A grandmother has reunited a soldier’s family with his long-lost WW2 bracelet – more than 70 years after it was found by her dad in Iceland.
Clifford Brown with his daughter Audrey Jackson
Clifford Brown served in Reykjavik with the RAF in the early 1940s and returned from the war with a gold bracelet which he said had been left behind by an American soldier.
He put the gold keepsake – engraved with the names ‘Joe J Stowe’ on one side and ‘Bonnie and Ronald’ on the reverse – in a box at home.
It was re-discovered by Clifford’s daughter Audrey Jackson, now 80, when he died 33 years ago and she kept it on her dressing table – until last month.
Worried it would be thrown away when she was no longer around, the determined grandmother-of four took to the internet in a bid to track down ‘Joe’s’ family.
She was amazed when within minutes she found a family tree mentioning him, his wife Bonnie and son Ronald and got in touch with the descendants.
Audrey, from Walsall, West Midlands, was amazed when she got a reply from James ‘Ronald’ Stowe saying his father had lost the bracelet while serving in Iceland in 1943 and 1944.
She has now sent the bracelet to retired pilot Mr Stowe, 78, in Georgia, USA, who can’t wait to be reunited with his father’s lost treasure.
He said: “I was surprised that a bracelet actually existed since I never saw my father wear any jewellery other than a wedding ring.
“Other family members are just as puzzled as me as to the origin of the bracelet.
“Joe died in 1996 and my mother, Bonnie, died last year.
“She would have been thrilled to know that dad’s bracelet has surfaced after all these years.
“I too am amazed and thrilled.”
Delighted Audrey said: “I couldn’t believe that after 70 years it was so quick and easy to trace someone from across the other side of the world with no other information than his name, his wife and son’s names.
Ronald Stowe
“Ron was a pilot for Delta Airlines and he tells me that he has flown in to London and Manchester many, many times – if only I could have made contact then before his parents both died.
“He is so looking forward to having the bracelet returned to its rightful owner after all this time, and I am happy for it to go to him and his family.”
Clifford, an amateur boxer, served with the RAF in Iceland between 1941 and 1945, before returning home to become a plasterer.
Joe Jay Stowe worked in a cotton mill in a small town in Georgia, before he enlisted to the US Army in 1939, and married Bonnie two years later.
He was shipped overseas aboard the SS Mariposa to Iceland, where he spent seven months, before he transferred to England.
Mr Stowe was in charge of cooking meals for 3,000 men headed for the D-Day invasion in France, before fighting in Belgium, Holland and Germany, and returning home in 1945.
The baker had another child – and four grandchildren – before he passed away in 1996, aged 73.
It it thought the men met over a shared interest in boxing, because Mr Brown used to host and organise fights for the visiting American soldiers.
Mrs Jackson, a retired office manager found the family tree on ancestry.com and has posted the bracelet to James, who was known as ‘Ronnie’ as a child.
She said: “I couldn’t believe how easy it was. I’m so relieved it has finally found his family once more.”
by Laura Elvin
