Riverhead man’s long-lost Purple Heart to be presented to family at his gravesite on Veteran’s Day

Willie Riley was a 23-year-old solider who’d been drafted into the U.S. Army in 1967 and sent to Vietnam. He was a .50-gunner riding atop a tank when it hit a mine. The explosion threw him 50 feet into the air. Riley suffered multiple serious injuries but survived, regaining consciousness in a military hospital in Germany.

The Army specialist was awarded a Purple Heart, a military decoration awarded in the name of the President to those wounded or killed while serving. He was also the recipient of four Bronze Star Medals, which are awarded to members of the U.S. Armed Forces for either heroism or meritorious service in a combat zone.

Riley cherished the medals, especially the Purple Heart. More than 35 years ago, he gave the Purple Heart to his sister Geraldine for safekeeping. He never saw the award again and was unaware his sister had placed it in a safe deposit box she’d rented.

Riley married in 1987 and settled in Riverhead, where he worked as a horse trainer at the Big E farm. In recent years, from time to time he wondered aloud what happened to his Purple Heart. It gnawed at him, his wife Lori said. He passed away last December after a battle with cancer, and before he died, he expressed regret that he’d never found his Purple Heart, she said.

Last night at about 9:30, Karen Heppner of McLaughlin Heppner knocked at the door of Lori Riley’s Aquebogue home.

“I thought, why is the funeral director coming to my house?” Riley’s widow said in an interview this morning.

Heppner told the startled woman she’d been contacted by a television news station in East St. Louis, Illinois to say they had Willie’s Purple Heart.

“I was stunned, just speechless,” Lori Riley said. “Then I started to cry.”

Riley agreed to an interview with the TV reporter last night.

“I’m still in shock,” she said.

Her brother-in-law was presented with Riley’s Purple Heart today at East St. Louis City Hall this morning, Lori Riley said. He is going to ship it to the funeral home by overnight courier and it will be presented to the family at Riley’s gravesite in Calverton National Cemetery on Saturday — Veteran’s Day.

The couple have four adult children, two of them in the military. Their son Darien is a Marine corporal and their daughter Heather is in the Air National Guard.

Willie posed for a photo with a display of military decorations at Camp Lejeune four years ago while visiting his son after he completed boot camp. He is pointing to the Purple Heart pinned to the display board.

“He really wanted to get his Purple Heart back,” his wife said. “It’s incredible for it to turn up like this— and just before Veteran’s Day,” Riley said.

“It’s so funny because the night before last, I dreamed of Willie for the first time since he passed. He was wearing his big cowboy hat and he came over to me and gave me a big kiss,” she said. “He didn’t say anything, just gave me a kiss and walked away,” she said, growing emotional. “And the next day, this happens.