My primary focus has been in researching the 18th Massachusetts Infantry, a Civil War regiment for whom James Barnes, a West Point graduate, was appointed as its first Colonel. As of 2018 more than one thousand of the 1,400 men who served with or were assigned to the regiment have had memorials entered into Find a Grave by this writer and other dedicated Find a Grave members. A debt of gratitude is due not only to the men who served with the 18th Massachusetts, but all who fought in the Union army and navy during the "late unpleasantries" that gripped the nation between 1861 and 1865. "The Union forever! Hoorah boys hoorah!"

There are other memorials I've entered and for each, most of whom I’m not related to, I try to gather as much information on the individual as possible and develop a biography, however brief, in order to tell something of that person’s life. It’s a slow process for the most part, and in many cases no one may ever see or read them, but as a conduit for those long dead, and no longer able to speak for themselves, it is a way of saying to others ‘I once was and this is who I was.’

My primary focus has been in researching the 18th Massachusetts Infantry, a Civil War regiment for whom James Barnes, a West Point graduate, was appointed as its first Colonel. As of 2018 more than one thousand of the 1,400 men who served with or were assigned to the regiment have had memorials entered into Find a Grave by this writer and other dedicated Find a Grave members. A debt of gratitude is due not only to the men who served with the 18th Massachusetts, but all who fought in the Union army and navy during the "late unpleasantries" that gripped the nation between 1861 and 1865. "The Union forever! Hoorah boys hoorah!"

There are other memorials I've entered and for each, most of whom I’m not related to, I try to gather as much information on the individual as possible and develop a biography, however brief, in order to tell something of that person’s life. It’s a slow process for the most part, and in many cases no one may ever see or read them, but as a conduit for those long dead, and no longer able to speak for themselves, it is a way of saying to others ‘I once was and this is who I was.’