B-25 #42-64889 crashed at sea off Cape Boram east of Wewak on the northern coast of New Guinea, November 27, 1943.
It was Dale Wilson’s thirteenth combat mission.
The MIA telegram arrived in Minburn on his mother’s December 4 birthday, six months before I was born. Dale was the first person Mom told in a V-Mail letter that she was having a baby the next spring. I grew up with the shadow of his loss and eventually became the keeper of his letters, official records, his stories.
Mary Ragsdale is a niece of John “Junie” Stack. Her grandmother, John’s mother, lived with them when Mary was a child. She shared a bedroom with her grandmother, and the photo of her missing uncle. Mary grew up with his loss and became the keeper of his letters, records, and stories. She and her husband, Jim Ragsdale, wrote Reading Between the Lines: Getting to Know Uncle Junie Through the Letters he Left Behind. It reveals that John Stack, the only married crew member, was lost on his ninth combat mission.
The man in the lower right of the crew photo was not on the mission that fateful day. Instead, gunner Sgt. Willie Ted Sharpton was the sixth member. Essie Sharpton, wrote Leora Wilson that her son Ted Sharpton had been lost on his one and only mission.
I don’t know the number of missions the other crew members had endured before this one, their last very last one. The plane and crew have never been located.
I’m still in contact with family members of these young men who have been missing since November 27, 1943. Mary Ragsdale hopes to offer an ebook version of Reading Between the Lines this winter. She said they acknowledged the anniversary of the loss of her uncle and his crew at their family Thanksgiving dinner.
Leora’s Letters: The Story of Love and Loss for an Iowa Family During World War II is available from Amazon in paperback, hardbound, and ebook, and as an audiobook, narrated by Paul Berge.
It’s also the story behind the Wilson brothers featured on the Dallas County Freedom Rock® at Minburn, Iowa.
What Leora Never Knew: A Granddaughter’s Quest for Answers is my journey of research into what happened to the three Wilson brothers who were lost during WWII.
I guess I had not put together that this happened so close to your birth. Your family had to bear that heavy weight and then they were blessed with a bundle of Joy to ease their pain.
Dale was the first person Mom told that she was expecting, a boy, she said they’d hoped. The little V-Mail letter was returned unopened (marked “missing” by Lt. Curtis Swan, whom I corresponded with decades later). I was the first person to open that little V-Mail. I was the first granddaughter. Mom and I stayed with my grandparents on the farm for two months after I was born.
Wow. I’ve read the book and studied this area myself and it still has impact.
It does, doesn’t it. Thanks, Rich!
Amazing that folks stayed in touch. All bound by that one event. Thanks, Joy.
Thank you, John. As as I had all the letters transcribed, I began a journey of research into what happened to my three young lost uncles. That was during the 1990s. It’s much easier now, but most of them are the next generation.
It’s wonderful that you acknowledge the loss of your uncles and post about them, Joy, yet sad. It makes me thankful that none of my family was killed WWII, and very thankful that in Vietnam my unit was so much better armed than the enemy that they ran from us.
Tim, after I began to transcribe all the letters, I was getting acquainted with family members I never knew. They were barely talked about because of the pain it would cause, but I didn’t know that. I just wondered why no one I knew, even close relatives on my dad’s side, didn’t remember that one central Iowa family had lost three sons during the war. Someone needed to tell their story, but at that point, I didn’t realize it would turn out to be me. I spent the 1990s doing research and going to writing workshops and conferences. Then, fibromyalgia set it. To stay. When it began to lift, the need to tell their story was front and center, in spite of the brain fog. I’m amazed at your Vietnam story. Didn’t you do two tours?
I didn’t do two tours, Joy. I tried to make that clear in a post. I volunteered for Vietnam, and when it took a long time for me to go, I reenlisted, thinking it would make it happen faster. In fact, it didn’t.
You volunteered. Amazing, Tim. Guy joined the AF to keep from getting drafted.
That makes sense. I enlisted at 17 years old. My parents had to approve, and my mom regretted it because I was pretty crazy after Vietnam.
How difficult. Your novels resulted from it all, didn’t they?
My first novel was pushed by my time in Vietnam. When I was in Long Binh there was a lot of heroin. One of my buddies died of an overdose.
Oh dear. I’m about halfway through Dan Antion’s compelling Poetic Justice. It deals with the aftermath of the Vietnam war, but I don’t know where it’s going yet. Have you read any of his books?
I haven’t, Joy. I’ll put that on my list.
I went to add it to my list and it was already on it.
These tragedies will always be felt, both the loss of what was and the loss of what could have been.
You’re right, Liz. I’ve only fleeting wondered about how many cousins I might have had on the Wilson side.
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Because of your books, your uncles sacrifices won’t be forgotten. War, as you thoroughly pointed out, effects loved ones. I hope you and your Favorite Guy had a wonderful Thanksgiving, Joy. 🙂
A very quiet one. Thank you, Nancy. I hope yours was warm and wonderful.
With little grandchildren, it was wonderful and loud. 🤣
Thank you, Joy! This hits home. Let’s hope that the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency opens up New Guinea for MIA searches. In the Indo-Pacific region, I’m told they’re currently focused on the Marshall Islands, Carolines, Thailand, and Vietnam (and rightly so). Unfortunately 2026 will be a lean year due to budget cutbacks, but there’s much to look forward to. Fingers crossed.
Thanks for your note, Dan. Mary Ragsdale said they remembered the crew at their Thanksgiving this year. I bet they do that every year. . .