Syracuse, Nebraska – Gerri Eisenhauer’s father, Army Pvt. William Walters was shipped off to World War II before she was even born.
In 1944, her family received his body back and a letter from the American government stating only that he had died somewhere in France.
“I always wondered where he died, how he died. It was just a small piece of a puzzle piece that was missing from my life,” Eisenhauer told CBS News.
For decades, the family resigned themselves to the fact that they would never know. That is, until a few months ago.
Eisenhauer was at her home in Syracuse, Nebraska, last summer when she received a message from Christophe Ligere, a French historian, from the small village of Grez-sur-Loing, in central France. The message read in part: “On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the liberation of France we pay tribute to soldier William Walters.”
Ligere had found Walters’ name in the diary of an eyewitness to his death, and he immediately felt that he had to find Walters’ family. Ligere did some research and found Walters’ family tree, and from there he found the online obituary of another Eisenhauer relative, leaving her that message.
“We were looking for our soldier,” Eisenhauer’s daughter, Jan Moore, told CBS News. “We didn’t know he was their soldier too.”
As Eisenhauer learned from Ligere, American forces began liberating the village of Grez-sur-Loing in August 1944. It was a joyful day, but there was one casualty: while crossing the River Loing into town, Walters’ boat capsized and he drowned at the age of 20.
After Ligere tracked down Walters’ family, he invited them to France to honor their shared hero and the sacrifice he made here. Eisenhauer and her daughter and son, Jan and Allen, made the trip in September.
Marc Perrot had witnessed Walters’ death at the age of 13.
“They went looking for him and found him,” Perrot explained in an interview with France Télévisions. “They did a lot of things to bring him back to life, but it didn’t work.”
Perrot met Eisenhauer and showed her where they laid her father to rest before his body was returned to the US.
“They covered him with flowers,” Eisenhauer said of the French. “It’s just amazing, the care they gave him.”
This week, Eisenhauer returned to her father’s grave in Cass County, Nebraska.
“The first time I was here and had the answers,” Eisenhauer said.
She says she feels at peace now, and it’s all thanks to the grateful people of France, who even eighty years later still see the US through the prism of our better angels.
“It’s very important because the… young people are coming from the US… to fight for democracy… in France,” Ligere told CBS News.
Steve Hartman
