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A small,
shiny metal object lying unseen on the
ground for decades has connected a
Manchester woman to the daughter of a World
War II soldier from Chicago who had no idea
her father was ever in the area.
Debbie
Crowley, who with her husband Glen operates
Crowley Paving, Sealing and Stripping on the
Murfreesboro Highway, was helping her
granddaughter with a riding lesson when she
discovered a single dog tag on the ground
that had recently been unearthed.
Crowley knew
the soldier’s name – Donald W. Karsner – but
little else, but with the help of the
Internet, found his obituary that listed the
name of his children. She called his
daughter, Sharon Streske of Buffalo Grove,
Illinois.
“I found out
from his daughter that he died in 2006, and
that he was a medic in World War II,”
Crowley said. “His daughter said that he met
his wife in Texas and that he served in the
Army and was stationed in Germany, but he
didn’t talk much about his service, so she
never knew that he was in Tennessee.”
Streske, who
with her brother Alan Karsner of Cicero
Illinois, say they are anxiously awaiting
the dog tag that Crowley has promised to
return to them in the mail.
Karsner may
not have spoken much about his experiences
during World War II, but there is much to
learn and more to imagine about this
faceless soldier than his name, rank and
serial number thanks to a few facts and the
World Wide Web.
According to
the U.S. National Archives and Records
Administration, Donald W. Karsner enlisted
as a private in the U.S. Army on March 17,
1942 in Chicago. He gave no preference in
which branch he wanted to serve, and signed
up for the duration of the war, plus six
months, “subject to the discretion of the
President or otherwise, according to the
law.
Pvt. Karsner
was a high school graduate, a textile
worker, and 25 yeas old.
According to
his daughter, Karsner served as a medic with
the 473rd Infantry Regiment
(Medical Collecting Company), assigned to
the 92nd Infantry Division, and
was awarded the Bronze Star for service
during the Battle of the Bulge, one of the
bloodiest battles during the war, where
75,000 Americans were killed, maimed or
captured.
Karsner
married his sweetheart, Charlotte, shortly
after the war and they raised a family in
Chicago. They were born five days apart and
died just five weeks apart at the age of 89
in the summer of 2006.
But the
question that haunts Crowley, and one that
may remain unanswered is, “How did his dog
tag end up in her yard in Manchester?”
Opal
Stephens, who has lived across the street
from Crowley for many years may have an
answer.
“They used
to do maneuvers in those woods (where
Crowley’s house is located) during the war,”
she said. “Also, during the war there was a
restaurant where the Mike’s Woods and Waters
is now. He could have eaten there.”
Stephens purchased the historic Moonlight
Court cabins located on the Murfreesboro
Highway 35 years ago. They were a popular
destination point when U.S. Highway 41 was a
major thoroughfare, she said. Two of the
double cabins have been torn down due to
water damage.
The most logical explanation, of course, is
that Karsner, at one point during his
military career, passed through Camp
Forrest, one of the Army’s largest training
bases during the war. It covered 85,000
acres and was a training area for infantry,
artillery, engineer, signal organizations
and cooks. It also served as a hospital
center and temporary encampment area for
troops during maneuvers.
Crowley may never know how the soldier’s dog
tag ended up in her possession, but she and
her husband Glen are now on a search for the
matching one.
“We put the pen in for the horses about six
months ago, and they must have loosened the
ground enough to bring the dog tag up to the
top. Maybe the other one’s out there
somewhere.” |
