Donated funds, labor set Revolutionary War soldiers' service in stone in Derry Township

The identities of Revolutionary War soldiers buried near Old Salem Community Church in Derry Township have been fading into history as time and weather ravage their headstones.

A campaign led by the Derry Area Historical Society, to rescue those veterans from obscurity, saw progress Saturday. Volunteers organized by society member and Greater Latrobe Junior High civics teacher William Snyder placed granite markers to more permanently designate the graves of four of the soldiers.

In a separate effort Saturday and Sunday, archaeology students from the University of Pittsburgh used ground-penetrating radar in an attempt to locate possible unmarked graves and an old foundation in areas immediately surrounding the brick church.

There are at least 30 Revolutionary War veterans buried by the church, which was founded in 1786. Since 2017, the society has raised enough funds through its “Adopt a Revolutionary Hero” program to cover new granite markers for 15 of their graves and has installed all but one of them.

The soldiers’ original headstones, dating to the 1800s, likely include less durable sandstone, Snyder said.

“It was very nice to carve and made some beautiful stones,” he said. “But, with the little cracks that developed in them over time, and the freeze-and-thaw cycles and water getting in those fissures, the face drops off so you can’t identify them.”

The granite markers, Snyder said, “will be here long after we’re gone.”

The new markers, which lay flat against the ground, were placed at the graves of soldiers James Baird (1740-1834), James Blair (1761-1843), John Denniston (1757-1805) and Robert Jellison (1749-1829).

According to cemetery caretaker Dan Barchesky, more than 25 people pitched in at the burial site over the weekend, including Greater Latrobe and Pitt students and staff, church members and other volunteers.

Snyder’s students earned extra credit, but there was another incentive for Greater Latrobe eighth-grader Landon Stevenson to get involved.

“I wanted to learn more about history in general, and I was interested in learning the history of the place I live in,” he said.

Former Derry resident Ric Thomas, who now lives in Sandy Lake, Mercer County, has been coming to the cemetery for decades to take photographs and learn about the past generations buried there.

“It’s like reading little snippets of history,” he said of the gravestone inscriptions. “Cemeteries are just so full of history. A lot of the original pioneer families are buried here.”

Snyder said Thomas’ photos have helped to document headstones as they continued to deteriorate.

The historical society is seeking additional donations to provide granite markers for remaining Revolutionary War graves at Old Salem. More information is available by visiting the society’s website at derryhistory.org.

Barchesky estimated the cost per marker exceeds $1,000. While the federal government has supplied markers for a few of the graves, Barchesky said that funding is available only if there is documentation that the veteran saw federal service.

“Many of them were in state or local militias in the Revolutionary War,” he said.

A plaque inside the Old Salem church lists veterans of the Revolutionary War, War Of 1812 and Civil War who are interred at the site. The current building is at least the third to house the congregation, Barchesky said, after previous structures were destroyed by fires in 1799 and in the 1850s.

The Pitt students, led by professor Bryan Hanks, used a radar device to detect features underground that could be a sign of unmarked graves.

“We found some anomalies that lined up with (nearby) headstones,” he said.

They also detected what could be part of a previous foundation along the west wall of the church. With the church’s permission, the Pitt archaeology group plans to return next year to conduct a small exploratory excavation, Hanks said.

“The early church was log but probably was set on a stone foundation,” he said.

The weekend radar work provided practical experience for the students and will result in a report on the group’s findings, provided to the church at no cost, Hanks said.