Okay so this happened back in 2013, but it still sits so heavy in my chest. I still think about it because it completely changed how I view love, loyalty, and honestly… pain. I was super close to my great-grandma, who was 91 years old at the time and already in her final stage of life. She was literally the softest, kindest, most heartbreakingly loyal woman I’ve ever met. Back during WWII, she had two daughters and one son with her husband who was sent off to war. He never came back. Just disappeared. No letters, no news, nothing. And because communications were TERRIBLE back then, everyone just assumed the worst that he died somewhere out there, nameless and buried under rubble. My great-grandma never remarried. She literally spent her whole life carrying his photo in her wallet like a teenage girl waiting for her prom date. Her dying wish was honestly so simple and pure she just wanted to know where he was, and if he had a grave, she wanted to be buried beside him. That’s all.
So me and my cousins took it seriously. Like REALLY seriously. We started with old documents, church records, even posted to random veteran forums and missing persons groups. It took us SIX MONTHS of full-on sleuthing and throwing feelers out across the internet. We even made a Facebook page and reached out to people with the same last name. And then, boom we got a message from a family that claimed to know him. Turns out… he didn’t die. He SURVIVED the war. And according to their family’s stories, he had been told that his wife and children had died during the bombings. He tried looking for them, but with the chaos and confusion post-war, he eventually gave up. He eventually remarried and lived a quiet life with another woman until he passed years ago. He was buried next to that woman the one he grew old with, the one he rebuilt with and their shared tombstone even had the words “Together Forever” on it.
We didn’t know how to tell my great-grandma but she was still so sharp, so aware, and she kept asking if we had found anything. So we brought her. We wheeled her to the cemetery. She stared at the grave for a long time without saying a word. And then, with her paper-thin hands, she started wiping the dust and leaves off his name like she had done it a million times in her head. And then she said so quietly I swear I almost missed it…
“Henry… it’s me. You found peace, didn’t you? Was she kind to you? Did she make you laugh when I couldn’t? Were you warm at night? I waited. I really did. I brought our children up. Alone. I didn’t marry. I thought maybe… maybe you’d come back. But I’m glad someone held your hand when I couldn’t. I just wish I knew.”
She didn’t cry. She didn’t get mad. But the silence after that? It was LOUD. Like something inside her just let go. On the ride home she barely spoke. She just held my hand and whispered, “Not too close… but not too far, okay?” when I asked her where she’d want to be buried. She passed away peacefully two days later.
And now I can’t stop wondering AITAH for giving her that truth? For spending six months unearthing a heartbreak she might’ve been better off not knowing? I thought I was giving her peace, but what if I gave her more pain? What if some dreams are better left untouched?
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NTA, you gave her peace in her last moments.
She already had pain, you gave her an answer to a question she’d been asking for decades. I think it’s likely that she decided she had no further unfinished business, and that’s why she died so shortly afterwards. Not knowing was likely haunting her, and you gave her closure in her last days. She’s resting in peace now.
Nta . At least she had closude
You did something beautiful and generous, she can go in peace knowing that he did not suffer and was living a peaceful life.
Was not expecting that to hit me in the feels as hard as it did, but that brought me to tears. You did the right thing, gave her answers and peace and it was a beautiful moment that she got to say good bye to him properly
You did the right thing. She still loves him and was probably happy that he had had a good life, even if it wasn’t with her. The fact she knew he had searched for her would have helped her reconcile the loss.
OP there is every likelihood that she suspected as much. Even possible that she knew he had survived, or wasn’t on any KIA lists, she would have known his regiment.
Its not an unusual story for that era of human history.
(Germany?)
You did a wonderful thing. 💗
NTA, but why did she wait so long to look for answers.
Definitely NTA. I’m sorry for your loss. Don’t feel guilty she asked you to do this and y’all did a good job
You’re only the asshole for tugging at my heartstrings like this. NTA for being an amazing grandchild
NTA – her life was hard and made harder because never came back but knowing the truth freed her. She genuinely loved him and her hope that he had a good life is proof of that.
As she said bury her nearby. So sad, as so many stories are from past wars.
Until the last survivors leave the memory and pain goes on.
Sweet child you’re NTA, you gave her the closure she needed to move on.
NTA
Even if the truth may have hurt your grandma, she deserved to know the truth before the end of her worldly life.
Did he have any (other) children?
Amazing great-grandson, you made her proud. She showed undying love and loyalty until her last breath, demonstrating compassion when bad news was revealed. Wish him well and said her goodbye. The world needs more people like your great-grandmother. War has always been and still is a great divider of families. You may never fully understand the truth or reasons behind this unfortunate outcome, but know in your heart that you had an incredible woman in your life. If you live your life according to her values, you will become an amazing person.
NTA I’m sobbing at this though. You gave her the closure she wanted/needed. You went to great lengths to give her peace.
No, it was her moment to let go, the past was a different world, war time was hard for many. She and your great grandfather are resting in peace now. This is a touching story.
Not me crying over a great-grandma that’s not mine and I never met 😭 what a heartbreaking story. NTA, it was not the outcome she and you had hoped for obviously, but I think in some way it brought her peace and some closure.
