With support from the University of Richmond

History News Network

History News Network puts current events into historical perspective. Subscribe to our newsletter for new perspectives on the ways history continues to resonate in the present. Explore our archive of thousands of original op-eds and curated stories from around the web. Join us to learn more about the past, now.

Breakthrough as DNA identifies WW1 soldier

He was a young man, like so many others, who fell on the battlefield at Passchendaele. Aged just 29, Private Jack Hunter died in the arms of his younger brother, Jim, who buried him there, on the front line, in a shallow grave.

Once the guns had fallen silent, Jim returned to look for his brother's body, but the ground had been chewed up by artillery and he could find no trace. So the story remained, unfinished, when Jim himself died, aged 86 in 1977, calling to Jack with his final words.

Now, 90 years after that infamous battle, Jack's body has been recovered, and has become one of the first to be identified using genetic profiling.
Read entire article at Telegraph (UK)