Beach Point, PEI — What happened to Eileen Williams? Family is still trying to answer that question, 61 years after she vanisheded without a trace.
The youngest of seven siblings, Williams grew up in Beach Point, located 30 Kms southeast of Montague. She eventually moved to Hamilton, Ontario, but she would come home to PEI every summer to visit her family.
Police say she disappeared during one of her annual trips home and was never seen or heard from again.
Williams' family has teamed up with a retiring RCMP officer in the hopes of finding new information that could help solve one of Prince Edward Island's oldest cold cases.
"We know that time is not on our side, and that anyone who knows what happened to Eileen may not be around much longer," said her family in a statement.
"We want people to know that Eileen was a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a cousin and a friend. Not a day goes by that we don't think about her."
According to a statement from her family, Williams' sister-in-law, Pearle, drove her to Montague and dropped her off at the post office on August 6, 1962.
They also say Williams had planned to do some errands and visit some friends from high school. She told Pearle that she would return to Beach Point if she didn't end up staying with her friends.
When Williams failed to return home that night, her family assumed she had stayed with her friends.
However, they grew worried when she failed to return home the next day, and they started to look for her.
They reported her missing to the Montague RCMP the following day and an investigation was launched.
Eileen Faye Williams was last seen on August 6, 1962 outside Montague, on the road that leads to Murray River and Beach Point, around 7 p.m. Her family believes she may have been trying to hitchhike back home to Beach Point.
Investigators note that Williams' return plane ticket to Hamilton was never used and her bank account remained untouched for several years, until it was turned over to her surviving relatives.
"Williams's mother passed away the following year. Some say of a broken heart," said her family.
"Her father followed two years later. They never got the answers for what happened to their daughter."
Williams disappearance is considered suspicious, but no arrests have ever been made.
Williams' family is urging anyone who has information about her disappearance to contact police. "Our hope is still that she will be found, and that we will have the answers her whole family has been waiting sixty years for," they said.
Anyone who may have information regarding the disappearance of Eileen Faye Williams is asked to contact the PEI RCMP Major Crime Unit at 902-566-7112. Information can also be provided anonymously through Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477).
