Claimed at last: Dead veterans find resting place with nonprofit's help

By Christopher Quinn

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Army veterans Lonnie Brown Jr. and Earnest Milton Carter Jr. are forgotten and alone no more.

On Thursday their cremated remains -- which gathered dust for more than a decade in a bankrupt Atlanta funeral home when no family member ever claimed them -- were interred on a green Cherokee County hill alongside 4,000 military brothers and sisters.

Thirty motorcycles gave the men a rumbling escort to their final resting place, American Legion members fired a 21-gun salute, and bagpipes played "Amazing Grace."

Candice King of Decatur, whose son Ryan C. King was killed in combat in Afghanistan a year ago, stood in for family members to receive the carefully folded U.S. flags given in honor of Brown's and Carter's service.

"My role is just to honor all the men who served," she said. "They should never be forgotten."

Bagpiper Bob Boyd of Sandy Springs, a former Marine, saw an announcement of the funerals in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and volunteered to play.

"These guys need something. It is not right to let them disappear without doing anything," he said.

Services were conducted by the Georgia Chapter of the Missing in America Project, which is involved in a search and rescue mission for local versions of the unknown soldier. They are looking for veterans among stored, unclaimed remains across the state so they can bury them with military honors.

"We just feel like it is our job to give them what they deserve," said Guy Webb of Gwinnett County, the Georgia coordinator of the Missing in America Project.

Fred Salanti, a Vietnam veteran from Oregon, founded the Missing in America Project in 2006 after hearing about unclaimed veterans' remains being buried without the free military funeral guaranteed them when they are honorably discharged.

He discovered the problem went deeper. Unclaimed and occasionally unwanted remains of veterans had languished in coroners' offices or funeral home closets for as long as 80 years. The organization was started to end that.

The nonprofit's volunteers in Missouri helped bury the remains of a Spanish-American War veteran earlier this week.

Nationwide, the nonprofit's operation has discovered 698 veterans, helped families claim 66, and buried 632, a spokeswoman said.

Brown and Carter bring the number of Georgia veterans the state chapter has provided services for to 12. All were interred at the Georgia National Cemetery in Cherokee County. Veterans organization such as American Legion posts and the Patriot Guard Riders of Georgia provide men and women to help conduct services, act as honor guards and provide music.

Betty Herring of Gwinnett County works with the state chapter searching for and identifying veterans among unclaimed remains. When she discovers one, the military gives her little information other than confirmation of the branch and dates of service in which the men and women served.

Brown, who died in 1995, served in the Army from 1943 to 1946.

Carter, who died in 1998, served in the Army from 1961 to 1963. Both black boxes of remains were among 96 unclaimed remains in possession of Sellers Brothers funeral home when it closed in 2006.

Webb said there will be more Georgia funerals to come as the search continues. He said they never hope to find unclaimed remains of a veteran, "but we know we will."

Speaking by phone, Linda Smith of Missouri, the Missing in America Project operations chief, said, "This is something that is a long time coming for some of these vets. Especially for those who have been gone for a while. When I walk away from one of these ceremonies, I feel a great deal of satisfaction that this has finally been done for them."