Searching for State Trooper Ben F. McEvoy’s headstone has become a mission and I’ve never been one to shy away from a challenge!
On Friday, Trooper Kelly came into the Historical Society and Marianne had a stack of information for her. We had located the obituaries for his family, including his two children, the newspaper article about his accident and various census records. We kept looking for various things when she was there and decided we’d go the the cemetery the next day. Kelly wasn’t able to, but Marianne was game.
On Saturday we went back to the Cemetery, sans Trooper Kelly, to look for that elusive headstone. Jim had his slim iron bar and he and Marianne probed a foot apart for the entire site. Three different times we thought we had found something and started shoveling. They were all false alarms.
With the second dig we encountered pieces of what appeared to be a broken headstone and a rusty metal hinge of some sort, and at one point we actually dug down about 3 feet, but were afraid to go further because we just weren’t sure exactly what we’d find. . . . . The picture shows Jim, shovel in hand, Marianne next to the prober and replacing the dirt, making sure the clumps of sod are covering our dig. We left the site exactly as we found it ~ well, maybe a little better! The model A is in the background.
Why go in the Model A? Well, it is the same era of the one that hit Cpl. McEvoy and Jim thought it would be cool to drive it! Evidently others thought the same thing, since we got a lot of honks, waves and thumbs up!
Final results of Saturday’s venture? Zip! No flat headstone, nothing that would even suggest another headstone was in the site.
Back to the drawing board!
I have written about the Civil War Veterans site in another blog, but I still can’t help being impressed with the fact that those who fought each other at one time are now resting together in eternity. Brothers in death.
The colors of green and gray make an awesome backdrop for our American red, white and blue flag. I love the simplicity of the Beidleman site.
This is perhaps, my favorite picture of the day. It was peaceful, serene and interrupted only by the chirping of birds and the leaves rustling under my feet. I turned around and took the next picture, with the same peaceful, serene feel.
If you look closely at the wall, you’ll see memorials for each member of the Boyd family, daughter and son-in-law’s included. Each one has their full name, the full name of their parents, dates of birth and death. Most of them tell where they were born! How’s that for a complete genealogy?
John White Geary, forever memorialized in this bronze statue erected by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. There is a bronze plaque on each side chronicling his achievements in life, First mayor of San Francisco, Governor of Kansas, Governor of Pennsylvania and Lt. Colonel in the Mexican War and promoted to Major General in the Civil War. This is also hidden away. 
Continuing on our western perimeter route, this bench was at the s/w corner of the cemetery. According to the inscription:
The interior is completely marble with the stained glass window being the only color. There appear to be four burial vaults in this crypt. It is beautiful and impressive.
Not finding Dorothy’s stone . . . yet, Jim decided we would replace Mary Auxer’s headstone. It had been pushed off of it’s base sometime in the last year and when we decided to clean up this site, it included trying to replace the stones in their original place. Mary’s stone is seen next to the shovel in the above picture, the base next to the head of the shovel and the stone itself behind it.
The above picture shows Jim “casing out” the job before us. It was not as easy as it appeared, due to the weight of the stone and the age of the participants in this effort! All we had to do was upright the stone and set it on the base. 
With the digging bar in hand holding up the headstone, Jim takes a break. At this point I went looking for some stones and bricks to prop up the headstone as he lifted with the digging bar.
With Mary’s stone sitting on it’s base, the bricks and stones we used to help prop it up are visible in the space it vacated. As Jim lifted a little more, I stuck another brick under the stone, on top of another brick. It was a hard job for Linda and a much harder job for Jim! However at this point our job was almost complete!
With Mary’s stone in it’s rightful place, we have started with our mission! It’s one step towards straightening up Section E, site 7 at Woodward Hill Cemetery, and I’ll keep blogging about our progress as we continue on our journey.
The saucer, oops grave marker, reads:
Lancaster Pennsylvania's Graveyard Rabbit 