The Baltimore Afro-American, Jul. 3, 1943.

Sidat-Singh's Body Found;
  Corps Plans Hero's Burial

Plan to Drop Wreath as Noted Athlete Is Laid To Rest in Arlington

WASHINGTON

An official military funeral, with big guns roaring and fighter bombers flying overhead, will be held Thursday for Second Leiut. Wilmeth Sidat-Singh at Holy Redeemer Chatholic Church, New York Avenue and M Street Northwest.

A wreath will be dropped from a plane on the body of the army flyer an ex-D.C. policeman and athlete when he is laid to rest in Arlington Cemetery.

Killed 7 Weeks Ago

Lieut. Sidat-Singh, former Syracuse University star athlete, was killed May 9 when he parachuted from his plane which crashed into Lake Huron, Mich. His body was sighted by a coast guard patrol at 3 p.m. Sunday, exactly seven weeks after the fatal accident.

He was a member of the 332nd Fighter Group, and when the plane fell into the lake was on a routine training flight form Oscoda to Selfridge Field.

Mother Feels Better Now

Mrs. Pauline E. Sidat-Singh, mother of the flyer, who recieved official notice from the War Department Monday that her son's body had been found, stated:

“We loved him, but God loved him more. I really don't feel so badly now, Wilmeth had really crammed a whole lot of living into his twenty-five years.”

Looking at a large room filled with scrapbooks, trophies, medals, pictures, fan mail that the great athlete had amassed in his very short lifetime, the mother added:

“I am sure a lot of little boys can get a bit of inspiration out to just looking at these things. They worry me all time now to look at them.”

N.Y. School Honors Athlete

Already the flyer's mother is receiving many telgrams and letters of sympathy. Clinton High School in New York, which Sidat-Singh attended, dedicated a pamphlet to the flyer.

Tuskegee Institute has sent a life-size painting of Sidat-Singh with the inscription “He was a man's man—what more can any man say.”

Many national and local organizations are expected to send representatives to the funeral. Pop Gates, the athlete's teammate on the Washington Bears, will head a Sidat-Singh Committee, which will form in New York and journey to D.C. for the funeral.

The flyer's body arrived here Tuesday and was taken to McGuire's funeral home where it will lay in state until the funeral.

The body was accompanied from the station by a guard of honor composed of policemen who had worked with the athlete here.

Sidat-Singh's Body Found; Corps Plans Hero's Burial, The Baltimore Afro-American, July 3, 1943.