High school sweetheart finds lost love’s diary in museum
Posted by staff / May 28, 2013 Laura MaeLaura Mae DavisLaura Mae Davis BurlingameNational World War II Museum
Thousands of sweethearts kissed their soldier boys goodbye as they headed off to fight in World War II, many for the last time, but few got the surprise that Laura Mae Davis Burlingame did when she visited New Orleans’ National World War II Museum.
Before her high school love, Thomas “Cotton” Jones headed overseas, she gave him a diary in which “…he wrote what he called his “last life request” to anyone who might find his diary: Please give it to Laura Mae Davis, the girl he loved.”
Although fate wasn’t on Jones’ side when he was killed by sniper fire in 1944, it was on Laura Mae’s, who went to the museum hoping to get a taste of the life Jones lived before he died.
“I figured I’d see pictures of him and the fellows he’d served with and articles about where he served,” she said.
What she got was the chance to page through the diary that mentioned his love for her over and over again, including his final entry:
Jones’s last entry, written aboard the USS Maui on Dec. 1, 1943, described winning $200 at craps. He had a total of $320, he wrote, and if he were back home “Laura Mae & I would really have a wonderful Xmas.” He wondered if he could wire the money to her as a Christmas present.
Full story at CBS News.
Photo credit: Fotolia
[…] Here’s the tale of one special love story passed on through a long lost diary. […]