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Reading World War I veteran laid to rest 54 years after his death thanks to Exeter Township woman

Reading Eagle - 9/21/2020

Sep. 21--The hearse carrying Lewis Hamilton's cremated remains made its way slowly up the winding road.

In the front passenger seat was Ayden Biancone, solemnly accompanying Hamilton's urn to its final resting place at Indiantown Gap National Cemetery, Lebanon County.

It was Ayden, 18, of Exeter Township who took Hamilton's forgotten ashes from a back cupboard shelf to honorable interment in a columbarium at the cemetery.

Their shared journey ended Tuesday when the Reading veteran was laid to rest, 54 years after his death.

In a phone interview after the ceremony, Ayden explained how she took responsibility for Hamilton's remains.

"My grandmother found a box at the back of a cupboard after moving to a home in Mount Penn about 15 years ago," she said.

Inside the cardboard box, the family found a paint-can-like cylinder holding human ashes. The label indicated cremation had taken place at the Charles Evans Crematorium in Reading. It listed Hamilton's name and date of death, April 16, 1966, but nothing else.

The strange find didn't surprise or disturb her family, said Ayden, a daughter of Vinny M. and Laura Biancone, who graduated this year from Exeter Senior High School and is now a freshman at Albright College.

The family knew the home's previous owner had been a mortician and figured the remains had gone unclaimed and were forgotten.

They put the can back on the shelf.

It remained there until earlier this year when Ayden's grandmother put the house on the market. Ayden learned of the can then and decided the ashes deserved a more permanent home.

"I thought, 'We have to find his family,' " she said. "This was someone's loved one."

Tracing history

Determined to find Hamilton's relatives, Ayden started by calling Charles Evans Cemetery.

Record keeper Sarah Gensemer confirmed his death date and produced a Reading Eagle obituary identifying him as a World War I veteran.

Ayden, an Albright College freshman, also used the Reading Public Library's access to the Ancestry.com online database for further research.

The genealogical website holds military, census and other records, including Pennsylvania death certificates.

"I learned a lot about him," she said of Hamilton.

Pvt. Lewis Hamilton enlisted June 22, 1918, at the age of 25 and was sent to Camp Greenleaf, part of Fort Oglethorpe, Ga., for training.

"He left the training camp just prior to a scarlet fever outbreak there," she said.

He served in the Army's medical corps and did not see action. After an honorable discharge Aug. 11, 1919, he immediately reenlisted for another year, last serving at Walter Reed Military Hospital in Washington.

When his military service ended, Hamilton returned to Reading where he had been living and working before enlisting. Records show he never married. He lived as a boarder at various addresses on the city's south side and worked in an iron foundry, possibly Reading Ironworks.

Hamilton was hospitalized at the Lebanon VA Medical Center when he died at 76 of a cerebral hemorrhage. According to his death certificate, he was born in Easton, Northampton County, the son of Samuel Hamilton and Alice Siebert.

The hospital provided the information on the death certificate and arranged for cremation.

Arranging the ceremony

Ayden then turned to social media in an attempt to find Hamilton's family. Though she was unsuccessful, and no family members have still been located, her post led to a tip connecting her with the Missing in America Project.

The goal of the 14-year-old nonprofit is to identify and inter the unclaimed remains of America's military veterans, said Linda Smith, director.

Smith of Waynesville, Mo., said thousands of unclaimed veterans' cremated remains, or cremains, are collecting dust on the shelves of crematories and mortuaries in every state. The Project helps to identify and inter them with honor and respect, she said.

Smith helped arrange Hamilton's interment in a columbarium at the national cemetery.

She also reached out to Mike Stewart, adjutant of American Legion WWI Memorial Post 109 of Mechanicsburg, Cumberland County. Stewart enlisted the post's Legion Riders as a motorcycle escort for the hearse carrying Hamilton's ashes.

The Legion Riders program promotes safe motorcycle riding for veterans and their families, Stewart said. Escorting the funeral processions of veterans is just one of the group's charitable endeavors.

Family friend John C. Lutz II, supervisor of Lutz Funeral Home in Mount Penn, volunteered to transfer Hamilton's ashes to an urn donated by the Project. Lutz also provided a case for the flag the nonprofit furnished and personally drove the hearse transporting the cremains to the cemetery.

"I don't think any veteran should be left behind," he said. "I had to get involved."

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, attendance at the interment ceremony Tuesday was limited to 25 people, Ayden said.

She and her family attended the ceremony in the chapel where she accepted the flag that had draped Hamilton's urn. Afterward, Ayden watched as his remains were placed into a niche. Earlier, she selected an eagle emblem and the epitaph "Finally at rest" to mark the spot.

It seemed appropriate, she said.

"Lewis Hamilton deserved this respect," Ayden said. "He is a part of our family now."

Any relative of Hamilton should contact Indiantown Gap National Cemetery.

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