American Legion post remembers those who served

Graves of U.S. service members buried in the KMC are not forgotten, thanks to an effort by the local American Legion post. Each year, in fact, legionnaires from Kaiserslautern Post GR01 place U.S. flags beside their headstones. Most were veterans who married a German spouse and remained in Germany after their service was done. Their graves are in Kaiserslautern, Landstuhl, Morlautern, Siegelbach, Schwedelbach, Otterberg, Otterbach and Ramstein.

“To register a grave, a U.S. flag is placed on the graves of veterans, their family members, and any other U.S. personnel that are buried in the cemeteries,” said Demetrius R. White, the post commander. If there was flag already there, it’s collected and replaced. The old flags are retired during an annual Flag Day ceremony each June 14. They record the information so the grave can be found again later on. Robert Leist, a civilian employee at U.S. Army Garrison Kaiserslautern, and local legionnaires Michael Young, Joseph Chonko, David Sears, and Djuan Stenson also took part.

“Partnering in community service has been the key to the program’s success,” White said. Several organizations support the effort, including the Boy Scouts of America, local fraternity and sorority chapters, and the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

They begin their effort in October, with the goal of visiting each U.S. grave by Veterans Day. Some served in World War II. Others were in Vietnam. Some serve during peacetime. Whatever the case, they deserve respect, Leist said.

Some graves are military style headstones. Others are German graves inscribed with details of the veteran’s service. “One was a guy who earned the Silver Star and the Purple Heart in Vietnam,” said Leist, a former Army noncommissioned officer who served eight years in the military police, two of those spent deployed to Iraq. It’s the first time Leist took part, he said.