MCCRACKEN COUNTY, Ky. — A line of men and women in biker gear stood to attention and saluted Friday in the terminal of Barkley Regional Airport in Paducah as the remains of TSgt. William Luster Leukering returned home, 80 years after he went missing in action in July 1944.
Rolling Thunder members salute as the remains of a World War II veteran return after 80 years.
The procession that welcomed him home included law enforcement from both Kentucky and Illinois, as well as members of the biker nonprofit Rolling Thunder, which advocates for prisoner of war and missing in action service members.
Todd Matonich, chapter president of Rolling Thunder Kentucky 5, rode in from Lexington to take part in the procession. A veteran who served in the Gulf War and has participated in 28 processions like this one, Matonich wore a vest lined with the dog tags of MIA Kentucky service members from Vietnam.
Todd Matonich rode in from Lexington to join the procession.
He said that these rides create a unique bond between the riders and their “brothers and sisters” coming home. In his mind, they’re not welcoming back a 100-year-old man. Instead, Matonich said Leukering remains forever young in his mind.
When the procession arrived at Loftus-McManus Funeral Home in Metropolis, Illinois, Matonich found himself “imagining him 80 years ago, you know, 85 years ago, running around this town, worrying about his dates, worrying about his family and then leaving, and 80 years later returning… It’s very chilling.”
Born in September 1915, William Leukering — called Luster by his family — was raised in the Round Springs community near Round Knob, Illinois, but the family moved to Metropolis when he was still young. He graduated from Metropolis Community High School in 1934.
As a young man, he ran deliveries for his father’s dairy business before he joined the United States Army Air Corps in 1942. He was 27 years old.
Paul Mathes, a retired state trooper and World War II reenactor who joined Friday’s procession, found Leukering’s story through an article in the Metropolis Planet earlier this year. He expressed fascination with the young man, which led him to create a replica of the veteran’s jacket, down to the exact medals and insignia he would have worn.
Paul Mathes recreated Leukering’s jacket, complete with medals.
Part of that fascination: the selflessness that led Leukering to serve, even though Mathes said his job at the dairy business would have exempted him from military service.
For Mathes, reenactments, recreations, and processions are a way to educate the public and remind them of the “forgotten vet.” Without actions like Friday’s procession, he said “[Leukering’s] story would have stayed buried.”
Mathes will be one of the speakers when Leukering is laid to rest next week.
After he trained in South Dakota, Arizona, and Washington state, Leukering achieved the rank of technical sergeant, and served as a radio operator, gunner, and crew chief on the “Shoo-Shoo Baby” B-17G Flying Fortress.
He and his crew flew 26 missions before another crew borrowed that aircraft. It was totaled during that mission. Their next plane: “Shoo-Shoo Baby II.”
On July 18, 1944, “Shoo-Shoo Baby II” joined a bombing raid on aircraft factories in southwestern Germany. They were attacked by enemy fighters and took heavy damage.
Six of the crew members were able to parachute out, while Leukering and four others were on board when the aircraft exploded.
He was 28 years old.
With the size of the blast, his brothers said not even his dog tags were found.
Leukering’s remains arrive in Kentucky.
According to the Defense POW-MIA Accounting Agency, roughly 72,000 American personnel from World War II are still unaccounted for. It took the organization more than 10 years to identify Leukering’s remains after German witnesses led their team to a crash site in 2012.
Recovery efforts continued into the next year, and a 2018 mission found possible human remains and material evidence. A partner team from the University of New Orleans continued the work, eventually identifying Leukering’s remains using a combination of dental records and DNA analysis.
According to Matonich, returning home 80 years after his death means that Leukering’s story “actually has a close now.”
Leukering will be laid to rest with full military honors on the 80th anniversary of his death at 10 a.m. Thursday, July 18, at Round Springs Cemetery in Metropolis.
To join the funeral procession, meet at the Aikins-Farmer-Loftus-McManus Funeral Home at 9 a.m. that day; or make a donation to plant a tree in his honor here.
