Yesterday I was going through some boxes of my collection, looking for a manual for the German Glassmine I have somewhere, and came across some great battlefield finds I made some years ago. I didn't find the manaul yet, but I did find alot of gear I didn't know I still had!
I would like to share some very private objects whitch I found in Belgium and Holland some years ago, some with a story to tell.
The first is a bracelet, non military, what I found in a rubishpit filled with bottles en rusty cans near Antwerp (Belgium). It has the name Leo J. Cable, on the back 1944, a service number and the letters Ola. It took me years to find out what the last three letters mean. The service number gave some information, and I started to search for the owner in telephone books. Then after alot of phone calls to America I came across a priest who happend to have knew Leo Cable! He even told me he did his funeral service back in 1992, and that Ola was his wife! That solved the mistery of the three letters, but sadly Ola had also passed away only two years ago. It would have been great to be able to give it back to her, but I found the bracelet to late. The priest told me the did have a son, but he lived in another state. I started a new search, and found him in Tenesee, and phoned him. Boy was he suprised when I told him what I had found, and when I sent him some pics of it he confirmed it was his fathers service number a signature. We spoke for a long time, and he told me the story of Leo, where he fought in Europe from 44 till the end of the war, ending his tour in Germany. His father had seen some heavy action! Ola gave the bracelet to Leo in 1944 when they where engaged and he set off for Europe, and they married when he came back. I told his son that I would like to return the bracelet to him and his family, because thats where it belongs. He was very happy I was returning it, but now here is the weird part of this story; after some phonecalls and e-mails I never heard of them again! I needed the adress to send it to Ameica, but never got a response, even after mailing them about 8 times, so now it still is in my collection. I dont know what happend, but will try to contact them again soon.
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