SGT Ivor Darrell Thornton

SGT Ivor Darrell Thornton was born in Brown Hill, Virginia on 8 Jun 1909. He was the sixth of ten children born to James Stoval and Ida Cornice (Young) Thornton. The family farmed. By 1940 Ivor was working in Marshall Field & Company's Fieldale, Virginia mill. 

As the country mobilized Ivor went into service and was assigned to H Company 116th Infantry Regiment and was with the unit on 6 Jun 1944 for the D-Day invasion of Nazi occupied France. He was later declared to be missing in action on the 7th of June and for many years this status did not change.

Memorialized on the Tablets of the Missing at the Normandy American Cemetery. However, his body has been identified. 

"The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency announced today that U.S. Army Sgt. Ivor D. Thornton, 34, of Martinsville, Virginia, killed during World War II, was accounted for March 10, 2025.

On June 6, 1944, "D-Day," Sgt. Thornton landed on Omaha Beach with Company H, 2nd Battalion, 116th Infantry Regimental Combat Team, 29th Infantry Division. As part of the second wave of the invasion, Company H disembarked its landing craft around 7:00 a.m. Fellow soldiers last observed Sgt. Thornton wading ashore, but he was not seen thereafter.

On June 7, 1944, the day after the invasion, Thornton's unit unsuccessfully searched for him. Consequently, the War Department listed him as missing in action. On June 8, 1944, graves registration personnel recovered a set of remains from Omaha Beach that they were unable to identify. They interred these remains in U.S. Military Cemetery (USMC) Saint-Laurent-sur-Mer, adjacent to Omaha Beach, and designated them X-159 St. Laurent (X-159).

Graves registration personnel attempted to identify X-159 in March 1945, but they could not associate the body with a specific casualty. In June 1947, analysts with the American Graves Registration Command (AGRC) were also unable to identify X-159. On March 3, 1949, a board of AGRC officers recommended the remains be declared unidentifiable.

In April 2022, Thornton's family, along with the family of another missing Soldier, requested X-159 be disinterred and compared to Thornton and the other Soldier. In September 2023, the Department of Defense and American Battle Monuments Commission exhumed the remains of X-159 and transferred them to the DPAA laboratory for analysis.

To identify Thornton's remains, the DPAA scientific staff conducted dental and anthropological analyses. Additionally, scientists from the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System performed mitochondrial DNA analysis. DPAA would like to thank the Bedford Boys Tribute Center for its assistance with this case.

Thornton's name is recorded on the Walls of the Missing at Normandy American Cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer, France, along with others still missing from WWII. A rosette will be placed next to his name to indicate he has been accounted for.

Thornton will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery on a date yet to be determined.

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The Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency announced today [March 12, 2025] that U.S. Army Sgt Ivor D. Thornton, 34, killed during World War II, was accounted for March 10, 2025.

In the Summer of 1944, Thornton was assigned to Company H, 2nd Battalion, 116th Infantry Regimental Combat Team, 29th Infantry Division. On June 6, during the storming of Normandy Beach, commonly known as "D-Day", over 156,000 allied forces targeted five beaches along the coast of Normandy, France. This operation is often remembered as one of the largest amphibious assaults in history. Sgt Thornton was reportedly killed during the invasion of Omaha Beach. His remains were not accounted for following the war. "