Howard Miller was born May 6, 1921, and died on November 22, 1942, the third day of the hard-fought battle for Betio, Tarawa while serving with Company A, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, Fleet Marine Force. Almost 6,400 Japanese, Koreans and Americans died in the fight for Betio.
Miller attended San Mateo High School and was a football player. After graduation, he worked at Bethlehem Steel in San Francisco. He was on a four-day furlough from Marine boot camp, when he married Elizabeth Bettinger. She learned he had died on New Year's Day, 1944.
His body was found after nearly a decade of excavations by History Flight, a Florida non-profit that researches and recovers missing U.S. service members. This group has accounted for most of the lost Marines on Betio.
The Marines were buried, but the location of those sites was lost. Mr. Miller's boots had bone fragments in it and DNA on those led to his identification. They also found his dog tags nearby.
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