Donations should be earmarked for the Georgia National Cemetery Advisory Council and sent to Georgia National at 1080 Veterans Cemetery Road, Canton, Ga., 30114.
Every Wednesday, rain or shine, in blazing heat or bone chilling cold and from early morning until evening, you’ll find 77-year-old Charles C. Capps of Tucker at the sprawling 775-acre Georgia National Cemetery, greeting families of deceased veterans — men and women headed to their final resting place in the lush green rolling hills of western Cherokee County.
And some live veterans, too.
Dressed in a Navy blue blazer and sporting a red, white and blue necktie, Capps is there to make sure burials go off on time and in a dignified fashion. He talks to a steady stream of mourners, hearse drivers and funeral directors, ready to answer any question and often directing long lines of cars.
On one recent morning, an aging Vietnam veteran strode into the cemetery’s public information center and sheepishly approached Capps.
“How much does it cost to be buried here,” he asked.
“You’ve already paid for it,” Capps replied.
“He’s awesome,” said Marge Helgerson, director of both the Marietta National Cemetery and Georgia National. “All the volunteers are. They’ll come whatever the weather. They greet the families, which is wonderful because we don’t have enough staff.”
Mary Mahoney, 71, of Decatur, said Capps “was a friend of my husband, Victor. He is literally there through rain, shine, sleet, snow. When my husband was buried, I have this vivid picture in my mind of Charles saluting the hearse. It’s very comforting to mourners.”
Capps sees what he does as a privilege. Sometimes, remains arrive in a hearse, with no family members, including homeless men who’ve died on the streets.
“No veteran should be buried alone,” he said. “We make sure that doesn’t happen.”
The local Patriot Guard chapter, headed by George Westbrook Jr., 67, said he can muster members in a hurry, and has.
“We had a case not long ago where there was a homeless man found on the streets in Lawrenceville,” Capps said. “He was given to a funeral home which was able to find out he was a veteran. We called George. We had full military honors for him.”
Westbrook, a Vietnam veteran, said increasingly these days, bodies come from VA medical centers. Funeral homes know to contact the National Cemetery Scheduling Office in St. Louis, he said, and contact Helgerson’s staff.
The volunteers, Capps said, “are the face of the cemetery. We speak with relatives, answer questions, make sure there’s a flag, and are ready to help people when their nerves are kind of raw.”
Korean War veteran Tom Doner, 80, who has “had to cut back” to one day a week, said “it’s amazing how many families come back and thank us for what we’ve done.”
Volunteers like Todd Copley, an Iraq-Afghanistan vet, serve both at the cemetery and on its advisory council, which solicits funds for expenses not covered by Georgia National’s budget and organizes a number of major ceremonies, such as one on Memorial Day.
“We have gotten signage on roadways, the marble sign that’s out front, and do outreach for the cemetery,” said Vietnam vet Ramon Garcia. “A lot of people don’t know the cemetery exists or where it is or who’s eligible. We spread the word.”
The council also raises funds for wreaths to be placed on all 10,000 graves in the national Wreaths Across America campaign in the winter.
Every other Wednesday, Bill Hendrick shines a spotlight on extraordinary and selfless acts by our friends and neighbors. To suggest someone for this feature, e-mail writer@billhendrick.com.
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