Nestled in Sycamore, vets leave reminders of wars gone by

SYCAMORE – Veterans of wars from two different centuries are buried in Elmwood Cemetery in Sycamore, and DeKalb County locals are trying to keep their legacies in living memory.

Every year, the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War E.F. Dutton Camp 49 partner with Elmwood Cemetery and the DeKalb County History Center for a heritage walk around the 159-year-old burial ground.

Sycamore pioneers Leonard Petrie and Martha Wilson were featured in this year’s heritage walk titled “Etched in Stone.” So was their son Samuel Petrie, a Civil War veteran.

Samuel Petrie enlisted in Company A of the 105th Illinois Volunteer Infantry and served until the end of the war in 1865, according to his obituary in the True Republican, a Sycamore-based newspaper, on May 6, 1914.

Petrie was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, an organization of Union Civil War veterans who formed after the war and later spurred the creation of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War.

On a Sunday in October, Wayne Mansfield, a member of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, placed a Grand Army of the Republic sign next to Samuel Petrie’s tombstone during the heritage walk.

“Grand Army of the Republic was a social, political organization for nearly 80 years in this country,” Mansfield said.

The last member of the Grand Army of the Republic, Albert Henry Woolson, died in 1959, but evidence of those soldiers’ legacies can be found on American battlefields and in what was their home front.

Petrie was known for operating a business that made bricks just north of Sycamore. Mansfield said the business on average produced about 500,000 bricks a year.

DeKalb County History Center Executive Director Michelle Donahoe said some bricks still exist.

“You can still see evidence of those bricks down at the DeKalb County Community Foundation,” Donahoe said. “The old Railroad depot has some of those bricks, so there are still pieces of those bricks around in the community. They made them really well.”

Those who fought in the Civil War were not the only veterans memorialized in the heritage walk around Elmwood Cemetery.

Army Cpl. Eaterson Byrd Jr., a 1965 Sycamore High School graduate who fought in the Vietnam War, was among them.

Byrd was awarded a Bronze Star medal with Oak Leaf Cluster, two Air Medals and a purple heart for his actions while serving with the Army’s Battery A, 1st Battalion, 21st Field Artillery, 1st Cavalry Division.

He was killed in action on May 28, 1970, in Cambodia, according to a June 4, 1970, Daily Chronicle report.

Jim Lyon, one of half a dozen members of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War who spoke during the cemetery walk, said he was keenly aware that he graduated high school only five years after Byrd. Lyon said it made him more appreciative of the later-in-life experiences only one of them got to enjoy.

“He didn’t have a chance to live his life like most of us,” Lyon said.

Byrd was 22 when he was killed, less than a year after he enlisted.

“It’s hard to find information on people that age,” Lyon said. “They haven’t established themselves, they haven’t gotten involved in organizations and done anything for the community, but he was very well thought of.”