To the Editor:

Our mother owns a burial plot at Beaver Dam Baptist Church on Carrsville Highway and our father, uncle, aunt, grandmother and grandfather on our mother’s side are all buried on the plot. Both our father and uncle were veterans of WWII and there are markers from the Veteran’s Administration indicating their service.

We attempt to keep small American flags flying on this plot honoring both veterans. However, in recent months the flags have been taken away on two occasions.

Flowers have also been stolen recently, but it seems particularly unfortunate that someone would actually take, steal, remove – we don’t even know how to describe it – American flags from the gravesite of two American veterans.

They both served our country in war and our uncle died in peacetime when the USS Hobson from Charleston, S.C., and the USS Wasp collided in the 1950s during maneuvers in the Atlantic. During that tragedy, our uncle and 175 of his shipmates were buried at sea.

For anyone who wants to buy these American flags, they are only a few dollars at local hardware stores and taking them away from the only place that marks two American patriots in our family seems so unexplainable and unnecessary. Please think about the hurt caused by removing something that is used to honor our loved ones but worth so little in material value.

Linda D. Johnson
Franklin