Veterans cemetery 'You can kind of be with your own kind' By JOHN LUCAS Courier & Press Western Kentucky bureau (270) 333-4899 or [email protected] November 22, 2003 HOPKINSVILLE, Ky. - For many military veterans, a sense of camaraderie accompanies them, even to the grave. And Friday, it drew them to dedication ceremonies for Kentucky's latest veterans cemetery, where, in a few years, many of them expect to rest beneath the red soil of south Christian County. Kentucky Veterans Cemetery-West, on U.S. 41A just south of Hopkinsville and near Fort Campbell where several of the more than 400 attending Friday's ceremony served, is the first of five veterans cemeteries the state plans to develop over the next few years. They will complement seven national veterans cemeteries in Kentucky, all but three of which are full, said Marty Pinkston, spokesman for the Kentucky Department of Veterans Affairs. Other state-maintained cemeteries are expected to be built at Fort Knox and in Grant County, he said, with two Eastern Kentucky sites yet to be selected. The 73-acre site, with a capacity for 27,600 graves, will see its first burials early next year, probably in February. Officials estimate the cemetery can expect up to eight burials a day as the nation's World War II and Korean vets die at the rate of 18,000 a day nationally. "It's a good feeling to know you'll be around other comrades - may we rest in peace," said Retired Command Sgt. Maj. Birney V. Gainer of nearby Clarksville, Tenn. Gainer spent 30 years in the Army, being assigned first to the 82nd Airborne Division and then to the 101st Airborne at Fort Campbell in 1961. That post straddles the Kentucky-Tennessee state line, and a reciprocal agreement with Tennessee allows Tennessee veterans to be interred in the Kentucky cemetery. Gainer's sentiments were echoed by Bob Pritoka of Princeton, Ky., commander of Princeton American Legion Post No. 116. "A lot of people have been looking forward to its opening," said Pritoka, who worked as a medic at Fort Campbell's base hospital from 1963-65. "You can kind of be with your own kind, and you can have your family with you." The spouse and dependent children for of any eligible veteran also can be buried in the cemetery, all at no cost to the family. Pritoka, who expects to be buried in the new cemetery, said he hopes to have his late wife's remains reinterred here. "It's really nice," he said, surveying a drive that loops through the property, past a committal shelter where preinterment services will be held. The walls of an open-air plaza also will serve as a columbarium for receiving the ashes of veterans and their family members. "This is going to be one of the prettiest military cemeteries in the U.S. - and I've been to a lot of them," Pritoka said. Most of the $6 million for development of the cemetery came from a $5.84 million grant through the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs cemetery grant program. The remainder, including $180,000 from Hopkinsville's VFW Post No. 1913, was raised locally. The cemetery will be maintained by the state's Department of Veterans Affairs, which will open and close grave sites, supply grave markers and provide perpetual care. The 101st Airborne, now deployed in Iraq, was on the minds of many at Friday's dedication. "As we dedicate this, ever with me is the thought about the sacrifices of the 101st - their recent loses and their loses before that," said retired Brig. Gen. John W. Nicholson, now under-secretary for memorial affairs with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. "We pause today to review and contemplate the sacrifice of people fighting for our freedom all over the world," said former Kentucky state Sen. Ed Ford, who now serves as secretary of the governor's executive cabinet. Ford also drew upon the words of President Abraham Lincoln at the dedication of the veterans cemetery at Gettysburg. He called upon those assembled to be rededicated to the unfinished work of protecting freedom. "Our resolve must be as strong as ever," Ford said. Gun smoke from a 21-gun salute and the echo of the final plaintive notes of taps drifted over the heads of those in the courtyard as the Rev. Gerald Baker, pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church in Morganfield, Ky., and former pastor of Sts. Peter and Paul in Hopkinsville, prayed for the veterans' blood and sacrifice to be remembered. ===== Tamara's Genealogy Bookstore Online http://www.angelfire.com/in4/genealogybooks/