Joe Lukie

Joe Lukie was born in Glen Jean, West Virginia, on 24 March 1924. He was the seventh of nine children born to Julia Kokovcseny and Laslo “Louis” Lukie. Hungarian immigrants who settled in the coal country of Fayette County. Louis worked in the mines, as did several of the Lukie children when they came of age.

Little is known about Joe’s early life. He lost his father in 1935 – according to family stories, Louis was run down by a drunk driver while leaving a bar one night – and was employed by the Scotia Coal and Coke Company at a mining camp in Brooklyn, West Virginia.

Joe volunteered for service in the Marine Corps on 6 October 1942; he traveled to Charleston to enlist. From there, he was sent to Parris Island for boot camp and New River for infantry training. In January 1943, Private Lukie crossed the country with the 5th Replacement Battalion, and sailed for overseas duty. He arrived in New Zealand that spring and was assigned to  King Company, Third Battalion, 2nd Marines. He trained with “K/3/2” at Paekakariki for the next several months, and earned a promotion to Private First Class.

In October, Lukie and his company boarded the USS Arthur Middleton and departed New Zealand for their next operation – the invasion of Tarawa.

On 20 November 1943, the Third Battalion 2nd Marines was assigned the task of spearheading the assault on Betio’s Red Beach One. They were subjected to devastating fire from the moment they crossed the island’s coral reef, and suffered heavy casualties while coming ashore and on the beach itself.

One of those who fell in action on the first day of fighting was PFC Lukie. He was last seen alive in the vicinity of Beach Red One, and failed to rejoin his company when the battle ended. Nobody knew what had happened to him, and so Lukie was officially listed as missing in action.

By January 1944, it was clear that none of the missing men from 3/2 could have survived the battle. Joe Lukie’s status was changed to killed in action, effective 20 November 1943. Because none of the remains buried on Betio after the battle could be identified as Lukie, a memorial marker was placed in Cemetery 33, Grave 1, Row 3, Plot 2.

The 604th Quartermaster Graves Registration Company exhumed the Betio cemeteries in 1946. They were perplexed and dismayed to find that “Cemetery 33” was a memorial, and after much digging in the vicinity managed to find the original burial trenches. However, the remains they found bore no correlation to the markers, and very few had any sort of identification.

One set of remains, designated “Betio X-201,” was exhumed from Cemetery 33 in March 1946. Technicians from the 604th found a key and an identification bracelet with the remains, but these items were too corroded to provide any clues, so “201” was reburied in Lone Palm Cemetery to await transport back to Hawaii. In January 1948, “X-201” was laid out on a laboratory table in Honolulu and examined by trained anthropologists. Although they were able to complete a detailed dental chart and estimate vital statistics – and remove the commingled remains of no less than three other men – the identity of X-201 remained a mystery. He was buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, Plot F Grave 1110.

In April 2017, on the orders of a DPAA directive, X-201 was exhumed from the “Punchbowl” and returned to the lab for analysis. This time, scientists added remains found on Betio during a 2013 JPAC mission. Using modern identification methods – including a reexamination of dental charts, chest radiographs, and DNA matching – the remains of X-201 were positively associated with Joe Lukie.

Lukie was officially accounted for on 5 September 2017.

CENOTAPHS
Honolulu Memorial, Tablets of the Missing

FINAL BURIAL
High Lawn Memorial Park, Oak Hill, West Virginia