PAWTUCKET, R.I. – For several decades, the cremated remains of more than two dozen American Civil War veterans languished in storage facilities at a funeral home and cemetery in Seattle.
The simple copper and cardboard urns gathering dust on shelves only had the name of each of the 28 soldiers — but nothing linking them to the Civil War. Still, that was enough for an organization dedicated to locating, identifying and interring the remains of unclaimed veterans to conclude over several years that they were all Union soldiers deserving of a burial service with military honors.
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“It's amazing that they were still there and we found them,” said Tom Keating, the Washington state coordinator for the Missing In America Project, which turned to a team of volunteers to confirm their war service through genealogical research. “It's something long overdue. These people have been waiting a long time for a burial.”
Most of the veterans were buried in August at Washington's Tahoma National Cemetery.
In a traditional service offered to Civil War veterans, the historical 4th U.S. Infantry Regiment dressed in Union uniforms fired musket volleys and the crowd sang "The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Names were called out for each veteran and their unit before their remains were brought forward and stories were shared about their exploits. Then, they were buried.
Among them was a veteran held at a Confederate prison known as Andersonville. Several were wounded in combat and others fought in critical battles including Gettysburg, Stones River and the Atlanta campaign. One man survived being shot thanks to his pocket watch - which he kept until his death — and another deserted the Confederate Army and joined the Union forces.
“It was something, just the finality of it all,” Keating said, adding they were unable to find any living descendants of the veterans.
While some remains are hidden away in funeral homes, others were found where they fell in battle or by Civil War re-enactors combing old graveyards.
Communities often turn reburials into major events, allowing residents to celebrate veterans and remember a long-forgotten war. In 2016, a volunteer motorcycle group escorted the remains of one veteran cross country from Oregon to the final resting place in Maine. In South Carolina, the remains of 21 Confederate soldiers recovered from forgotten graves beneath the stands of a military college’s football stadium were reburied in 2005.
Sometimes reburials spark controversy. The discovery of the remains of two soldiers from the Manassas National Battlefield in Virginia prompted an unsuccessful attempt in 2018 by several families to have DNA tests done on them. The Army rejected that request and reburied them as unknown soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery.
Along with those buried at Tahoma, Keating said, several others will be buried at Washington State Veterans Cemetery and a Navy veteran will be buried at sea. The remains of several more Civil War veterans were sent to Maine, Rhode Island and other places where family connections were found.
Among them was Byron Johnson. Born in Pawtucket in 1844, he enlisted at 18 and served as a hospital steward with the Union Army. He moved out West after the war and died in Seattle in 1913. After his remains were delivered to Pawtucket City Hall, he was buried with military honors at his family's plot in Oak Grove Cemetery.
Pawtucket Mayor Donald R. Grebien said Johnson's burial service was the right thing to do.
“When you have somebody who served in a war but especially this war, we want to honor them,” he said. “It became more intriguing when you think this individual was left out there and not buried in his own community.”
Grebien said the burials recall important lessons about the 1861-1865 war to preserve the Union, fought between the North's Union Army and the Confederate States of America at a cost of hundreds of thousands of lives.
“It was important to remind people not only in Pawtucket but the state of Rhode Island and nationwide that we have people who sacrificed their lives for us and for a lot of the freedoms we have,” he said.
Bruce Frail and his son Ben — both long active in the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War — were on hand for service. Ben Frail was also a re-enactor at Johnson's service, portraying a Union Army captain.
“It's the best thing we can do for a veteran,” said Bruce Frail, a former commander-in-chief with the Sons of Union Veterans and state coordinator for Missing In America Project.
“The feeling that you get when you honor somebody in that way, it’s indescribable,” he said.
The task of piecing together Johnson’s life story was left to Amelia Boivin, the constituent liaison in the Pawtucket mayor's office. A history buff, she recalled getting the call requesting the city take possession of his remains and bury them with his family. She got to work and Johnson's story became the talk of City Hall.
She determined Johnson grew up in Pawtucket, had two sisters and a brother and worked as a druggist after the war. He left to make his fortune out West, first in San Francisco and eventually in Seattle, where he worked nearly up until his death. It doesn't appear Johnson ever married or had children, and no living relatives were found.
“I felt like it was resolution of sorts,” Boivin said. “It felt like we were doing right for someone who otherwise would have been lost to history."