A Wisconsin family is on a mission to bring home the remains of a World War II Marine who has been missing for nearly 80 years. William Albert Ellis Jr., a Milwaukee Marine Reserve Unit member who would have turned 100 this July, was killed in Okinawa in May 1945.
Jeff Stockinger, Ellis's great-nephew and an Iraq Army veteran himself, has taken up the challenge to bring "Uncle Billy" home after decades of unanswered questions.
Watch: Wisconsin family seeks closure after decades of searching for WWII Marine's remains
"Billy, from what I've heard from stories wise was a wild witted kid, and a hard charger, and wanted to serve his country," Stockinger said.
Ellis wasn't just a Marine – he was also a gifted boxer who won the 1942 Marine Corps featherweight championship.
According to Stockinger, Ellis was killed by a grenade in Okinawa while trying to rescue an injured soldier. For decades, the family received vague messages from the government.
"The government was giving vague messages that the body was unrecoverable. We don't know where he is," Stockinger said.
Ellis's mother never stopped seeking answers. "She kept writing and writing, 'Well, I want my son home, why aren't you doing more?'" Stockinger said.
After years of writing to lawmakers, hiring a private investigator, providing DNA samples, and finding a possible match of remains in the Philippines with help from a nonprofit, Stockinger has now turned to the University of Wisconsin's MIA Recovery Identification Project.
Charles Konsitzke, team leader for the project, explained the scope of their work: "Our primary focus is our Wisconsin missing. You may or may not be aware, but we have 82,000 missing from World War II and on currently, nationally. And of that roughly 1500 are Wisconsinites."
The team is now gathering documentation on Ellis's case. "We're putting in a request for the archives, for two boxes of materials specifically regarding Ellis, Ellis's unit, and the history. So it's always building upon all the documentation that we can acquire. Need everything, and we can't work from assumptions," Konsitzke said.
The UW project has already recovered the remains of four WWII heroes in France and Belgium. Their goal is to find closure for families like Stockinger's.
"Don't give up. It takes time," Konsitzke said.
For Stockinger, the wait has been too long. "He's just been missing for 80 years on May 13 this past year. Far too long," he said.
The Army veteran remains determined to bring his uncle home to Milwaukee. "I want my uncle coming right here to Milwaukee. I want him right here. I want him buried next to his mom and dad. And the big thing is that he's missing from the Marine Corps, out of the Milwaukee reserve unit here. And I know the Marines here would love to have him home," Stockinger said.
This story was reported on-air by Charles Benson and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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