Wilfred Husband awarded Purple Heart posthumously

WILFRED HUSBAND IS REPORTED KILLED IN RAID ON NAZIS

Reported as missing in action December 11, 1943, S/Sgt. Wilfred Merle Husband, son of Mrs. Marion Cushing Husband, of 114 Vandervoort Street, is now revealed to have been killed on that date according to an announcement of the War Department.

He was a ball turret gunner on a Flying Fortress that failed to return from a bombing mission over Germany .

Mrs. Husband last week received posthumously the Purple Heart awarded to her son.

S/Sgt. Husband was born in Tonawanda, October 5, 1923, and attended North Tonawanda High School. He was employed at Columbus McKinnon Chain Co., and Benson Shipbuilding Co. and enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in April 1942 but did not actually enter the service until he following September.

He received his basic training in the south and west and was sent overseas, arriving in England just a few days before he was killed in action.

Surviving, in addition to his mother, are three sisters, Mrs. Elva Jean Moag of Tonawanda, Mrs. Audrey Harbeck of North Tonawanda, Miss Lois Husband of Lansing, Michigan, and his father, Merle Husband, of Michigan .

Article: Tonawanda News - January 10, 1945
Photo: Courtesy of Alexander Tuinhout, see also WWII Letters & Notes HERE for more from Alexander.