Ruby Ring Returned To Flier After War
PM CDT in News
By The Associated Press
HARRISON - Cloteen Cowan wears a necklace with a ruby that survived a German prisoner of war camp during World War II.
In 1941, as a high school graduation gift, Kirby Cowan's father gave him a ring with a red stone in it.
The younger Cowan wore the ring when he went off to war. He was wearing it when he was shot down over France in 1944 and he was wearing it when he was sent to a POW camp in Germany. It was there that Cowan parted ways with his father's gift. German guards took his ring, coins and other personal possessions when he was processed into the prison.
After Cowan and his wife, Cloteen, married in 1945, they figured they would never seen his ring again. Cloteen said she had spoken with other war wives and they reported their husbands had never gotten back their personal items after the war.
But a year later the Cowans received from the War Department a box that contained Kirby's ring and other belongings.
"The only thing we can figure," Cloteen said, "is that the German who took his things was an honest man and wrote everything down."
The Cowans had the red stone appraised and found that it was a ruby. A few years ago, when the ring would no longer fit on Kirby's finger, the Cowans had the ruby affixed to a necklace Cloteen now wears.
The Morning News: News : Ruby Ring Returned To Flier After War
Ruby Ring Returned To Flier After War
For the first time I have seen "History" at close quarters,and I know that its actual process is very different from what is presented to Posterity. - WWI General Max Hoffman
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