The year was 1945 and 21 year old Army Air Forces 1st Lt. William Gray was on a combat mission over Germany in a single-seat P-47D Thunderbolt aircraft when disaster struck. His airplane came in contact with a tree and he crashed.
The Defense POW/MIA said investigators recovered Gray’s remains last year. Two people who saw Gray’s plane go down told the investigators where to look, Q13 Fox reported Friday. The investigators were in Lindau on another recovery mission.
“The bones they found were embedded in the tree,” Gray’s niece Jan Bradshaw told the station.
Her brother Doug Louvier added, “It grew over his remains and really protected and marked the spot.”
Gray was buried side-by-side with his best friend—Bradshaw and Louvier’s father. – Fox News
Local WWII veteran’s remains recovered more than 70 years later, in a tree https://t.co/ufY6pCewDr pic.twitter.com/rLioDvh7Fs
— #Q13FOX (@Q13FOX) July 15, 2017
Image of Army Air Forces 1st Lt. William J. Gray, Jr., 21, of Kirkland, Washington. (Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency). Featured image of P-47D By USAAF [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
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