Traverse City Record-Eagle

Grand Traverse County

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  • Jan-Michael Stump

    CIVIL WAR

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    CIVIL WAR
October 18, 2009

Vet in unmarked grave given burial service

BY ART BUKOWSKI

TRAVERSE CITY -- John P. Sinclair lay in an unmarked grave for 95 years, his plot tucked between other local Civil War veterans under a stand of gnarled old trees in historic Oakwood Cemetery.

Sinclair, an Ohio native and sergeant with the Union Army, died near the shores of Long Lake in 1913 and was buried in the cemetery along Eighth Street the next year. It's believed his grave never had a headstone, possibly because no family could be located to pay for one.

But Sinclair received a brand new marble headstone and burial service Saturday after a group of Civil War enthusiasts tracked him down. The group, Battle Creek-based Robinson's Battery, is in the process of finding the final resting place of all the members of Sinclair's unit.

"It's sort of a labor of love, trying to get all of them present and accounted for," said Deb Gosselin, Robinson's historian.

Gosselin used a series of records and a 1914 Record-Eagle article to determine Sinclair was in the cemetery. Records indicate the names of the soldiers he's buried between, so the group was able to find his burial plot.

Robinson's battery contacted the Robert Finch Camp of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, a local civil war group. The enthusiasts joined forces to re-enact a full Grand Army of the Republic burial service, and the federal Department of Veterans Affairs paid for a reproduction Civil War-era headstone.

"It's one of the things (we) do to keep alive the memory of those who fought ... It's important to society that these people be remembered and the Civil War be remembered," said Neal Breaugh, Robert Finch Camp secretary.

Among those gathered for the ceremony was Traverse City resident Chris Campbell, 62, Sinclair's cousin four times removed. Campbell learned of the service last week through a news story in the Record-Eagle and contacted the Robert Finch Camp to inform the group he's related to Sinclair.

"This is really cool. As my brother said, now we don't have to do it," he joked.

Campbell believes his ancestor would be honored by the formal funeral service and headstone.

"How surprised he would be, I think, that anyone would remember him 100 years later," he said.

Honoring the memory of Sinclair and his fellow soldiers is what drives Robinson's Battery, which so far has tracked down about 110 of the 130 members of Sinclair's unit.

"This was just a group of people. There were good guys and there were bad guys, people that went on to fame and fortune and people who died like (Sinclair)," Gosselin said. "It does make you feel good to restore this person to the place in history that he deserves."

For more information, visit www.robinsonsbattery.org.

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