Stephen F. Austin State University

NACOGDOCHES, Texas -- The quest to find the owner of a highly decorated U.S. Army uniform which has been on display in the window of the Nacogdoches Goodwill store for months is one step closer.

Patrick Richey, a Mississippi-based military collector and researcher and former Stephen F. Austin University student and instructor, spied the uniform recently while visiting friends and family in Nacogdoches. Following a conversation with store manager Kim Karnes, Richey agreed to take the uniform with the understanding that he would attempt to identify and locate the owner.

"We were never able to identify whose uniform it really was," Karnes said. "And, when we looked into donating it to a museum, they wanted to know whose it was. It was really important information."

So, when Richey came into the store, and Karnes realized his military research background, she eagerly agreed to let him take the uniform with him back to Mississippi.

Richey, who is currently working on his doctorate degree at the University of Southern Mississippi, said this isn't the first time he has reunited a Nacogdoches military uniform with its owner.

"I ... picked one up here three years ago. It was a Korean jacket from a guy who my wife's grandmother went to school with," he said. "I looked at the Nacogdoches High School graduates (from that year), and got his address in New York, and wrote him a letter, and he wrote me back."

Richey said the man told him that his mother had passed away here in Nacogdoches, and the uniform must have been disposed of along with her estate.

Richey's interest in militaria stemmed from his family's long history of service.

"My family has been in the military since I can trace," he said. "They fought in every American war, even before it was country."

Richey is himself a military man, serving from 1996 to 2005 in the 418th Civil Affairs Battalion attached to the 4th Infantry Division.

"I started collecting heavily when I was in the military because I started to realize the stuff around me was historical. So if I got a piece here and a piece there, I would just kind of tuck it away. I knew someday it would be important, and it's just kind of grown from there."

Richey estimates he has somewhere near 2,000 uniforms. He keeps them in bins at a storage facility in Mississippi.

"I find them at Goodwills, flea markets and surplus stores. Veterans will give them to me when they get back because they don't want them. I just try to put as much information as I can with each piece ... Some of the pieces have absolutely no story to them, and some of them are just unbelievable.

"From his first glance at the medals and patches, Richey said he could tell that the owner of the uniform spent a long time in service and was a "pretty stout soldier."

"He was with an elite unit, and he received a lot of awards with his elite unit," he said. "The more stuff he's done, the easier it will be to narrow him down ... And this guy has a lot."

Richey said he may learn more details from a military Web site he often uses, where a substantial amount of veterans register.

"What I would do is take a picture of this," he said, holding up part of the uniform. "And say, 'Does anyone recognize this information from this period to this period?'"

Richey said he believes the man or woman who wore the uniform served in either the Somalia or Rwanda conflicts, adding that some of the awards show that the person served overseas, but the presence of only one bar on the lower right sleeve makes it unlikely that they served in Afghanistan, as most soldiers who have served there have at least two.

He also made a special note of the Ranger and specific unit artillery qualification medals which line the chest and collar of the jacket, saying that the combination of the two is often only present on officer jackets.

Richey said if he identifies the uniform's owner, he will seek to return it to them or the community from which it came, but if he discovers it was intentionally abandoned, he will try to place it in a private collection where it will remain as one piece rather than be sold in parts by an antique dealer.

"I think all of it has a story, and that's the reason I do it. Because it's history, and if people preserve it then in 100 years it still exists," he said. "If the people at Goodwill would have taken the patches off and sold the medals then they could have made $25 off all the neat little things, but they would have destroyed a complete piece of history. In 100 years, it wouldn't have existed. But, at least now, it has a chance to make it."