World War II veteran’s headstone found off Highway 80

SAVANNAH, Ga. (WTOC) - Savannah native Malcolm Crawford Jr was just 22 when he died in a fatal plane crash in 1944.

His body was then moved to Hillcrest Abbey East Cemetery, where he rests to this day, but recently another headstone of his was found over 13 miles away, and hadn’t ever been discovered until recently.

“[Me and my dad] just saw something irregular, not natural and we walked into the woods about 10 yards off of highway 80 or so and when we walked in I looked at the headstone and it said ‘Private First Class Malcolm Jr’... I was like ‘this is a military headstone,’” said Bloomingdale resident Drew Roberts.

Roberts sifted through 80-year records to find an answer on why this headstone was buried, and what it was doing so far away from his grave.

“What I really found interesting was the fact that he’s in Savannah and nobody knows his headstone’s here,” Roberts said. “At the end of the day I believe this headstone needs to be where it needs to be.”

The cemetery he’s buried at said they couldn’t move it. They already have his headstone, so then we asked a local cemetery manager, and he gave the answer.

“So somebody had paid for this, wanted it nice and neat and clean and they just never paid for it and so instead of just bringing it to his gravesite, they left it here right on the side of the road, about 10 yards away from highway 80 where millions and millions of people have traveled over 81 years or so and nobody’s ever known about that,” Roberts said.

A discovery that was made Thursday were other headstones nearby, one of which turned out to be Floyd Crawford’s mother.

Like mother, like son.

The next step for Roberts and this discovery is to contact the family.

WTOC has reached out on Facebook to potential relatives of Crawford Jr, but haven’t heard back.