Memorial Day 2007
This account began for me in 1971 and came to closure on December 29, 2000. I will shorten it as much as possible but still will get all pertinent information included. Please bear with me.I had been honorably discharged from the Army in 1969 and attended college afterward. In 1971, I sent away for a POW/MIA bracelet from one of the national POW committees. I received a silver metal bracelet with the name of James R. Williams, T/SGT, USAF, and the date of 12/29/67 inscribed on it. I wore the bracelet for a while until I graduated from college and then put it away in a box and stored it at my parent's house. I had forgotten James R. Williams at that point.
I was visiting my mother on Memorial Day, 1999, and she gave me a box of my old stuff to take home with me. Mom is always trying to get me to take things out of her basement and over to my house. Well, the POW/MIA bracelet was right on top. I put it on my wrist and felt sort of an electric chill go through my body. At that point, I decided to try and find out more information on James R. Williams.
I found some sites on the Internet that looked promising and went to the Virtual Wall website. Sure enough, James R. Williams was listed as still being MIA. The information that followed sent more of a chill through me than did putting on the bracelet. James R. William and I shared the same birthday - month, day, and year! What are the chances that I would have received his MIA bracelet through a random selection? On Memorial Day, 1999, I posted a memorial message on the VVMF web site for James but I still wanted more information.
Through research, I found more information on James' last mission in Vietnam and that he had presumably died in a plane crash but no remains had been recovered. In October, 2000, I received an e-mail from an active duty Air Force sergeant who had studied this plane crash and the deaths of the persons aboard it. He sent me pages of information as well as a photograph of James Williams from 1967. The remains had been recovered from villagers and were being buried in a common grave at Arlington National Cemetery in November, 2000. I was invited to attend the funeral service but felt I might be considered an intruder to the families and declined the invitation.
It was now December, 2000, and I still had the POW/MIA bracelet and also the knowledge of exactly what happened that night of December 29, 1967. I was thinking about what should be my next step. It was now time for closure on my part. On December 29, 2000, I went with my daughter to the Vietnam Memorial and slowly walked to Panel 33 East. I took the bracelet off my wrist, touched it to James' name on the panel, and placed the bracelet on the black granite base of the Wall. I said a last goodbye, wiped away a tear, turned and left.
The bracelet had made a full circle.
posted by Ex-Fed @ 7:06 AM
1 Comments:
Hi ....
I, too, had James Williams on my bracelet. My mother had gotten one for her and one for me, at random, even though we personally knew at least two POWs (We are an Air Force family). I had always wondered what had happened to Tsgt. Williams. I knew that he was not repatriated with the rest in 1973 (I was home on leave to watch them come home with my Dad, who just sat there with tears streaming .... An amazing thing to see from a grizzled jet pilot), including Norman Gaddis and Robinson Risner. I am saddened to find that he never has come home. We sent in our bracelets when "they" were gathering as many as possible for a memorial ... I don't know where that memorial is.
Thank you for your information.
Juli Robinson (juli.in.athens@gmail.com)
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