Girardville dedicates monument for Civil War Medal of Honor recipient
KAYLEE LINDENMUTH / SHENANDOAH SENTINEL - Tom Dempsey, left, and Stephen Barrett unveil a new marker for Patrick Monaghan's gravesite at St. Joseph's Cemetery in Girardville.
GIRARDVILLE – Go back a few years, and St. Joseph’s Cemetery in Girardville blended in almost seamlessly with the woodlands to passersby along Route 54.
In 2018, a group of community members and volunteers began efforts to clean up the long-abandoned cemetery.
Since then, much progress has been made at the entrance to the cemetery and in the section nearest the highway.
Within the cemetery is the gravesite of one of America’s nearly 3,500 Medal of Honor recipients, one of the 1,522 from the Civil War.
Corporal Patrick Monaghan’s gravesite is one of the first gravesites within the cemetery, immediately adjacent to the remnants of stairs which once helped mourners traverse the steep slope of Locust Mountain.
Monaghan’s headstone, as of 2018, was an unassuming, modest marker adorned with a flag in a Civil War flag holder.
The Congressional Medal Of Honor Society wanted to change that, Joseph Wayne, president of the Girardville Ancient Order of Hibernians, said, and so a new marker was created.
That marker was installed and unveiled at a ceremony today, which Wayne served as master of ceremonies for.
Wayne was joined by members of the American Legion posts in Girardville, Ashland, and Sinking Spring, as well as other veterans’ groups, and Girardville’s two fire companies and police department.
Tom Symons provided an opening and closing prayer for the ceremony while a Legion honor guard performed a 21-gun salute and performed Taps.
Preceding the ceremony was a procession from the Legion post downtown to the cemetery.
Tom Dempsey, Girardville, told the gathered crowd of Monaghan’s history, noting that he was born in Ireland in 1843 and moved to the Minersville area, where he joined Company F, 48th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment.
He shared Monaghan’s own words regarding his actions in 1864 that led to his Medal of Honor.
Monaghan and his unit marched rapidly towards Petersburg, Virginia, in June of 1864.
During a skirmish, a New York regiment “lost its colors,” meaning they lost their flags, which Dempsey said were used as a means of communication in warfare at that time.
Monaghan’s unit took position near an enemy encampment.
“While in this position the most profound silence was maintained, as we could hear the enemy talking, and every man was notified to secure his tin cup and trappings so as to make no noise and be ready for a charge,” Monaghan is quoted saying.
His unit charged, and “a rebel fired, with his gun so close to the left side of my head that my hair was singed, my cheek slightly burned, and ear injured by the concussion so that I feel the effects of it yet,” Monaghan recalled.
In the skirmish, Monaghan recovered the New York regiment’s colors and several prisoners of war, driving off the Confederate forces.
Monaghan returned to Schuylkill County after the war and married another Irish woman, Bridget Derrick, and then moved to Girardville to serve as superintendent of the Girardville Borough School District.
He served in that post until 1909.
Monaghan passed away in 1917 and was buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery.
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Interesting story…what did he do to be awarded the Medal
Of Honor?