My uncle, Leland Brown, known by me as “Unkie LeeLee”, was in the army during
World War II in Europe. His mother was getting regular letters from him until one day
they just stopped. His mother, of course, was frantic, so his dad and brother-in-law tried
to investigate through the Department of the Army and the Army didn’t know where he
was either. They didn’t know if he was alive or dead, but they had not received notice that
he had been killed or wounded, so they assumed he was alive somewhere.

Well, that was good, but no real answer. No one heard from him in months. After six
months had passed, the family wondered if he had just decided to stay in Europe and start
a new life after the war.

Image the joy when a large packet arrived in the mail for his mother from T-5 L. E.
Brown. In the packet was the letter transcribed in this book by me, Lynn Wilder Ford. I
hope you enjoy it as much as I did when I came across it in my grandmother’s papers.

P. S. He never told where he was during those missing months. He must have been doing
something the Army asked of him as he wound up the War with an Honorable Discharge.