PUTNAM COUNTY, W.Va.—– Delegate Kathie Hess-Crouse says that efforts are being made to either return the Purple Heart that was found on CSX train tracks in Putnam County to the family of its owner or to have it displayed to honor the sacrifices that the owner made.
The medal was awarded to Private First Class Robert Lee Lawrence, who was born in Charleston, West Virginia and lived in Robertsburg, West Virginia.
Hess-Crouse was on 580 Live on Monday and said his military service was short, but he made a huge sacrifice.
“It appears he married around the age of 16, enlisted in the military as a Marine around the age of 17, was sent to Okinawa when it started on April 1 of 1945, and he was killed over there April 23 of 1945,” Hess-Crouse said.
He was 18 when he was killed at the Battle of Okinawa and was laid to rest at Zachary Taylor National Cemetery in Kentucky in 1949.
Hess-Crouse said that CSX workers were the ones who found the heart.
CSX workers who found the medal
“Some CSX workers were in Putnam County, working on the train tracks doing some checks, fixes and everything and they came across, laying on the train tracks in Hurricane, a Purple Heart, a real Purple Heart,” Hess-Crouse said.
Jacob Sheline is the CSX worker who located the Purple Heart on the train tracks. However, she has permission to honor all of the CSX workers that helped in finding the medal, as well as PFC Lawrence.
She found out about the Purple Heart when Military Order of the Purple Heart Commander, fellow Marine Corps Veteran and CSX worker Chris Meadows reached out to her, to request that they work together to find a place to display the heart to honor PFC Lawrence’s sacrifice.
She said that they are making an effort to locate family, and they truly don’t know how the Heart got on the train tracks.
“They’ve tried locating family, they have no idea how this Purple Heart ended up on the train tracks in Hurricane in perfect condition,” Hess-Crouse said.
She said that they have the name of his wife, whom he married in 1943 at 16 years old.
“This is back in 1945, and he had no children, it appears he had no siblings, he was married, I don’t know if they’ve been able to locate who was his wife at the time, we have her name, it’s Dorothy Juanita Daugherty,” Hess-Crouse said.
They are working on putting the Purple Heart in a shadow box, with help from Purple Hearts Reunited, a non-profit foundation who vows to help reunite lost, stolen, and misplaced medals of valor to veterans and their families. Hess-Crouse hope they can coordinate a ceremony in order to respectfully re-home the medal.
And Hess-Crouse said that she has permission from the Putnam County Courthouse and the Culture Center to display the medal there.
“Both places are more than willing to put it in a place of honor permanently so that it’s on display, so this doesn’t happen again,” Hess-Crouse said. “If we of course cannot find family that it would rightfully belong to.”