Interesting Headstone
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Interesting Headstone, a couple of WWI heroes, Corp Corbett Benefield and Pvt Elmer Keith
Caddo Herald, October 14, 1921
Keith and Benefield Funerals on Sunday
Next Sunday morning at 11 o'clock the funerals of Elmer Keith and Corbett Benefield will be held at the Baptist tabernacle, after which the Elmer Keith Post American Legion will take charge of the remains. Interment will be in Caddo Cemetery.
It is not announced yet who will conduct religious ceremonies at the tabernacle.
The bodies were shipped from Hoboken Sunday and arrived Wednesday. They were held in state at the Presbyterian chapel until Sunday, being watched by details from the A. L. Post.
Elmer Keith and Corbett Benefield both were corporals in Company E, 142nd regiment, 36th Division, which trained at Fort Worth. Keith lived in Caddo, was the son of Mr. and Mr. W. T. Keith, and was a member of the Methodist church when he left for the army. He was an excellent young man, liked by all who knew him. Benefield lived just south of town, was a young man much respected by his friends and neighbors. Both were killed about the same time in the fighting around St. Etainne at the beginning of the Meuse-Argonne offensive, October 8th, 1918. It is co-incident that their bodies arrived back in America just three years after being killed.
These were the only Caddo boys to lose their lives in the World War. Others were wounded, and came home. Others were in the big fighting and came out unscathed. It was the fortune of battle that these should be called to pay the supreme sacrifice. To them, then, we owe every courtesy, every consideration. vast number of people will be present to pay respect, to silently acknowledge their debt to these young men. Our encomiums* will fall upon unhearing ears, but their families will know that their neighbors have not forgot what their boys did for the Nation.
No other church service will be held that morning. The Tabernacle will seat more people than any other place.
Caddo Herald, May 30, 1919
Al, where did you run across this? Where abouts is Caddo? Chris S
...Mr. Benefield's Great Great Grandson was doing some genealogy work and found above portrait in Wikipedia mistakenly identified as Elmer in a bunch of Elmer Keith photos. Tracked us down. Not our Elmer but interesting for sure!
...Wyoming
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