More on Maple Grove: Spanish-American War Veteran?

MYSTERY OF THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR VETERAN BURIED IN MAPLE GROVE CEMETERY as researched by Fern Eddy Schultz.  "Maybe someone, some day, will be able to identify who is buried there."

Just thought I would let you know what I did/did not find as a result of researching about the stone in Maple Grove that is for a Spanish-American War veteran—“Natural Rock, 1893-1902, No inscription.”  

I checked Martin Barlag’s listing of Veterans in La Porte County Cemeteries—He assigned No. 17 to Maple Grove Cemetery.  In his list of Spanish-American War veterans, he lists the following:

            17        Ackerman, Rollin C.                 1895 – July 5, 1944

That, of course, would mean that Ackerman was only 3 years old when he served.

Following the list of Spanish-American War veterans, Martin has a listing of WWI veterans and he lists the same information here for Ackerman serving in WWI and buried inMaple Grove Cemetery. 

 

The Veterans Graves Registration Form for Ackerman gives information about his service in WWI, buried in Maple Grove Cemetery.

Edna Kitchell’s cards for Maple Grove do not include anyone from the SA War.

The newspapers used to list all the veterans in the various cemeteries in the issue published near Memorial Day.  Strange but in all of those lists, they never included any veteran burials in Maple Grove Cemetery.  That cemetery was not even shown over the years of listings.

 

Pat Harris and I did visit the stone the night of the tour.  It appeared to possibly have something etched on it.  I photographed it and put it through PhotoShop but was unable to see any etching.  Pat said she thought she depicted a “P” at the middle top of the photo.  I have attached a copy of the photograph I took.  Maybe you have a program that you can put this through that might divulge something.

 

I have abstracted death information from the newspapers from 1900 through 1919.  I checked the information for 1902 but nothing indicated a burial at Maple Grove or that the individual was a SA veteran.  A search could be made at the health department of deaths in 1902 but that record will not give a burial location (and the individual who is buried there may not have died in La Porte County or his death may not have been recorded). 

 

Anyway, I will put this information in the file at the museum.  Maybe someone, some day, will be able to identify who is buried there.  It would seem that since 1902 (if that is the actual death date) is not all that old in comparison to many earlier burials, the caretaker of the records might have some information to clarify this.   But then again, those records are not always as complete as we would like.