The Civil War memorial, with a fine bronze of a Civil War soldier, was put up in 1891. It stands in the middle of the Homestead Cemetery Soldiers Circle, which is dedicated to veterans of the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, and the two World Wars.
A. D. 1891 Erected to the memory of the country’s defenders by Gen. Griffin Post No. 207 G. A. R., Gen. Griffin Circle No. 41 Ladies of the G. A. R., J. S. Hollinshead Camp No. 31 Sons of Veterans, and the Citizens of Homestead and vicinity.
“Bivouac of the Dead” was written by Theodore O’Hara, who fought for the Confederacy; but it is a mark of how serious we were about reconciliation after the war that it appears on many Union monuments. Like Joyce Kilmer’s “Trees,” it is one of those poems against which nothing can be said, not because it is a great work of art, but because people love it with an unreasoning devotion.
The old Bethel Cemetery is full of Gillfillans (or Gilfillans), whose memorials are in all styles from the early settlers’ handmade tombstones to elaborate marble monuments from the middle 1800s.
IN
memory of
SARAH GILLFILLAN
Who departed this Life
March the 2nd 1818 aged
20 years.
IN Memory of ALEXANDER GILLFILLAN Who departed this Life Agust the 11th 1821 in the 27th year of his age.
SACRED to the memory of ALEX’R GILLFILLAN who departed this life Sep. 6th, 1836 in the 91st year of his AGE.
PVT 4 CO 2 PA BN WASHINGTON COUNTY MILITIA REVOLUTIONARY WAR 1745–1836
SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF MARTHA, Wife of ALEXANDER GILFILLAN who departed this life February 19th, 1840 In the 81st year of her age.
JOHN GILLFILLAN BORN JUNE 21, 1784 DIED JUNE 20, 1859. — “For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.”
ALEXANDER SON OF JOHN & MARGARET GILLFILLAN Who died in Philada. Dec. 7, 1845 Reinterred in this place Jan 1, 1846 in the 26 year of his age. Resident[?] of Jefferson Medical College Philadelphia
IN MEMORY OF JOHN SON OF ANDREW B. AND ANN GILFILLAN WHO VOLUNTEERED IN THE SERVICE OF HIS COUNTRY SEPT. 1861. IN CO. E. 101ST REGT. PA. VOL. WAS WOUNDED AT THE BATTLE OF FAIR OAKS AND DIED JULY 1ST 1862, AGED 23 YEARS AND 11 DAYS.
This is the churchyard of the Mount Pisgah Presbyterian Church in Green Tree. The little cemetery itself straddles the line between Green Tree and the Westwood neighborhood of Pittsburgh, and it is a curious fact that the section of the cemetery in Green Tree is neatly maintained, but the section in Pittsburgh is overgrown and forgotten—although some attempt had been made to clear some of the larger bushes from it when Father Pitt visited. Doubtless the true explanation of the phenomenon is that the overgrown section is not visible from the church, and thus can be allowed to go to ruin without making a spectacle of itself every Sunday.
Tombstones litter the forest in the overgrown section. Much of the ground cover is Vinca minor, which is often called Cemetery Vine because it was such a popular planting in old cemeteries.
In this section were some old family plots fenced with iron rails; we can still identify the Graham family plot, below:
Note, again, the luxuriant growth of Vinca minor.
There are tombstones here that go back to the 1840s at least, but most of the older ones are illegible, if they can be found at all. Here, however, is a legible tombstone from 1842 (forgive the strong backlighting):
SACRED
to the memory
OF
GEORGE P. RAMSEY
Who departed this life
July 27th 1842.
In the 54th year of his age.
—
Remember man as you pass by
As you are now so once was I;
Repent in time, make no delay,
For in a moment I was call’d away.
The epitaph begins as one well-known funerary poem and ends as another; the last line has five feet instead of four. But it is still a powerful sentiment.
In spite of the general neglect, someone cares enough to see that all the identifiable veterans have flags for their graves, so that little flashes of red, white, and blue light up the floor of the woods. Here is the grave of Corporal David Aston, a Civil War soldier whose birth and death dates are not mentioned:
John Park Hickman, volunteer soldier, died in Virginia just after Lee’s surrender ended the Civil War. We do not know whether he died of injuries sustained in battle, but the lack of any mention of a particular battle suggests to Father Pitt that he was one of the many victims of disease. His monument is not large but splendidly romantic in a fashionably 1860s way.
This huge tower of zinc may be the biggest zinc monument in the Pittsburgh area. The zinc monument makers sold statues like these to municipalities all over the country as a relatively inexpensive way to have a very impressive Civil War memorial. Huge though they are, they are built on the same principles as the zinc cemetery monuments offered to ordinary families, with various interchangeable parts that can be mixed and swapped to make any composition you like. This one was donated by the citizens of McKeesport, and it lives up to the monument salesman’s most extravagant claims: here we are, more than a century later, and the thing still looks magnificent.
