Last Post Fund recognizing veterans with special gravestones

Its mission is to make sure all veterans receive a gravestone at their final resting place. Researchers comb through cemetery records to find the grave sites of veterans before a permanent military stone can be installed.

Members from the Last Post Fund’s Alberta branch conducted a ceremony at Mountain View Cemetery on Wednesday, to recognize veterans buried at the Lethbridge site.

Those veterans’ grave sites were unmarked for years, and following dedicated research efforts, the identities of the veterans have been found, and they will now receive official military headstones.

Temporary signage has been installed throughout Mountain View Cemetery, marking the resting places of the identified veterans. In due course, permanent Last Post Fund gravestones will be installed.

So far, at Mountain View Cemetery, a stone has been installed for William Roy Carver, who passed away in 1996.

The headstone of William Roy Carver, installed by the Last Post Fund at Mountain View Cemetery in Lethbridge (Lethbridge News Now)

The graves were identified by Alberta branch member Yvonne Sugimoto.

In southern Alberta, she is awaiting the delivery of nine markers in Lethbridge, two in Taber, one in Raymond, five in Fort Macleod and several others in Calgary.

“Veterans Affairs [Canada] estimates that about 225 every year need our service,” said Glenn Miller, member of the Last Post Fund’s Alberta branch.

The Last Post Fund owns and operates its own National Field of Honour in Pointe-Claire, Quebec, where Miller said over 22,000 burials have taken place since 1930.

“The National Field of Honour became a national historic site in 2009. It is the only Canadian cemetery entirely devoted to veterans and their close ones,” he said.

Video from Wednesday’s event at Mountain View Cemetery, featuring Glenn Miller, can be seen below.

(Lethbridge News Now)

“There remains today approximately two to four-thousand graves that we don’t have marked and that’s only an estimate. Nearly 3,500 graves have been marked since this program started in 1996,” Miller remarked.

“Today, these signs will help to provide dignity to our veterans now that they have been identified with permanent markers.”

The headstones, once installed, will be permanently maintained by Veterans Affairs Canada, according to Miller.

He added that a recent, newer focus for the Last Post Fund is a ‘lost veterans initiative’. Members are helping researchers with going out to cemeteries and identifying the grave sites of veterans.

Yvonne Sugimoto has been a volunteer with the Last Post Fund for over a decade.

“I started because I noticed that there were some graves in the Field of Honour that weren’t marked. So, I asked the cemetery staff, who put me in touch with Glenn [Miller],” she said.

“Since then, because these people, men and women, were willing to give their everything – their lives – for our way of life… I wanted them to be remembered.”

At Wednesday’s ceremony, Sugimoto recognized the grave of John Rufus Lowther. His site has a temporary Last Post Fund sign but will be getting a permanent military marker.

The temporary sign at John Rufus Lowther’s grave site. This will be replaced with a permanent headstone by the Last Post Fund (Lethbridge News Now)

“He was born in 1894 here in Alberta. He’s a ‘native son’ and he died in 1956. He was the last of his family living in Alberta, he was an electrician,” she said.

“He was 24 when he enlisted in 1918 and he was just a tiny person – he was five foot two. So, it didn’t matter if you were huge or tiny. These people were willing to fight for our country and we should remember them.”

Sugimoto explained that when she began the researching process, she used the Field of Honour as a source. As the process moved along, it became more challenging to identify the veterans and their resting places.

“The process that I’m going through now is very labour intensive. I have a list of everyone buried in the cemetery and I’m going through the death registers and matching up when they died with when they were born and if it looks like they might be in the right age category, then I start looking for their obituaries and their military records,” she said.

“Once I’ve got all that together, then I submit it to the Last Post Fund for consideration for a headstone.”

She said some of the graves were very easy to find “within days”, while others have taken up to nine years.

“There’s one man in the Fort Macleod cemetery and due to his age – he was born in the 1880s – his obituary said he served in World War One. I looked for seven years in World War One under every possible spelling of his name, and finally one of his family members from Saskatchewan contacted me through Find a Grave [a cemetery records website] and said he served in World War Two, which totally stunned me,” Sugimoto said.

“We did find his records in World War Two and they accepted him [in the war] because they knew he was a lumberman and he could do what they needed as far as harvesting lumber in Scotland. Sometimes it’s a very interesting process, sometimes it’s confusing and time-consuming but overall, it’s rewarding, because these people do deserve to be remembered and recognized.”

Below is a list of those who will receive gravestones at Mountain View Cemetery in Lethbridge:

Thomas Marienus “Tom” Dogteron (1920-1984)
Joseph Thomas Patrick Ferguson (1894-1960)
Thomas Samuel Hunt (1880-1954) & Jessie Benson Hunt (1880-1954)
Steven “Steve” Kravets (1894-1962)
John Rufus Lowther (1894-1956)
John Dirk Roelofs (1910-1984) & Mary Mildred (Mannen) Roelofs (1909-1985)
Cleason Schweitzer (1889-1951)
Samuel “Sam” Vere (1886-1950)
John Cyrus Wright (1893-1983)

In Taber:

Edward Eldon Ellingson (1914-1982)
James Leper Milne (1885-1956)

At Temple Hill in Raymond:

Edward Davies (1875-1965)

Union Cemetery (Fort Macleod) – the Last Post Fund notes that a guide is needed to find the actual gravesite as the cemetery is not marked:

James Hugh “Hughie” Campbell (1896-1954)
George Percy Dixon Ferguson (1893-1929)
William E. Ferguson (1883-1962)
John Purrier “Jack” Griffin (1897-1973)
Richard John Sherlock “Jack” Vandersluys (1910-1993)

The Last Post Fund was previously featured in a Remembrance Day special by Lethbridge News Now.

READ MORE: Lest We Forget: how to honour the lives and sacrifices of veterans

Further details on the fund are available here.

by Justin Goulet

Last Post Fund recognizing veterans with special gravestones

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