Seven Decades After His Disappearance in WWII, Wife Discovers The Truth

From the moment Peggy and Billie Harris locked eyes, they knew they were destined to spend their lives together. Unfortunately, the universe had other plans for the lovestruck pair.

Hurled Into War

Billie was abruptly thrown into the devastating conflict of WWII to fight for the U.S. in Northern France against the Nazi occupation. Just as Billie was set to return home to his loving wife, fate would intervene and Billie would never return. Peggy waited desperately to hear news of her husband. Peggy tried to deal with the loss of her love. For almost seven decades, she struggled to come to terms with Billie’s disappearance. After all those, Peggy’s life would be forever changed by a startling discovery.

Seven Decades Ago

It all began around seventy years ago. A small-town girl named Peggy Seale had just graduated high school while World War II broke out to mass horror. Men were being called to serve, and young Peggy was determined to offer her own services. She left her hometown of Vernon, Texas, to begin working at the Altus Air Force Base in Oklahoma, just across the border from her home state. Here, Peggy was employed as an electrical mechanic.

Female Mechanic

Peggy Seale was the only female mechanic on the entire base. The young beauty quickly turned the heads of many of her fellow army officers. She caught the attention of one of her generals who believed Peggy was the perfect match for his son. The general’s son was an aviation pilot, stationed down in San Antonio at the time. The father urged Peggy to write his son, Billie Harris, but she was hesitant to unexpectedly reach out to a stranger.

The Letters

Billie made contact with Peggy through his father. Enclosed in the letters he would send to his father, Billie would also include a letter for Peggy. At first, Peggy was hesitant to answer, but their love would soon bloom. “I worked with Billie’s father at that time,” Peggy said. “He was writing letters to [Billie], telling him about me, and I refused to write to him first or give him or his father my address. So he wrote a letter to me and put it in an envelope to his father to give to me. That was my first acquaintance with him.”

Young Lovers

Soon, the back and forth correspondence between the two young lovers allowed their romance to grow even while miles apart. “I wrote to him that I loved opera and listened on Saturday afternoons. I thought that would turn any man off, but he wasn’t and he wrote back. I wrote him that I memorized poetry and he wrote back that he memorized poetry as well and he thought that was really great,” Peggy recalled.

Inseparable Souls

Peggy remained hesitant until she met Billie in the flesh. While Billie was on leave he came to Peggy’s base. The two met in a plane hanger at Altus AFB. Their meeting confirmed Billie’s instinct, the pair were destined for one another. They became inseparable. Their courtship lasted for months, soon enough, the pair announced their engagement.

Alarming News

The couple married shortly after in 1943. The newlyweds were overjoyed, but news soon reached the pair that Billie was being transferred to Florida. He was due to be shipped out to Europe within a matter of mere weeks. Without hesitating, Peggy flew out to Florida to be with Billie. The two were given just two weeks to be together before Billie would face the destruction and violence of the ongoing war. To the couple’s shock, their plans would change yet again.

True Love

Billie and Peggy had little money, so instead of buying wedding rings, the two happily exchanged their high school senior rings. They were in love and material wealth meant little to the husband and wife. The couple had only been married six short weeks and were looking forward to their two-week vacation together when suddenly the vacation came to a sudden end. A German U-boat attacked a US vessel off the coast of East Florida, killing everyone on board. Billie had to be shipped out immediately.

Ambushed!

The vessel that the Germans had targeted was full of aviator pilots; pilots that were desperately needed for the European war effort. As a result of this sudden and fatal attack, Billie and his team were called up early. Billie was given a promotion to 2nd lieutenant and soon sent off to the battlefields. Peggy had no idea that that would be the very last time she would see her husband.

Sworn to Secrecy

Following Billie’s departure, Peggy was sent back to Texas, but was instructed to keep her husband’s whereabouts secret. At the time, there were spies all across the United States, so military wives were urged to be tight-lipped about official matters. Despite the danger, Billie managed to reach his intended destination.

Returning Home

Billie was stationed in the allied United Kingdom and performed operations over Northern Nazi-occupied France. He completed around 60 to 100 different missions, exceeding all expectations. Given the extensive number of missions he completed, he was given permission to return home. Thrilled by the prospect of returning to Peggy, he raced to the docks to catch the soonest boat home. But an obstacle soon arose; ehe wounded soldiers were first priority on the boat and there was no room for the lieutenant. Billie would have to wait.

Delayed

Billie kept his spirits up, knowing that it was only a matter of time before he would return home. He wrote a letter to his beloved wife, informing her that he had been delayed. Peggy was distraught by the news of the delay but was reassured that her husband would be on his way home soon, or so she thought.

Back to the Frontlines

Unable to return back home, Billie refused to sit idly by while the war raged on. He jumped back into his plane and headed back towards his base. Days soon turned to months as Peggy anxiously awaited word from her husband. One day, she received a correspondence from the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force. The letter said that Billie Harris had returned to the United States.

 

Good News

Peggy was ecstatic by the news of Billie’s return. Despite the letter, days and soon months passed without any sign of Billie. Peggy was repeatedly told that Billie was simply being processed, which could take some time. But Peggy and Billie’s family began to fear that something horrific had happened…

Where is Billie?

Peggy and her father-in-law speculated that Billie had returned to America but was in a hospital, gravely wounded. Perhaps he had lost his memory after a head injury and was unable to remember his identity? Peggy turned to the Red Cross to try to track down Billie, but her reaserch proved to be fruitless. All the Red Cross told Peggy was that they were unable to launch an investigation into the whereabouts of her husband.

