The late Harris “Had” Parsons and his widow, Ruth Parsons, were married and both served in World War II.

But serving in the military at the same time in the same war didn’t bridge the distance between them. He served in Europe, and she served at Pearl Harbor. That separation, however, didn’t stop them from reuniting after the war and resuming their marriage, which lasted for 68 years, until Parsons died at his home in Gorham on April 4.

“I found a rose, scrambled it up and mailed it to her,” Parsons, then a tank driver, recalled in an interview shortly before he passed away earlier this year.

Parsons, a technical sergeant, arrived in La Havre, France, in 1944, after training in Kentucky. He rumbled through Europe driving a tank for Gen. George Patton.

After he enlisted, his wife joined the Navy Waves the next day. Ruth Parsons was a Navy storekeeper 1st class who was stationed on Ford Island at Pearl Harbor. She ordered commissary supplies for the ships in the Pacific fleet. “Ford Island was very busy,” she said.

They stayed in touch by mail, and he said the letters were screened. She didn’t know where he was, but he knew she was in Pearl Harbor.

When the war in Europe ended before the one in the Pacific, he signed up for another four months. He didn’t want to return home if his wife wasn’t there. The Red Cross arranged for her to be at home when he returned.

The Army gave Parsons a job in the tank corps because of his experience driving tractors and trucks on the farm in Gorham where he grew up. Despite that experience, he found the tanks tough to drive.

“It was tricky to shift,” he said, but he soon figured out the key: “Double clutch ’em. It slides right in good.”

On duty in Europe, he ate combat rations and slept on his tank. “You always had to keep your eye open,” he said.

He said his tank wasn’t “seriously hit” by enemy fire. When it was hit, he said it was a dead sound like hitting a barrel of cider.

In the winter with snow on the ground, he slept on the tank to keep warm. Sometimes he drove the tank all night. “It would stay hot for quite awhile,” Parsons said.

Harris and Ruth Parsons have two daughters, Susan Parsons and Julie Marshall. Susan Parsons said her mom still has the World War II rose and the letter it came in.