Staff Sgt. Stephon Smith carries the potential remains of a fallen Marine from the Guadalcanal campaign during a repatriation ceremony at Marine Corps Base Hawaii, April 4, 2025. (Marcos Alvarado/U.S. Marine Corps)
CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa — A Marine has been honored for helping recover American troops’ remains from a World War II battlefield in the Solomon Islands.
Staff Sgt. Stephon Smith, an explosive ordnance technician with Bravo Company, Headquarters and Service Battalion on Foster, received a Joint Service Achievement Medal on April 4 for his work with the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency this spring.
Smith volunteered with DPAA as a short-term individual augmentee during an investigative mission on Guadalcanal, he told Stars and Stripes in a June 3 interview.
While his primary role involved identifying unexploded ordnance during excavations, he also helped process evidence under the supervision of a DPAA science expert, the team’s captain, Marine Capt. Jonathan Tamanaha, said by phone June 5.
The mission focused on recovering the remains of troops from 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment who were killed in the September 1942 Battle of Edson’s Ridge during the Guadalcanal campaign and buried in unmarked graves, Smith said.
Roughly 72,000 U.S. service members from WWII remain unaccounted for, including 374 in Guadalcanal, according to an Aug. 13 news release from U.S. Indo-Pacific Command.
The monthlong effort, which ran from March 2 to April 4, transitioned from investigation to recovery after heavy rains flooded the nearby Lunga River and rerouted it into the excavation site.
Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Stephon Smith, left, is awarded the Joint Service Achievement Medal for outstanding service in support of the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency during a repatriation ceremony at Marine Corps Base Hawaii, April 4, 2025. (Marcos Alvarado/U.S. Marine Corps)
“If we did not move into recovery, we risked losing the graves forever,” Smith said.
A potential U.S. government shutdown on March 14 also threated to cut the mission short, Tamanaha said.
“We operated on the assumption we had one week to do anything we were possibly able to do, and that’s when Staff Sgt. Smith 100% stepped up to the plate and started assuming multiple duties,” he said.
Tamanaha declined to say how many sets of remains were sent to DPAA’s laboratories in Hawaii for analysis, citing security concerns. However, the team collected enough evidence — bone fragments, personal effects and other artifacts – to fill a half-dozen Pelican 1650 cases, he said.
During the excavation, the team also found nearly two dozen mortars and grenades, Tamanaha said.
“I wouldn’t even say every other day,” Smith said. “But it was enough to keep me on my toes, that’s for sure.”
When ordnance was found, Smith identified the items, alerted nearby villagers — more than 50 residents — to keep a safe distance, and coordinated removal with a local Royal Solomon Islands Police explosive ordnance disposal team.
“When it comes to communication — this is their home that we’re talking about. We’re in their backyard,” he said. “Being able to express to them that this is a dangerous area now.”
On April 4, Smith hand-delivered remains during a repatriation ceremony at Marine Corps Base Hawaii.
It was “truly an honor … to be a part of something bigger than myself,” said Smith, who enlisted in 2015 in his hometown of Baltimore.
“This entire mission in and of itself was easily one of the best experiences I’ve had in my Marine Corps career and my EOD career,” he said. “… This was just an amazing opportunity because the magnitude that these Marines — this was their first time back on U.S. soil after 80 years.”