You let her have closer. That in its self is a form of peace. Just do as she asked and bury her close but not to close to her husband. She didn’t cry or get upset because for her he had died long ago. She was probably glad he had someone. She had her family. In her mind she always thought he died alone, probably in pain and fear. So she was probably happy to learn the truth.
I’m confused. Granddad was sent off to war in Europe.
Were they Americans? So, she was in America while he went overseas?
If that’s the case, why would he say he was told his family was bombed and died? There was no war in America.
This is a moot point if they were both European and lived in an area that WAS bombed during the war. Then, that would be plausible.
You gave her closure which was peace.
I’m NOT crying!!
NTA she was hurting either way and I think knowing he thought she and their children had died and bravely moved on and found some happiness again, living a full life, is a better ending than him dying way too young in a horrific war
Ok you maybe are a little bit of an AH for making us redditors cry for your great grandma and the pain she suffered
No. You gave her closure and knowledge. That’s the best gift on a lifetime of waiting.
OMG! I’m not a cryer but I cried reading this! I literally cried!
NTA! You gave her closure!
Phew wasn’t expecting that for my afternoon Reddit catchup.
I think you gave her peace, she finally found out what really happened and was able to go without any unfinished business.
As sad as it probably was to find out they missed out on all those years it seems like she was happy he was happy in the end 🤍
NTA.
She genuinely loved her life waiting to find out that truth. Any truth is better than guesses and being unsure.
You gave her the truth, and with her final act, she gave him what she couldn’t in her life: a proper goodbye.
You gave her the chance to say goodbye to someone she loved. A proper goodbye. If he had died in the war, or died after living a life without her — he died before her. She was always the one meant to stand over his tombstone and bid him farewell. She was clearly the stronger of the two.
You gave her the one thing she needed that no one else could give her: the chance to say goodbye.
That’s what she needed to pass peacefully, and you gave it to her.
NTA in any way, shape or form.
I knew a lot of people who survived that war, once upon a time. Their families died, wiped out. They lived entire lives wishing for even the smallest hint or word that maybe their family lived. They moved on, created entirely new families, but they still wished and prayed.
Instead, they went into their graves knowing the people they loved most were in a mass grave, turned to ash, gone up in cinders. If they were lucky, they knew where the final place their family member was seen alive was located. They didn’t know if they were moved, relocated, or that was it. There was no possible way for them ever to find out.
The person they loved more than life itself became a nameless casualty. Their body starved, desecrated, relieved of life. The only person who would ever remember their name now also being lowered into the earth.
He lived. She remembered. Your family remembers. He made a second family and they remember. He will not be forgotten. He will not be one of… he got to be him until the moment he had his name carved in a headstone. Even in death, he got to be someone. And you gave her that before she passed. They were both someone.
It sounds like it gave her peace tbh.
So grandma is 91 in 2013, so born in 1922. Before WWII she had multiple children with her husband. WWII was 1939-1945, so if you are European she would have been 16 when her husband was drafted in 1939. If you’re American and he was drafted in 1945, she could have been 21.
To have 3 children by 21 in the 1930s means your grandma was the luckiest woman alive, given the rate of both infant and maternal mortality in childbirth at the time, with deaths practically guaranteed if you experienced something like preeclampsia or obstructed labour. While mothers have been having dozens of children for years, having 3 in a maximum of 5 years in the 1930s would have given her a mortality rate of over 1% with each birth, which doesn’t sound like much but it is in the 30s when childbirth was among the biggest mortality rates.
Except you said that grandpa couldn’t find your grandma & co due to bombings. There was one aerial bombing against the US in 1942, and to this day that is the only aerial bombing against North America. There were also incidents like Pearl Harbour and various ships were attacked, but unless granny lived on a boat she wouldn’t have had to evacuate.
Which means you’re European. Which means grandpa would have been drafted well before 1945. Which means grandma had her 3 kids by the time she was 16-20 (and 20 is pushing it because most European countries had established conscription by 1939). While the average marriage age in Europe at the time was 16, the conscription age was 18, and the bombings were largely in 1940/1941.
So for her to have 3 kids, and grandpa to have lost them in the bombings, grandma would have married grandpa when she was 16 and he was 18 in 1939, they had 3 kids, also in 1939, and then he got conscripted, also in 1939, in order to lose them in the bombings that began in 1940. That’s a lot to do in a year.
Additionally, while communication wasn’t great at the time, it was a lot better than you gave it credit for, and any evacuations were monitored reasonably well. There were absolutely cases of kids just… disappearing without documentation… but not a mother with three children who knew who her husband was and where he was and was waiting on him to come home.
And while there were also people who died in the bombings or were presumed dead, your grandpa wouldn’t have been able to declare people who were very much alive as passed away, your grandma would have been notified if he tried and she would have been documented somewhere, whether that was on a voting card, a work contract, or a rental agreement, and he wouldn’t have been able to remarry with a living wife. There were literal government departments dedicated specifically to reuniting loved ones who lost each other in the war. Communication being bad doesn’t explain how this could have happened unless grandma didn’t put her name on anything at all through to 2013.
So not TA for telling your grandma about this, given it didn’t happen. YTA for using global tragedies for your karma farming.