WWII soldier died in fatal airplane crash. After 80 years, his memento was reunited with his family

A World War II soldier's family has been reunited with a precious memento 80 years after his death. The soldier, Technical Sergeant Joseph L. Gray, was among the 31 servicemen who lost their lives when their plane crashed into a mountain on the Isle of Man. The plane, B-17G Flying Fortress, never got to reach its destination after it took off from an airbase in England, with its tragedy considered to be one of the deadliest crashes to have ever occurred on the island. Now, his family has finally received one of his closest belongings, per Fox News.

Gray's dog tag was discovered in 2010 by a local metal detectorist, who handed it over to the Manx Aviation and Military Museum, where it stayed for 15 years before finding its way back to the soldier's family. The tag could only be returned because a man called Donald Madar travelled to the crash site from his home in Pennsylvania this April. He had lost his great-uncle in the crash and treated the trip like a personal pilgrimage. Madar had also been in touch with Gray's family since 2020 because his great-niece, Clare Quinn, had reached out to him on Facebook about the crash.

"When I was visiting and holding the tag, something stuck out about the name and I remembered the post she had written five years ago. She asked about Joseph and told us all about him in a post she uploaded," Madar said, recalling a post made by Quinn. "I then reached out to her. That was where we came up with the plan to return it home through her sister." Madar met with a historian on the Isle of Man, Ivor Ramsden, who gave him the dog tag along with a letter for Gray's family. On May 7, Madar drove 40 minutes to Brickville House Restaurant in Pennsylvania to deliver the memento to the family.

"I could see the emotion rush into her — her eyes began to tear up. I could tell it was so important for her family that they took possession of a piece of their history," Madar pointed out, referring to Claire Quinn's sister, Bridget Daily's reaction to receiving the memento. "It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining. We went in blind, as we hadn't shared images of each other as we were talking over email," Madar went on. "We sat down and talked about the event, the history and of course, Joseph. It was great to get to know him through her stories." He added, "I built the moment up, only revealing the letter when I thought it was the right time — it was a wonderful moment." He was thankful to the museum for making the transfer happen.

In a similar scenario, a 101-year-old woman was reunited with the painting the Nazis looted from her dad during World War II. The woman from the Netherlands, Charlotte Bischoff van Heemskerck, revealed that the painting had been stolen from her father in 1940. The 1683 portrait of Steven Wolters by Caspar Netscher was a beloved possession of the man who was a doctor at the Children's Hospital and had gone into hiding because he refused to obey Nazi orders, per The Guardian. The woman had decided to sell the piece to Sotheby's so her family could use the money to sustain themselves.