Military cemetaries

[StephenLawson]

This was written as a response to another thread but it might be viable to add here as well. The question amounted to, why do you see two or more names on some headstones with various dates?

They are stacked on top of each other gents. Military graves often use the stacking method. Several men can be buried on top of each other to conserve space. Most active military cemetaries still practice this but after ten years replace the headstone. Thats why when you go to a military cemetary its is more imprtant to view maps concerning the plot locations for a specific year. Most keep thorough records but are not generally available to the public.

There is a military cemetary not far from where I work (Federal Prison) On our property we have a large lake that has its shoreline reinforced with broken marble headstones. I did some checking into this and found that their practice was to remove and break up the headstone once every ten years and prep the plot for a new grave...stacking one casket on another. Further investigation says that this has been the practice in Europe for hundreds of years.