A Poor Cemetery of Veterans and Other Forgotten People

Near my neighborhood, I found a small cemetery. I thought there might be some old headstones of interest and I decided to make a visit. It's a very poor cemetery that appears to belong to a church that is no longer in existence.

Many of the headstones were damaged, and some were completely missing. Whoever is buried in those graves is now nameless, gone and long forgotten. Many of the graves contained children.

From the names, I believe the church must have been ethnic Polish. In any case, these were poor people and a far cry from Lakeside Cemetery, with the likes of John D. Rockefeller. I found one marker that was wood, and another that was home-made. Many stones can't be read at all.


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I checked just about every marker, and I found the names of American War Veterans; some from as far back as the Spanish-American War. Some died in battle. These graves were in no better condition than the others. With Memorial Day coming soon, I have decided to post photos of the headstones marking the graves of these veterans in remembrance of our fallen heros who died while defending our freedoms.

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TedG954 said:

I checked just about every marker, and I found the names of American War Veterans; some from as far back as the Spanish-American War. Some died in battle. These graves were in no better condition than the others. With Memorial Day coming soon, I have decided to post photos of the headstones marking the graves of these veterans in remembrance of our fallen heros who died while defending our freedoms.

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I really like that idea. Would be nice if more of us would do that. Take a day of shooting and shoot veterans graves and publish them

I shot these last summer at a small cemetery near here. This section honored the Confederate soldiers.

Around where I live, organizations have sprung up in the last 10 years or so that look after the cemeteries that have been forgotten by the towns responsible, and put on enough pressure to see the cemeteries at least receive some maintenance. The few private cemeteries have been adopted by other organizations like the Girl Scouts who have seen to the restoration of long forgotten private cemeteries such as the Grand Truck Railway Cemetery in the East Deering area of Portland Maine. Perhaps something like this would work in your area, many times folks are looking for a good cause to become involved in, and this fits the bill for many.

It is interesting that many of the headstones, dated into the 1940s, seem to be made of marble, especially since granite headstones started to become popular in the 1880s or so... at least around here.

A timely post, and a worthwhile endeavor; Very touching, TedG954.

WM

We cherish, too, the poppy red
That grows on fields where valor led;
It seems to signal to the skies
That blood of heroes never dies.
But lends a luster to the red
Of the flower that blooms above the dead
In Flanders Fields.

-From "We Shall Keep The Faith" by Moina Michael, Founder of the Memorial Poppy

The early headstones up in in Maine are mostly marble, most worn to beyond reading, probably from acid rain. There are a few slate ones to that hold up well to the elements. But the granite ones (especially if polished) hold up the best, some over a 100 years old, look as if they were erected last week. We have a couple local cemeteries I visit that date back to the early 1800's, late 1700's.