Civil War Vet "Takes A Road Trip" - A Century After His Death

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Just off Crane Road in St. Charles, there’s a small cemetery that’s easy to drive by. One of the earlier cemeteries in St. Charles Township, Prairie Ridge is the last resting place of many of the first pioneers who settled here in the mid-19th century. Left untended for a long time, the cemetery was mostly overgrown in the 1960s when a group of teens visited the cemetery sometime in the winter of 1969.

History doesn’t record what happened next, but somehow, the teens managed to steal the 200-pound tombstone of Civil War veteran Pvt. Mark Ladd. Pvt. Ladd was an 18-year-old farm boy born in Plato, who enlisted in the Army in September 1862 and who died in St. Louis about five months later on January 5, 1863. One account says he ”fell to Confederate cannon.”

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After desecrating the young soldier’s grave, the teens decided to take the tombstone with them on a Rt. 66 road trip. In April of 1969, they were caught creating a pile of stones and attempting to place Pvt. Ladd’s tombstone on the top of that pile just outside of Kingman, Arizona, near Interstate 40 by Arizona Highway Patrolman John Helmer.

Patrolman John Helmer after retirement in 1990.

Patrolman Helmer, a veteran himself, took it upon himself to return the tombstone to its rightful place of honor. But where was that? He worked with his local American Legion in Kingman, and Post Commander Charles Hartup knew who to notify. He wrote to Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater, who passed along the information request to an archivist at the Library of Congress, James Rhoads, who dutifully located Ladd’s Army records. But there was a missing piece of information - his death certificate indicated nothing about the final disposition of his body.

Sen. Barry Goldwater

But they did know that he was from Plato, Illinois. Requests for information from the American Legion’s headquarters in Illinois and the Illinois Veterans’ Commission revealed Pvt. Ladd’s final resting place - Prairie City Cemetery in St. Charles, Illinois. The Kingman American Legion paid for the transport of the slab back to Illinois, and on Sunday, October 20, 1969, almost exactly one hundred and four years after it was first erected, the tombstone was reinstalled at the head of Pvt. Mark Ladd’s grave.

From left: Commander Charles Hartup, Kingman, AZ, American Legion Post; Chakres McCarthy, Legion member and president of the Kingman Chamber of Commerce; and Richard E. Tolf, St. Charles American Legion Post 342.

Today, the cemetery is well-maintained by the Township of St. Charles, like many other cemeteries in the township. But it’s easy to miss as you head down Crane Rd. The next time you go by, maybe remember not only the heroism of Pvt. Ladd, but the kind hearts of strangers and the relentless efforts of public servants to pay appropriate respect to these hallowed heroes and their final resting places.

From his tombstone:

He has finished his cause and is now with the bless’t.

May this flag ever wave o’er this soldier at rest.

Our Hallowed Grounds a Look at St. Charles Cemeteries

A History of North & Union Cemetery

Did you know that St. Charles has six cemeteries? In 1945, St. Charles Township formed a cemetery department to assume care and maintenance of North and South cemeteries, which were originally privately owned. Today, the Cemetery District encompasses six locations:  

South Cemetery, c.1815.

North  
South                                   
Little Woods                     
Union                  
Prairie                                 
Round Grove                    

All six cemeteries (approximately 45 acres) are carefully maintained, although South and Round Grove are no longer active interment locations. The Cemetery District operations are funded by a small tax levy on St Charles Township property.

North Cemetery Plat Map.

North Cemetery, aptly named for its location in relation to St. Charles, is the resting place for many of the community's early settlers. It was owned in the latter 1800s by William C. Irwin.

More popularly known as ''Uncle Bill", Irwin came to St. Charles in 1840 and permanently settled here in 1847 after a brief residency in Galena, IL.

Irwin was a cooper or barrel maker by trade. He was also the town funeral director for a number of years. He was probably best noted for developing Irwin's Block, a collection of commercial buildings, located on W. Main St. between 1st and 2nd Streets.

When he died in 1900 he was laid to rest in the cemetery he owned.

The cemetery remained in the possession of his estate for a number of years. Citizens concerned with its upkeep formed the Ladies' Cemetery Association. They collected dues from lot owners and hired to have the grass cut. But it was felt this effort was but a temporary solution to a long term problem. Each new burial meant one less contributor and one more lot in need of care.

In 1912, another group of concerned citizens, The Cemetery Union of St. Charles, formed and decided a new cemetery was in order. They took option on 12 acres directly across 5th Avenue from North Cemetery. They collected about $5000 to gain clear title of the property and deemed a percentage of proceeds from the sale of new lots would provide care and maintenance.

Still another group of concerned citizens in 1917, formed the North Cemetery Association and purchased North Cemetery from Irwin's heirs. They paid $1000 and collected another $1400 for care and maintenance.

Union Cemetery

By 1932, the Cemetery Union had paid almost all its start-up debts. It hoped someday the two cemeteries would be able to form a "union", hence the name Union Cemetery. This, they believed, would best provide a properly managed the resting places of the community's own.

For as many a St. Charles native rested beneath the manicure lawns of North and Union Cemeteries so too the product of a local company decorate those lawns.

St. Charles Memorial Works began in 1923. It was first located on the northeast corner ofN. 5th and E. State Avenues. It was owned and operated by Swanson Brothers. Algert Swanson was the business manager,. Edwin Swanson was the stonecutter. The business listed itself as maker of markers and mausoleums; later it listed itself as maker of granite and bronze makers. Today it lists itself as all of these at two locations; one in St. Charles, the other in Elgin, IL.

By 1937, Algert operated the business alone. He was later joined by his daughter, Carol. When Algert died in 1953, Carol continued the business a few years before her mother, Ruth, gave it to family member, Einar Bergsten, and employee, Ellis Carlson. Today Carol- now, Carol Glemza -works as an administrator at Baker Community Center.

Ellis Carlson was a stonecutter. Eventually his son, Terry, joined the business. By the 1980s Terry was the company's president, a position he still holds.

In 1972, St. Charles Memorial Works relocated to W. Main Street. Its original location was razed and the house that occupied the property was moved to Chestnut and Fourth Avenues when North 5th Avenue was widened and the new viaduct was built over the Chicago Great Western railroad tracks.

North Cemetery, Union Cemetery, and St. Charles Memorial Works are among St. Charles' own. They stand as testament and tribute to those who built St. Charles and now rest in its hallowed grounds.

Don’t forget to join us on October 6, from 11am-4pm as the St. Charles History Museum and the St. Charles Park District will host Grave Reminders , its Annual Cemetery Walk. The event is scheduled . at North Cemetery located on N 5°' Avenue (Route 25) in St. Charles.