CHICAGO – Buried at the edge of a Chicago Catholic cemetery are an elderly person’s remains marked only by a cement cylinder deep in the ground labeled with the numbers 04985. The person died in 2015 at a nursing home not remembering much, including their own name.
The breakthrough is bringing closure to generations of relatives and friends. But whether they knew the name or the numeral, the investigation has unearthed more mysteries about how Reba, a Women’s Army Corps veteran raised in a large family, became homeless with no recollection, aside from wanting to be identified as a man called Seven.
Public records, interviews, newspapers and police work have offered some insight about the person with two lives, even with so much still unknown. Investigators say the next step is to honor them with a new gravestone and military honors.
Sheriff Tom Dart’s office took on the case of Seven Doe — the name in some official records — last year. The office has gained notoriety for cold case work, including identifying victims of serial killer John Wayne Gacy.
“We never had anything like that before,” Dart said. “This one is different and it just kept getting more different.”
Mount Olivet Catholic Cemetery (Google Street View)
A match came up for Reba, who enlisted in the Army in 1961.
Rick Bailey, the son of Reba’s late brother Richard, was “totally in shock” when he got a call from investigators about his long-lost aunt.
Investigators were able to piece together parts of Reba’s life.
About a decade after the accident, she joined the military, serving in Alabama, Texas and California. Investigators found she was briefly married to a fellow veteran, John H. Bilberry, who passed in 1989.
What happened to Reba between returning from the military and showing up at a Chicago worker house with no memory remains a mystery.
They also don’t know what prompted the memory loss, the change in gender identity or the name Seven.
Denise Plunkett found Seven on a cold day in the late 1970s on the porch of St. Francis Catholic Worker House. It is a hospitality house for people who are homeless and others who want to live in a community.
When asked their name, they would often say “Mr. Seven.”
“Nobody could have done more to help the homeless,” Plunkett said of Seven.
Since Seven didn’t have a legal name or known family, Chicago police launched an investigation, but were unsuccessful. Seven became a ward of the state and died in 2015.
“We know she was cared for,” said Amanda Ingram, who would have been Reba’s great niece. “That is the best that my grandfather could have ever asked for.”
The case could also change Illinois law.
In Reba’s case, family could have had the chance to plan funeral services. Dart’s office is drafting legislation.
“We decided as a family not to disturb her,” Rick Bailey said. “At least we know where she is now.”
