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 Travel & Outdoors | December 2005 
150 Years Later, U.S. Fallen Remain
 Dane Schiller - San Antonio Express-News
The remains of 750 unknown U.S. soldiers lie in a little-known cemetery in San Antonio, more than 150 years after they were pulled from shallow battlefield graves in what was once the heart of enemy territory.
Although many Mexicans give little notice to the rock-wall enclosed cemetery, which looks like a park or an estate, the burial site near the center of this capital is yet another reminder of the U.S.-Mexican War, which Mexico branded into its history books simply as "The Invasion."
Today, as U.S. troops fight another war in another time and place, and the bodies of U.S. heroes are returned daily to grieving loved ones, the idea of a death without a homecoming might seem inconceivable. Wasn't anyone waiting for these men and women? Descendants of some of the war's veterans contend most soldiers killed in the conflict, which lasted from 1846 to 1848 and which was driven by the movement of Americans west, were simply left behind, as at the time, Washington didn't bring home its dead.
Due to logistics and hot weather, it was the policy of the Army to often dump bodies into mass graves as soon as possible, according to historians. They believe as many as 11,000 of the war's U.S. veterans remain buried in neglected, forgotten graves all over Mexico and the United States' Southwest.
"A lot of people wanted to forget about it when it was over," said Jerry Bullock, a retired Air Force colonel, whose greatgrandfather, Sidney Moore Price, enlisted in the military in San Antonio before fighting in the war. "Getting a body from Mexico City to Indiana or Texas was quite an undertaking." Some Mexicans are puzzled why the U.S. government-owned cemetery, dubbed at its entrance, "U.S. National Cemetery," is necessary and question why the United States left its dead.
"They are heroes who died defending something they didn't start," said Jorge Mendoza, 44, a salesman who works near the cemetery. "It is not right for the United States to leave them behind. They should be in their homeland so people can know about them and what they did; they should be buried where they were born." Others find it an affront to Mexican nationalism. The war was especially bitter for Mexico, which lost half its territory to the United States under the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo.
"Some Mexicans say, 'What are you doing here you invaded us,' " said Héctor De Jesús, who is a U.S. Army veteran and the cemetery's 17th superintendent. "I say, 'It is history; we are trying to preserve history.' "
‘known But To God’
Among Mexico's most revered heroes are young military cadets, known as the Niños Heroes (Boy Heroes) who fought to the death as U.S. soldiers attacked Chapultepec Castle, a few miles from what is now the cemetery.
Legend holds that the last cadet standing wrapped himself in the Mexican flag and leapt to his death rather than be captured or killed by the Americans.
Beside the castle, which draws thousands of visitors, is a large monument to the cadets. Some Mexicans wonder if those who fought the Niños Heroes lie here at the cemetery.
The war sparked nationalism and remains one of the most important events in its history, Raymundo Alva, a Mexico City historian said.
"It reminded us we are not the only country in the world, and others have their eye on us," Alva said. "We realized we had to take care of ourselves and our natural resources and make sure we do not get invaded again." There is also wonder if the immaculate, lush, one-acre site was snatched up as part of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which resulted in the United States establishing Texas, California and other states.
But unlike that territory, which was taken, the Mexico City cemetery, which, records show, once bordered a pigsty, was bought by Washington in 1851 for US3,000.
De Jesús, the cemetery superintendent, said because of the dead, most locals seem to fear the cemetery, although on several occasions he's found coins, cookies, the bodies of chickens in plastic bags, and other assorted items he believes were used in assorted cemetery rites.
Maximino Saldaña Muñoz, 46, a gardener who has manicured the cemetery for four years and who occasionally comes across some of the trinkets, said he sometimes explains the cemetery to agitated countrymen.
"They say the United States should not be here and think (the cemetery) was stolen as part of the invasion," he said. "I say it is private property. It belongs to the United States they bought it." The U.S. government gathered up its soldiers' bodies most of which were marked by wooden grave makers that were no longer legible and buried them as unknown soldiers in a common grave to be maintained and protected by the U.S. government.
"To the honored memory of 750 Americans known but to God whose bones collected by their country's order are here buried," reads the inscription on a marble monument flanked by two U.S. flags.
Bullock and the Texas-based historical group, "Descendants of Mexican War Veterans," note that back in 1847, the U.S. government didn't take responsibility for returning the remains of its dead soldiers and that only a few bodies, mostly those of officers who had money or soldiers from communities who took up collections, were returned to the United States for burial.
"To this day, the bones of many a U.S. soldier lie in some lonely, forgotten spot, in places known only to the men who have long since joined their comrades in death," notes a message on the group's web site, which encourages anyone who knows of the burial site of a Mexican War veteran to contact the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to apply for a free grave marker.
‘Bring Our Folks Home’
The Mexico City cemetery is still a sore spot for some U.S. citizens, as the unknown soldiers were known at the time of their burials and their demises recorded in Washington. The Mexico City monument, perhaps to avoid offending Mexicans, makes no mention that the dead were soldiers.
"It was trying to do the right thing and coming up short," Bullock said of the cemetery. He said his group would like to see the unknown soldiers brought home, but believes it would require a grass-roots movement to get Congress to act.
"They are not going to decide one day let's bring our folks home from Mexico," he said.
Ranked by size, the Mexico City cemetery is the smallest of 24 cemeteries abroad that are under the control of the American Battlefield Monuments Commission.
The largest is 172.5-acre Normandy American Cemetery with 9,387 interred remains.
Although the Mexico City cemetery sits beside a highway, which in 1976 gobbled up half its grounds, and is in the shadow of a billboard promoting Paris Hilton, it is an oasis amid the chaos of one of the world's largest cities.
Birds chirp. Flowers bloom. Benches are usually empty, but occasionally draw couples or someone looking for a quiet place to think or read.
The cemetery, which held its last burial in 1924, also holds the identified remains of 813 U.S. veterans, their families and diplomats.
They were all buried in the cemetery and later dug up and put in rock-wall crypts when the size of the cemetery was cut in half to accommodate the new highway.
De Jesús, who resides in a house on the cemetery grounds, said that as a U.S. Army veteran, he has no trouble living among the dead.
"Since I was in the military," he said, "it feels like an honor, to me, taking care of the soldiers." |
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