Last updated: December 23, 2020
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Wreaths Across America
897 S. Columbus Av., Mt. Vernon, NY
914-667-4116
Saturday, December 19, 2020
This is a self-guided tour, commemorating the Wreaths Across America event, honoring service members buried in the historic cemetery. The location map provided here will assist in locating these 25 gravesites, beginning at the grave of Matthew J. Graham. They are decorated with small green wreaths. You can learn more about many of these service members through articles on our website, www.nps.gov/sapa, under History and Culture, People and Stories. Ring the bell of the visitors’ center, the other building at St. Paul’s, closer to the street, if you require assistance. Please observe six-foot distancing protocols and stay safe & healthy. Please be aware that extreme winter wather could casue postponement of this event. Happy holidays to all.
1) Matthew J. Graham, born in Ireland, served as an officer in the 9th New York Volunteer Infantry, Civil War, and was wounded at the Battle of Antietam, Sept. 17, 1862, requiring amputation. He survived until 1907, and eventually wrote a classic history of his regiment.
2) Reflecting an earlier conception of military service, Will Pinkney served for many years as the Captain of the Militia of the Town of Eastchester in the mid 1700s.
3) William Champney served for three years in the 6th New York Heavy Artillery, a locally recruited until in the Civil War, at the unusually advanced age of 64, fulfilling non-combat roles at the battle front.
4) Joseph Gallaudet was a corporal in the 6th New York Heavy Artillery and suffered a severe leg wound at the Battle of Gaines Mills, part of the Virginia Overland Campaign, May 30, 1864. He never really recovered from the injury, and died at age 33, in 1871.
5) Born a mile from the church, Theodosius Fowler was an officer in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, with an extensive combat record, including the Battles of Saratoga and Yorktown. After the war he established a very successful merchant enterprise and lived until age 89.
6) An accountant, John Walter Hodge was a Landsman, the preliminary rank for new recruits in the Navy, during World War I, and died of Influenza, the global pandemic, at a station in Rhode Island in 1918, at age 21.
7) John Logan served as a musician, likely a drummer boy, in the 9th New York Volunteer Infantry, during the Civil War, and was a prominent Mason and very active in veterans affairs in the years following the war.
8) Born near the church, Peter Bertine was a quartermaster sergeant in the 11th New York Volunteer Cavalry Regiment, living in Brooklyn at the time of enrollment. He died of disease at a hospital in Washington, D.C. in 1863.
9) John Griffith was a popular local boy who had just graduated from high school and excelled at mechanical work when he joined Company 555 of the Motor Transport Service and died of Influenza, while stationed on Governor’s island, New York, at the end of World War I.
10) Born in Canada, Alfred Thomson completed an officer training program and served in the United States Merchant Marine in the final two years of World War II. Thomson remained in the service after American victory, took sick at sea, and passed away in Sweden in 1947.
11) Stephen Pell Hunt was a corporal in the 8th New York Heavy Artillery, heavily engaged at the Battle of Cold Harbor, in Virginia, June 1864. Deeply involved with St. Paul’s for more than a half century, he led the church Sunday School for 40 years and was eventually chief warden, lay leader of the parish.
12) Joseph Shardlow was a corporal in the 33rd New York Volunteer Infantry, recruited in upstate New York. He died of disease, probably dysentery, at a Union Army hospital in Virginia in 1862.
13) Michael Mclaughlin, who was born in Ireland, served as an assistant engineer on the USS Genesee, Union Navy, during the Civil War. The ship saw blockade duty in the North Atlantic and combat on the lower Mississippi River. He lived in Brooklyn after the war, raising a large family with his wife Pauline, who is also buried here.
14) Samuel Pell was an officer in the Continental Army, serving throughout the Revolutionary War, cited for meritorious service at the great American victory at Saratoga in 1777. His finely carved sandstone marker features a Trophy of Arms at the top and an engaging epitaph at the bottom.
15) Philip Pell was a Colonel on the staff of General George Washington in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War and additionally served as the army’s Judge Advocate General. Pell was the last member of the Continental Congress, 1789, as the original government of the United States expired.
16) Born in England, Charles Turnbull was an officer in an artillery unit, Continental Army, during the Revolutionary War. Captured at a battle in New Jersey in 1777, he served as a prisoner of war, on parole in Brooklyn, for several years, and moved to Westchester County in the 1790s.
17) Clarence Lanzendoen, who grew up in this neighborhood and was baptized at St. Paul’s, died of Influenza, after only a few weeks at an Army training camp in South Carolina, in 1918, towards the end of the First World War, at age 21.
18) George Carter, born enslaved in Virginia, escaped to freedom early in the civil War, and later served as a private in the 10th United States Colored Troops, helping to secure Richmond when the Confederate capital fell in April 1865. He moved to Mt. Vernon in about 1880 with his wife and children and worked as a gardener and janitor.
19) Ramsey Flynn, who had previous military experience, was an officer in the 313th Regiment, 79th Division of the regular Army, during World War I, engaged in France at the Battles of St. Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne, where he suffered a gas attack on November 3, 1918.
20) William Mercer, who lived in nearby Pelham volunteered for the 6th New York Heavy Artillery in 1862, a unit largely raised in the lower Hudson Valley area and served for the duration of the Civil War.
21) Stuart Robinson, a Mt. Vernon plumber, served in the 2nd Antiaircraft Machine Gun Battalion, in France, First World War, and died of Influenza in France in February 1919. He was re-interred here the following year.
22) This grave marks the interment of several New York militia soldiers who were killed in a 1777 skirmish with the British, during the Revolutionary War, about three miles north of St. Paul’s. Their remains were moved here in the early 20th century.
23) Victor Hawley was born in Arkansas, and his family moved north when he was young. He served in the western theater of the Civil War, from 1864-5, with an Illinois cavalry regiment and moved to Mt. Vernon after the war, one of many Union Army veterans who re-located to this growing area in the late 19th century. He died in 1913.
24) James Virus was working as an usher at a Mt. Vernon theater when he was drafted for service in the First World War, assigned to the 2nd Antiaircraft Machine Gun Battalion, and fought at St. Mihiel and the Meuse Argonne offensive.
25) William H. Hintzen, who was buried at St. Paul’s in 2016, served as an Army sergeant in the Korean War, the only solider from that 1950s conflict buried here.