'Heart'-warming
WWII GI’s medal returned to family
A Purple Heart medal found years ago along a dirt road in Rockland County — and kept in a cigar box — was returned to the family of a World War II hero during an emotional ceremony on Sunday.
Relatives of Bronx-born Staff Sgt. Bernard J. McNamara — wounded in a 1943 battle in Italy before being taken to a POW camp in Prussia — said they didn’t realize the medal was missing until Sen. Charles Schumer tracked them down to tell them it had been recovered.
Daughter Catherine Birong, 67, said she was thrilled to see it again, especially since her father, who went on to work for Con Edison, passed away in 1975.
The last time she saw the military decoration was in either 1962 or 1963 — John F. Kennedy was president — when some of her young cousins were over at the house, driving her mother nuts.
“So my mom . . . she took out my dad’s stuff, the medals, and I think [there were] a couple hats and stuff,” Birong recalled. “So she got them dressed up and pinned the medals on them and she told them go out and play soldiers.
“I think that was the last time I saw the medal,” she said at a press conference attended by three generations of McNamaras.
There is no database for American service people who have earned the medal, which is awarded for be- ing wounded or dying in battle.
A Rockland man who long ago found it in the dirt recently brought it to the attention of the American Legion post in Nyack.
“[He was an] old guy getting on in years and he started realizing what that medal actually meant,” said Cmdr. Anthony DelRegno.
Schumer dedicated a staffer he said worked like “Nancy Drew” to figure out the mystery.
Grandson Matthew BirongSmith said getting the medal released a flood of memories, including a funny story about the wound that let McNamara earn it.
“My grandfather Bernie did not consult my grandmother Ellen until he enlisted. She understandably was upset and afraid. She knew all too well the possibility that he may never return home,” BirongSmith recounted.
“Ellen told Bernie that if he was shot, she hoped he was shot in the rear. She had a sense of humor.”
When McNamara went MIA for six months, Birong-Smith said Ellen was in agony.
“She finally received word that he was a POW, and it wasn’t until the end of the war when Bernie returned home that she learned what led to his capture.
“During a battle, Bernie was wounded by shrapnel and he was wounded in the upper thigh and lower butt,” he said. “I do believe it provided some necessary comic relief for my grandparents as they put their life back together after the war.”