On my way home from St. Louis, I passed, then did not pass a spot that had been intriguing me for years. This time, I turned around and returned for a close look.
You can see why this lonely site interested me. There, with a pine tree and some flags for company was some kind of marker stone. I had been passing it each time I drove to and from St. Louis, about four times each year and had gone my way, wondering.
The new highway was being built opposite the site. It and the wall holding that majestic pine and earth had been left. The highway builders may have felt the same kind of mystery and awe that held me there for more than a few minutes.
Was this a grave? Had some soldier fallen, been buried and stayed on that spot? Perhaps it is a memorial to those thousands of men, on both sides, who had been mutilated past recognition in the battles of that war. Perhaps the body of a soldier, uniform torn beyond identification had been found there and the stone memorialized the place.
A Boy Scout troop in a nearby town maintains the marker. I guess they refresh the flags and flowers I found there. I salute them for caring beyond most of us. I wish that I could tell that unknown what I waited 20 years to hear: "Welcome home."