The Red Cross

The Red Cross once again assured Peggy that Billie was simply being processed, but that they didn’t have the funds or the capacity needed to locate him. Thousands and thousands of soldiers were returning home from Europe, which meant the Red Cross was simply unequipped to deal with the surge of investigations about missing persons. But Peggy refused to sit around and wait for news of her husband.

MIA

Finally, news soon arrived. According to the United States Armed Forces, Billie Harris was listed as “missing in action.” The letter was dated July 7, 1944, but Peggy knew that something was amiss. Peggy went back and searched her records. Sure enough, she was right. She had received a handwritten letter from Billie Harris dated after the 7th of July. She became desperate, where was her husband?

Reports From Berlin

Peggy then received a letter from Berlin that seemed to confirm her worst fear: Billie had been killed in action. She knew that these reports were unreliable due to frequent cases of mistaken identity. She didn’t want to believe the report. Years and years later, Peggy’s disbelief would be justified…

Off the Radar

Peggy soon decided to take matters into her own hands and wrote a letter to her congressman in Washington D.C. Surely there was someone who could aid her in her desperate search fro Billie. She was determined to uncover the truth about her husband’s mysterious disappearance. When she eventually received a response from her congressman, it revealed nothin more than what she already knew, Billie was still listed as missing in action.

Never Giving Up

As the years passed, Peggy refused to believe she had heard the last of her husband. She eventually gave up hope that he was alive, but she demanded some sort of closure about his untimely end. She wanted to know how he had died and where he was buried. Only this would allow her to move on. This crucial information wouldn’t see the light of day for almost 70 more years. Peggy never remarried or sought out other romances. “Billie was married to me all of his life, and I choose to be married to him all of my life,” she told CBS News.

Still MIA

Peggy Harris never gave up hope she would discover Billie’s story. She knew that he had most likely died in the horrific war, but at the very least she wanted to know where his remains were buried. In 2005, she penned another letter to her congressman in Washington D.C., representative Mac Thornberry. She eventually received a reply from him, but it was far from what she had hoped for. According to the representative, after all these years Billie Harris was still listed as missing in action.

The Archives

That wasn’t an answer that Peggy could accept. Billie’s cousin, Alton Harvey, soon got involved. Together, he and Peggy called every organization that they could think of, which soon led them to contact the Arlington National Cemetery Archives. According to the archivists, the process of looking into their records could take around six months. Unexpectedly, the pair would receive some surprising news.

A Surprise

Just weeks after they put in their request to search for Billie Harris, Peggy received an unusual call. Someone else had already requested and paid for a copy of Billie’s records. An unknown French woman from Les Ventes had requested the paperwork. The copy of the records had already been sent to the woman in France. Peggy made it her mission to find out just who this mysterious woman was. When she finally made contact, Peggy was shocked by the reason behind her involvement.

KIA

The mission that Peggy and Alton thought would take months, turned out to be a very simple process. Since the records had been pulled so recently for the unknown woman, what should have taken months, turned into a matter of a few minutes. The records clearly stated that Billie Harris had been killed in action.

A Congressional Blunder

But if Peggy and Alton had so easily found the answer to their question, why had their representative in Congress told them Billie Harris was still missing in action? As it turned out, no one had actually made an official inquiry. Representative Thornberry issued a formal apology to Harris, apologizing for the mishandling of a highly sensitive matter.

The Annual Parade

But one question still remained: Who was the mysterious French woman who requested Billie’s records? After some research, it was discovered the woman was the mayor of the French village of Les Ventes; a place where the name Billie Harris was well known. In fact, he was considered a hero in the surrounds. After Peggy got in contact with the mayor of the small French city, she was invited to come to France to participate in one of their annual parades. They wanted her to witness the yearly parade, which includes a procession of the village’s citizens marching down a street called Place Billie D. Harris, a street named after her husband!

A Life of Death Decision

Billie Harris is considered a hero in the small hamlet of Les Ventes. The story goes that Billie saved an entire village as well as countless other lives. The village was under the occupation of the Nazis where his plane was shot down in combat. As his plane was plummeting from the sky, it was headed straight for the village square, full of innocent residents. He had two choices, either eject and let the plane crash straight into the village square, killing people, or try to divert the plane from the catastrophe.

Saving a Town

Billie made a quick decision and turned his plane away from the village, knowing that he was risking his life in the process. He crash-landed in a wooded area just outside of Les Ventes. The villagers, seeing what Billie had done for them and their village, raced into the woods to see if they could save the injured pilot. Sadly, it was too late for Billie and the crash proved to take the young soldier’s life.

Billie the Hero

Peggy Harris soon arrived at the village, to her surprise, she learned the tale of Billie’s courageous actions. She was moved to tears to see that their main road was named after her late husband. Billie’s life had not been lost in vain; he was a true American hero.

Normandy

Billie Harris’ body was moved from Les Ventes to the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial shortly after the war ended. On the soldier’s gravestone, was his name clearly written: Billie D. Harris. It was the closure Peggy had in search of for seven long decades. Local people told Peggy that Billie’s grave is the most decorated in all of the cemetery. Finally, Peggy could move on with her life with the knowledge of her husband’s brave death.

A Legacy

Peggy returned to her hometown of Vernon, Texas knowing that her husband was a cherished hero loved by so many. His legacy would continue to live on. Peggy Harris still remains married to her true love. She visits her husband at the cemetery in France at least once a year and sends flowers to his grave frequently.