(NewsNation) — After a New Jersey woman discovered she accidentally gave away the burial flag of her father, a Korean War veteran, at an estate sale, she was devastated.

“I didn’t even realize it was missing until the night after the first day of our estate sale. So it was devastating,” Colleen Lange said, adding that she was “desperate” to find it.

According to NewsNation partner Patch, the flag had been given to Lange’s mother as part of her father’s burial ceremony, after he died of cancer at the age of 60.

Lange had been frazzled leading up to the estate sale after losing her mother just a few months before, Patch reported. Her mother’s house, listed on Jan.1, sold within two weeks, leaving Lange with only a short time to clear it out.

An article about the ordeal was written by Patch, and a friend from college saw the story. The friend shared the article with her uncle, Vietnam War vet George Mariasz — who coincidentally had the flag.

Mariasz had been at Lange’s estate sale, and had seen the funeral flag up on a shelf. As a veteran, he hates to see any flag being disrespected, so Mariasz asked someone else at the sale, who erroneously thought the family didn’t want it, if he could have it.

“He’s very patriotic, just a really sweet man,” Lange said of Mariasz.

Speaking to “Morning in America” on his 75th birthday, Lange said he was so relieved someone wanted the flag that he cried when returning it to Lange.

It was an emotional occasion for Lange, too.

“I showed up at the door and I thought, oh my gosh, he looks so much like my father. And of course, I cried,” she said.