David Clark Jr. was a United States Navy sailor who was killed on the USS Oklahoma when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
His remains were identified on November 24, 2020, along with the Trapp brothers and Oliver Burger.
Background[]
David Clark Jr. enlisted in the United States Navy from Trinidad, Texas. His service number is 3565851 and was attached to the USS Oklahoma as a Seaman Second Class.
Case[]
At about 7:48 AM on December 7, 1941, the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service conducted a surprise military strike against the United States at the naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The USS Oklahoma was one of the first ships to be attacked. The ship was torpedoed and capsized. Clark was killed during the attack, though his exact circumstances are unknown. His remains were located between 1941 and 1944, but not identified. As a result, he was considered missing in action while his remains were buried in the Punchbowl at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Overall, 2,335 Americans were killed in the attack, four hundred and twenty-nine, including Clark, were on the USS Oklahoma. The surprise attack led US President Franklin D. Roosevelt to declare December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy. The following day, the US Congress declared war on Japan, which led to the United States' formal entry into World War II.
Marble stand dedicated to Clark Jr.
Clark was awarded the Purple Heart posthumously.
In September 1947, the American Graves Registration Service was tasked with identifying the remains of unknown soldiers from the Pacific Theatre. However, they were only able to identify thirty-five of the crewmen from the USS Oklahoma. In October 1949, the American Graves Registration Service ruled Clark, along with many soldiers whose remains were not identified, as unrecoverable.
His name is featured on the USS Oklahoma Memorial and in Court 5 of the Honolulu Memorial of the Courts of the Missing in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Identification[]
In 2015, the Department of Defense and the Defense POW/MIA accounting agency initiated a program to exhume the unidentified sailors of the USS Oklahoma to try and match their DNA against the DNA of family members whose loved ones were never identified. Scientists at the D.P.A.A. employed anthropological analysis, while scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System utilized mitochondrial DNA and autosomal DNA analysis to identify the servicemen.
Through these methods, David Clark Jr. was identified on November 24, 2020.