Philip H.J. Wills lives in England and uses his Whites XLT metal detector to search fields and places where interesting artifacts turn up. One day in 1998 while searching in a field near Brixham in South Devon, he found a bracelet 6 inches down, in a field which was known to have been occupied by American Servicemen in 1944 just prior to the 'D' Day invasion of Europe.

"The bracelet tag was just over six inches deep in a pasture field that has only been plowed twice since World War II," Philip recalls. The links to the bracelet were scattered - yet the bracelet tag had the serviceman's name and service number clearly engraved on the front, "William R. Layton 0-2049309", and a term of endearment "I Love You Irene", on the back."It has now been repaired at the jewelers and is in excellent condition - considering it has been buried for over 50 years," Philip said.

Finding the bracelet was easy - however finding the owner was much more difficult. Philip wrote the American Embassy in London and they referred him to the National Personnel Record Center (NPRC) in St. Louis, Missouri. "Understandable as I am not related to this gentleman, the information they would release to me was limited." They told him that in 1951 his last city and state was Easton, Maryland. This told Philip that he had survived the war and if still alive, would now be in his seventies. He contacted two families of like name living in Easton, but no luck. Finally, he received information, that both the owner of the bracelet and his wife were deceased, and he discontinued the search. Then, about two months later, he received information from the same source advising that the information was incorrect. This led Philip to start searching again, only to hit a wall when military authorities wouldn't release any info. Once again, he shelved the project until February '07 when he decided to try once again. This time, he enlisted the help of his nephew, Andrew, in Kansas City and incredibly, within days he discovered that the serviceman had died in 1993, but his wife Irene was still alive and 85 years of age. They traced Irene's address and phone number in Maryland and phoned her to tell her about the finding of the bracelet. At first, she thought it was some sort of scam, but she knew that she had given her husband a bracelet. Andrew asked Irene to provide her husbands military service number. This she did by sending a copy of an envelope addressed to William's parents in 1944 which had his service number. This proved conclusively that she was his wife and that they had the right man. Philip then wrote to Irene to advise her that he would be sending her the bracelet. Once Irene received the bracelet, she sent back a letter telling Philip that they were high school sweethearts, growing up together, and explained what an emotional experience it was to get the bracelet back after she gave it to her husband William when he was posted overseas in 1942 (65 years ago). She went on to say that her husband was an Army Lieutenant with 12 ambulances under his command. He went all though France, Germany and Belgium evacuating the wounded from the front lines until the European war ended. He was then sent to the Phillipines via the Panama Canal and while he was en route to the Pacific, the war ended. He finally returned home from Japan via the California coast and arrived home in Maryland on December 31, 1945. Sadly, he died in 1993, five years before Philip found the bracelet.

Philip also received a letter from William's younger brother. He told of Williams business after the war, and said that William never spoke about his his wartime experiences. He provided the photo of William sitting alongside his driver in his jeep, which he lovingly named Irene. The photo was taken in France in 1944, and Philip felt it brought a memorable conclusion to his search, and story.