WAYCROSS — The Waycross Veterans Memorial stands in the shadow of a water tower near the business district of this small Georgia town.
The granite monument is a simple tribute, with the names of 148 local sons and daughters lost in combat since World War I. Among the 17 heroes listed under “KOREA” is Dewey E. Rewis Jr., who joined the United States Army in 1950 at age 18.
An asterisk follows Rewis’ name, denoting him as MIA, or missing in action. Rewis was captured by the enemy on Dec. 2, 1950, during the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, a 17-day siege that pitted 30,000 U.S. and United Nations troops against 120,000 Chinese soldiers.
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
What happened to the corporal after he was taken prisoner became a matter of rumor and conjecture. Other soldiers from his unit captured at Chosin and later released reported Rewis died at a prisoner collection point known as Death Valley. But his body was not recovered, and he remained MIA, not KIA, or killed in action.
This week, though, the hero came home.
The Department of Defense recently identified Rewis from among 33 boxes of human remains returned to the U.S. by North Korea in 1993. Flown to Jacksonville on Thursday, Rewis will be laid to rest Saturday in a cemetery in rural Echols County, home to generations of departed family members.
The burial will do more than erase an asterisk on a veterans memorial. Rewis’ interment will end 73 years of “quiet grieving” for his family.
‘His momma and daddy … they never spoke of him’
Austin DeLoach knew his first cousin Dewey Rewis Jr. DeLoach just doesn’t remember anything about him. Neither do other surviving family members of Rewis’ generation.
“We were a close family, always visiting with each other, and I was 8 years old when he went off to Korea, so I know we spent time together,” DeLoach said earlier this week while sitting in a booth at the Waycross Chick-fil-A.
“I just can’t recall anything.”
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
The Rewis clan is familiar to many who live in the rural areas and small towns along the northwest edge of the Okefenokee Swamp. To hear DeLoach tell it, the first family members in the area were abandoned as children along a dirt road in Echols County, near the Georgia-Florida border, in the mid-1800s.
They walked several miles and stopped at the first house they saw. The homeowners, a local doctor and his wife, took them in and raised them. The children grew up to be farmers, and over the following decades they spawned large families. They also accumulated nearly 7,000 acres of land.
Then the Great Depression hit. They couldn’t pay the property taxes, and parcels sold off gradually, with family members holding onto small plots — 20 acres or so — to farm and live off of.
Into this reality, Dewey Rewis Jr. was born.
DeLoach’s narrative on his cousin begins and ends there. He can’t recall whether Rewis was an artist, an athlete or a musician. Or if he was shy or gregarious. He can’t name Rewis’ favorite food or whether he aspired to be the next Walt Kelly, the famed cartoonist who created the comic strip character Pogo, an opossum that lived in the Okefenokee. A likeness of Pogo stares down from the Waycross water tower at Rewis’ name on the veterans memorial.
“His momma and daddy … they never spoke of him. They grieved his loss for the rest of their lives,” DeLoach said through a pained expression, his eyes squeezed tightly shut. “So since they didn’t talk about Dewey, neither did anybody else of that generation. And now they’re all dead.”
Even as talk of Dewey Jr. became taboo among the Rewis family, others shared his parents’ pain. When DNA analysis of human remains began to produce reliable results in the early 2000s, several family members, including DeLoach, submitted samples to the government.
As the years went by without a positive identification, the Rewises continued their quiet mourning.
Then came a telephone call earlier this summer.
“It brought tears to my eyes,” DeLoach said. “Grief is such a powerful thing. To get the opportunity to finally lay that boy to rest … there’s satisfaction in getting closure.”
Pride is another strong emotion within the Rewis family. U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, the Pooler Republican who represents the Waycross area in Congress, said he felt the family’s profound patriotism and respect for veterans during a recent meeting.
“Cpl. Dewey’s sacrifice has been both remembered and honored by the Rewis family for generations, and I am overjoyed that they, finally, can pay proper respect to their beloved family member,” said Carter, who will attend Saturday’s funeral. “I promise, Cpl. Dewey will not be forgotten.”
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
Credit: Adam Van Brimmer
A celebration of life and a family reunion
DeLoach expects some 200 family members and friends will join him at the Wayfare Primitive Baptist Church cemetery on Saturday for a welcome home 73 years in the making.
The burial ground is in Echols, Georgia’s smallest county, with a population of 3,699. Everybody will know everybody, DeLoach said.
DeLoach is in charge of the food: seven pork butts, a smoked ham, trays and trays of greens, beans and slaw. He sees the burial not just as a celebration of life but an opportunity to rekindle family bonds. His mother once organized annual family reunions, but those gatherings have become less frequent since her death in 2014.
Planning for Rewis Jr.’s funeral has brought the family together again, DeLoach said.
“If there’s a silver lining in all this, that’s it,” he said. “The time for quiet grieving is over.”
About the Author
