinterred. A positive ID was confirmed in January 2017.

“I was screaming and jumping up and down,” Beauprie said. “I wish I was with my cousin when we got the call, because it was so amazing and excited and overwhelming. And sad, too.”

Beauprie said the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency informed them that in December 1947, Armstrong’s remains were disinterred from the Burma cemetery by the American Graves Registration Unit but were declared unidentifiable.

His remains were sent to a nearby base in Barrackpore, India, and temporarily interred there. Then, in 1949, Armstrong’s remains were shipped to Hawaii and re-interred in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific at Honolulu.

They remained there until Tilley contacted Beauprie and Evans.

Now his remains will be shipped to Kansas and taken to Hutchinson to be buried in Fairlawn Cemetery, with his parents.

Beauprie said there will be a public visitation from 5 to 7 p.m. on Friday.

The family will have a private burial service on Saturday. Beauprie said there will be an Air Force missing man formation flyover the day of the burial, conducted by the 23rd Fighter Group from Moody Air Force Base in Georgia – today’s Flying Tigers.

Armstrong’s casket will be draped with the same flag used in his first burial service, Beauprie said, stitched with 48 stars.

Beauprie said there will be about 80 family members in attendance on Saturday, many that have never met each other before.

“It’s like a family reunion,” she said. “That’s something Lynn and I never even thought about.”

Beauprie said it’s indescribable to have found Armstrong, but she wants their story to help more than her family.

“We’re giving a lot of people hope that they can be successful and they can find their family members,” she said. “We didn’t think we were ever going to find him and then we did. Hopefully, they’ll all come back.”

This story was originally published June 12, 2017 at 8:02 PM with the headline "They lost their uncle in WWII. Now the pilot’s remains are coming home.."