How to help

About three hundred Union veterans lie in this lot. We are trying to learn who each of them was, from the records, and to put what we learn at the stone where a visitor can read it. Most of the work is still ahead of us. Three kinds of help make the most difference.

1. Photograph the stones

The lot has 318 surveyed positions. We have read a name on 113 stones and photographed 95 of them. About 154 stones have not been read at all — most were recorded only by the state of service carved at the top. A clear photograph of any one of them, with its grid position, is new knowledge. 4 markers (D12, D13, D19, M2) are sunk with no inscription read at all; photograph them as they are and tell us how far they are buried.

Every photograph must come with its grid position: the row letter and column number from the plot map. Row A is the uphill row; A1 is its western end, the top-left stone on the plan. Put it in the filename (F5_2026-11-08.jpg) or in a note with the upload. If you are not sure, photograph the neighbouring stones as well and we will work it out.

How to shoot:

Straight on, filling the frame; then a second, wider shot showing the stone in its row.
Soft light is best: an overcast day, or early morning or late afternoon when the sun rakes across the letters. Full midday sun flattens them.
Brush grass aside by hand if it covers letters.
Please do not dig, pull turf, scrub, chalk, or put anything on a stone. If a stone is sunk or overgrown, photograph it as it is and tell us. The City's cemetery staff will clear it properly.
Add your name so we can credit you.

Upload stone photographs

Stones we have no photograph of

Stones to photograph again

Our photograph of each of these leaves something unread — a buried date line, a sunk marker, a weathered word. A better angle, better light, or a visit after the grass is cut may settle it.

A4 — Charles F. Latham date line under fallen leaves
C14 — ISRAEL JACKSON date line below ground
E1 — Lonzo H. Knight month of death under earth
E3 — WILLIAM BURROUGHS lower half of the stone under earth; no date
E4 — [JOH]N LAMBERT given name and date under earth
E5 — THEODORE MACE year of death worn
E6 — BARTLETT B. MATTHEWS unit and date under earth
E8 — [???]R M[c]KENNEY photographed in hard shadow, mostly buried; the name itself is uncertain
E9 — Benjamin Ringgold right half of the stone under earth; rank and date not visible
E10 — Jeremiah three-quarters under earth; only JEREMIAH exposed
E11 — CHARLES H. SAN[D]ER[S] right half under earth; surname read with reservation
E12 — Sylvanus Green day and year of death partly unread
E13 — HENRY FRAWLEY the middle regiment's number reads 42 or 47
E14 — EDWARD GERALD year of death under grass
E15 — JAMES A. L[?????] surname under earth; only JAMES A. L exposed
E16 — GEO. C. CARL only the name line exposed
E17 — [CHA]RLES A. DEXT[ER] only the name line exposed
E19 — WILLIAM W. [??????] surname under a flag when photographed
E20 — JOHN VANYEA date line under earth
E22 — [JOH]N H. SPENCER mostly under earth
E23 — IRA SMITH lower half under earth
E24 — WILLIAM A. LEWIS date under grass
F5 — Benjamin F. Williams last digit of the year illegible
F16 — William Burr month and year partly unread
I2 — Gibbs badly worn; given name unread
I6 — [HENR]Y C. DIGGS given name partly unread
I9 — PHILIP HARRIS year of death illegible
I21 — CHARLES H. SMITH last digit of the year illegible
I23 — JOHN H. BARNETT year of death illegible
J2 — ORRIN VROMAN day of death reads 14 or 15
K2 — Thomas George last digit of the year under grass
L20 — JOHN GIBBS day and year of death illegible
L24 — [AM]BROSE C[LARK] stone partly buried; first letters of the name and the date line
M4 — THOMAS B. BAR[BER] marker half-buried; company letter and date line
M5 — BENJ. G. GARDINER date line not read
M8 — JOHN H. EASTON lower line weathered
M10 — EDW. CRUTCHFIELD no date line visible; is there one below ground?
M11 — WILLIAM W. WALLEY date line not read
M15 — WILLIAM WALKER last digit of the year illegible
M23 — JAMES B. BERRY year of death illegible
N3 — PVT. JOEL HOLBROOK month and day of death in shadow
N15 — MICHAEL McELROY month of death partly hidden by grass
A17 — NATHANIEL MOSELEY position in the row inferred from the date sequence; confirm the stone is at A17
N9 — CHARLES H. GARDNER position in the row inferred; confirm the stone is at N9

A stone photographed but not yet placed

Samuel M. Warner — Co. E, 3d R.I. Heavy Artillery, died July 24, 1895. Photographed April 2, 2024, from a distance; the stone to its right begins JOH…. A death in 1895 belongs with row J. He is not on the survey sheet. If you can stand at the stone and tell us its row and column, that settles it.

2. Find a record of a man

Each man's page ends with an Upload a record button. It takes a census page, a pension card, a city-directory entry, a newspaper item, a photograph, a family story — anything that shows who he was. You do not need an account. With each file, tell us what it is, where you found it, and why you believe it is this man: a matching name is not a matching man, and that reasoning is the most valuable thing you can give us. Every contributor is credited on the page.

3. Tell us if you are family

If you are descended from a man buried here, or know someone who is, please say so when you upload, or write to us. We do not publish a page about a man whose descendants we know of without talking to them first, and family papers and memory are often the only route past what the government wrote down.

What happens to what you send

Uploads go to a holding folder that only the project's researchers can see. We read each file, check the identity, and record where it came from. Records we can host — National Archives files, City of Providence records, your own photographs — go on the man's page with a caption and a citation. Records from subscription sites are cited and linked, not copied. Nothing is published without a source.

Questions: Bernard Brennan, bbrennan@jwu.edu.