Louis Giles has been working for three years to put a new gravestone in place for Samuel Neale, a Black Maryland veteran who worked as a steward and a medical assistant to a surgeon during the War of 1812.

On Saturday, Giles completes that mission.

There are detailed descriptions of Neale’s service as part of an application for a Maryland pension, memorialized in an 1870 copy of the Frederick Examiner. That makes him one of the state’s most easily identifiable Black veterans of the War of 1812, Giles said. But for years there was nothing to mark his grave.

Having a first and a last name on record, as well as knowing that Neale was Catholic and died in Frederick, helped Giles track down his burial site, in a family plot at St. John’s Cemetery in Frederick. There, a grave marker for him had long ago crumbled away.

Giles grew up hearing stories about his fourth great-grandfather fighting in the Battle of Baltimore, and as president of the Society of the War of 1812 in Maryland he is dedicated to ensuring other veterans of that war get the recognition they deserve.

The society typically works with cemeteries and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to mark the graves of Maryland’s veterans of the War of 1812. They’ve installed about a dozen gravestones over the years. More recently, the society has turned its attention to the state’s Black veterans — who are difficult to locate because they typically were listed only by first name in muster rolls.

Giles said his team believes there were more than 1,500 Black War of 1812 veterans in Maryland. Neale’s burial site is the first one they’ve located, and they’re on the hunt for others.

The VA typically pays for the gravestones of any veteran located by the Society of the War of 1812 in Maryland, Giles said. This time, however, the department turned the society down — noting that Neale was a servant rather than a solider.

Giles argued that Maryland’s discriminatory laws at the time of the war should be taken into account. The state restricted men of color to noncombat positions, according to the U.S. National Park Service website.

“I talked to historians all over the place, military, and none of them agree with the VA,” Giles said. “They all come back and say that if he was on the muster roll he was a member of that unit and deserves the same benefits [as] anybody else in that unit.”

Giles started the gravestone application process for Neale in December 2021. The VA rejected the request and denied several appeals, he said.

He spoke to a VA board of appeals judge last month and just recently received unofficial word that the department would reverse its previous denials and qualify Neale as a veteran. The VA, citing “federal privacy protections,” said it could not comment on any decision at this time.

If made official and finalized in the coming weeks, the VA’s ruling on Neale could set an important precedent for other Black veterans, Giles said.

“This result should allow all Black Americans listed on military muster rolls to be eligible for a VA grave marker,” Giles said.

But for Neale, Giles said, he decided not to wait. Last November, the society and the cemetery where Neale is buried took matters into their own hands.

Chuck Foltyn, a member of the board of directors for St. John’s Cemetery, talked to Geoff Irwin, owner of Lough Memorials in Frederick, about the project. Irwin agreed to inscribe and donate a stone.

“You like to give back as a business owner, but when it’s something really special like this, it’s just the right thing to do and I’m more than happy to do that,” Irwin said.

Made of granite and worth about $2,500, the light-colored stone blends with the others in the Neale family plot, where his son, daughter, wife and granddaughter are buried. His son, Samuel Neale Jr., was a professor at Avery College in Pittsburgh.

Early Wednesday morning, the sounds of shoveling dirt and “Goodbye Earl” by The Chicks carried through the cemetery.

A team of three installed the stone that will be unveiled in a ceremony Saturday. The guest list includes Robert Stewart, the acting superintendent of the Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine, and members of the African American Resources Cultural and Heritage Society.

The ceremony will have an honor guard and a musket salute, both performed at military funerals.

The Society of the War of 1812 of Maryland paid for the installation, and St. John’s Cemetery is paying for the food and tents at the event.

Foltyn often gives tours of the cemetery, which was dedicated in 1845, with the first burial on the site being for a free Black man. There also are military markers for 16 Union soldiers who died in Frederick.

Some gravestones, like Neale’s original one, have fallen into disrepair.