BLUEWELL, W.Va. — A two-year search for a military headstone that was found by state Division of Highways employees in a Summers County ditch took steps closer to being returned to its rightful place after a televised report on Tuesday alerted the public to the search.
Shelby Morris, an employee in the Summers County office of the WV DOH said that she had been searching locally for the grave of Staff Sgt. William H. Moore since a highway worker found the stone about two years ago. Morris has a special personal interest in making sure the military headstone is returned to Moore’s final resting place. She and some of her family members tend to the cemetery where many of the men who died during the construction of the Big Bend Tunnel are buried.
Lee Ann Hill of the West Virginia Veterans Affairs Office works with the Gold Star Families program. She said that she was able to do some searches and learn that Morris had been living in Dallas, Texas at the time of his death. She also learned that he was from Coalwood. Morris was born Jan. 27, 1918, and died on Oct. 22, 1969. According to his headstone, he served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam.
“His father’s name was William Moore and his mother’s name was Octavia…
