One of Hoke County's Finest Finally Coming Home

After nearly 84 years in Hawaii's National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific with no name, Neil Daniel Frye finally returns to North Carolina in April for burial with full military honors.

U.S.S. West Virginia going down after the attack on Pearl Harbor (National Archive photo)

While serving on the U.S.S. West Virginia, Mess Attendant Third Class Neil Daniel Frye—who lived in Hoke County before joining the Navy—died on Dec. 7, 1941, when Japan attacked our Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor. His remains were recovered after the battle, but identification was impossible at the time.

Frye was interred as one of the hundreds of unidentified victims of, what President Franklin Roosevelt said was “…a date which will live in infamy,” at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. Advances in DNA testing prompted the Department of the Defense to exhume some of the remains in 2003.

STM3 Neil Daniel Frye (Courtesy of the Department of Defense)

The process is expensive and slow, but in 2017, Frye’s casket was among 35 caskets exhumed containing remains associated with the West Virginia. They were brought to a laboratory in Hawaii, where scientists identified Frye on Sept. 27, 2024.

On April 3, at 11 a.m., he returns to North Carolina and will be buried at Sandhills State Veterans Cemetery in Spring Lake with full military honors. His name remains on the Courts of the Missing memorial at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

The U.S.S. West Virginia was sunk during the Pearl Harbor attack, but refloated later and returned to service. One hundred and six members of its crew died on Dec. 7, 1941. In all, the lives of 2,403 U.S. personnel and civilians were claimed.

Family members of Frye can contact the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency for more details about his service.

Editor’s Note: His niece contacted us and asked that we correct his birthday in this story. It was 1921 when he was born, on April 3. This year, on that date, he’s finally coming home. He was 20 years old when he died. He died too young, standing on the Front Line of our Freedom.