On Saint Patrick’s Day 2016, Jim Farrell received a surprising email: an M-1 rifle engraved with the name M. Teahanhad been discovered in Normandy 72 years after its owner, Martin (Matty) Teahan, Jim’s uncle, had been killed in the June 1944 D-Day invasion of France. A young private in the 508th Parachute Infantry Regiment, Matty had been laid to rest beside his fellow heroes in the Normandy American Cemetery, but now French Army General Patrick Collet was writing to inform the family that Matty’s rifle had been recovered and was safe in his possession. Luck of the Irish! Thus began Jim Farrell’s adventure of discovery and self-discovery, as he and his family embarked on the successful quest to bring his uncle home in spirit by repatriating his historic rifle.

A saga spanning four generations and multiple countries, the rifle’s extraordinary journey and recovery is also the story of Matty Teahan, a humble private made of the stuff that made so many of his generation great—the strength of character, courage, and will-power to prevail against great odds, and the guts, determination, and sheer daring-do to jump out of a perfectly good airplane over enemy territory. Martin Teahan’s emblematic M-1 rifle currently is in the new US Army Museum at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. Similarly, the Farrell family’s quest represents something larger than itself: the intensifying search by the children of the Greatest Generation to understand the facts and meaning of their fathers’ and grandfathers’ war, and their intense desire to come to terms with the often tragic, yet seldom discussed, repercussions of the death and violence their elders experienced in World War II.