Albion students seek headstone for soldier’s unmarked grave at Alms House Cemetery
Provided photos: Albion eighth-graders Kendall Peruzzini, left, and Mary McCormick spent time with Albion Town Clerk Sarah Basinait to research cemetery records from the former Alms House on County House Road.
Press Release, Albion Central School
ALBION – Two students from Albion Middle School used part of their summer vacation to research a former Civil War soldier believed to be buried in Orleans County.
Eighth-graders Kendall Peruzzini and Mary McCormick spent time with both Albion Town Clerk Sarah Basinait and County Historian Catherine Cooper, scouring century-old records in hopes of proving the soldier’s burial site – an unmarked grave at the former Alms House Cemetery on West County House Road.
Eventually, they and their classmates will apply for a headstone from the National Cemetery Administration and hope to hear back soon. In 2011, Service Learning students joined the county in cleaning up the long-forgotten cemetery out of respect for those buried under the simple, sandstone markers etched only with a number. About 75 stones exist and the vast majority of the approximate 200 burials there have no headstone.
Once school begins, their fellow social studies classmates will join in the service learning effort.
