ROOTS & BRANCHES

When you’re a genealogist, it can be said that you have an affection for cemeteries that others may find to be a bit off.

I’ll take my lumps on that score.

I found cemeteries to be fascinating even before I was a genealogist. In part that was because growing up I lived within walking distance of two where—even then when I only knew a fraction of the ancestry that I’ve proven now—there were more than a dozen of my direct-line ancestors.

But it wasn’t just those memorials that fascinated me. I really enjoyed the art I saw on many other tombstones, as well as seeing the differing flag holders that accompanied the markers. Each war had a difference design.

Ones that I had never seen in eastern Pennsylvania, in which many of the veterans were descendants of German-speaking people who came to American in the 1700s, were what Steve Kleiner, one of my correspondents from Blair County, found and noted, “This may be of interest to those with German or Austrian family lines.”

He found flag holders with the American flag as expected but the hold looked like German “Iron Cross” and wave carved with the letters “D.A.V.K.V.”

“So what’s that all about?” Kleiner questioned. “What you’re looking at is a flag holder for someone who was in the German army during World War I, and then later immigrated to the United States. and became an American citizen.

Kleiner received assistance from Erik Mentzer, a Mount Aloysius College history professor. “It is a grave marker for the Deutsche-Amerikanisches Kriegs Verband,” Mentzer said.

This was an association of veterans of World War I who served for the Kaiser but came to America after the war. “There are numerous examples in Altoona and a few in surrounding counties. So far as I know it was founded as a way to not only preserve old camaraderie, but also to signify devotion to their new country,” Mentzer said.

He also noted that the flag holders can be found on graves in Blair County, especially in the “Dutch Hill” part of Altoona.

Kleiner found a description of the 1934 Armistice Day Celebration in which Joseph Rahm, spokesman for the German-American War Veterans and Soldiers Society was introduced.

His speech included the following: “The great World War ended 16 years ago yesterday. Today you are perhaps wondering why we of the German-American War Veterans and Soldiers have marched with the American Legion and other American veterans. We marched today because we are now American citizens, having the same aims of our now fellow-comrades to defend our country’s flag and uphold its constitution.”

What a great way of showing how these recent immigrants had shifted their allegiances to their new country!