I found this in my local paper today, it reminded me of a thread here about the Hurtgen Forest Bracelet.



LAKEWOOD – For years, Tom Wilbeck tried to gather information about his father’s family.

He searched for records and even hired a genealogist to trace the family tree. Yet down every avenue, he came up mostly empty.

That is, until this spring, when a big piece of his family puzzle fell into his lap.

Or fell from the fax machine, to be more specific.

Shortly after Easter, Wilbeck, 59, received on a home fax machine a letter regarding his uncle, Stanley Wilbeck, who was killed in World War II.

The letter was from a Florida woman, Joanna Neely, whose family had found a Purple Heart awarded to Stanley Wilbeck in a box while cleaning out a deceased relative’s belongings in Florida. The family wanted to give the medal to Wilbeck’s next of kin.

Tom Wilbeck, who lives in Lakewood, never had met his uncle and knew very little about the Chicago man. But he jumped at the chance to learn more about his family history.

“I’ve been trying to find out things about my family on my dad’s side for years and ran into a brick wall,” he said. “I felt I was destined to do that, to receive [the medal], even though I didn’t know him.”

A private in the U.S. Army in the 8th Infantry Regiment, 4th Infantry Division, Stanley Wilbeck was killed in action in WWII on Aug. 8, 1944, according to the Illinois Department of Veteran Affairs. He was 26. His remains are buried at Brittany American Cemetery and Memorial in St. James, France.

Stanley Wilbeck was married to a woman named Bernice Crocker, who later remarried to a man named Thomas Hughes.

When cleaning out some family belongings in a shed of a Florida home, Hughes’ relatives came across a box containing the Purple Heart.

The family contacted Tom Wilbeck and sent the medal to the Illinois Department of Veteran Affairs.

IDVA Director Tammy Duckworth presented the Purple Heart to Tom Wilbeck at a brief ceremony May 5 in Springfield. He also was presented with other medals his uncle had earned but was never awarded, including the World War II Victory Medal, European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal, American Campaign Medal, and the World War II Honorable Discharge Lapel Pin.

Tom Wilbeck said he planned to display the medals prominently in a case in his home. He also is taking a business trip to France this fall and plans to meet his uncle for the first time, posthumously.

“It felt like something I had to do,” he said.



Northwest Herald - Local News and Video for McHenry County, Illinois - Long-lost war medal discovered

__________________

Scott