| The Fort Mackinac Post Cemetery on
Mackinac Island, Michigan is the final resting place for Fort Mackinac
soldiers and their families. The exact founding of the Post Cemetery is
unknown, but local tradition is that both American and British soldiers
from the War of 1812 are buried here. In addition to the soldiers and their
families, six civilians are interred in the post cemetery.
Many early burials in the cemetery are unknown because
the graves were marked with simple wooden crosses which have long since
decayed and disappeared. There are about 108 burials in the cemetery, but
only 39 of those graves are identified.
Known burials of note include Ignatius Goldhofer, a Civil
War veteran who came to Fort Mackinac in 1869. He was buried in the Post
Cemetery by his wife and children, when he died three years later.
Other burials include Edward Biddle, who served as sheriff,
village president and surveyor in the mid 19th century, and the 1880s burial
of Josiah and Isabel Cowes, the infant children of Lieutenant Calvin and
Mary Cowles.
The cemetery was closed to burials soon after the US Army
abandoned Fort Mackinac in 1895. Protestant and Catholic burials were originally
at cemeteries in town. When those cemeteries were closed in the mid 1800s,
many of their their interments were relocated to the adjacent St. Anne's
Cemetery and Mackinac Island Cemetery. To be buried on Mackinac Island
today, you must have been born there, been a resident or owned a business
on Mackinac Island for more than 15 years to qualify.
The Post Cemetery is under the control of the National
Cemetery Administration. There is no office at this cemetery. It is overseen
by Great Lakes National Cemetery in Holly, Michigan.
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Mackinac Island
Fort Mackinac
Stuart House City Museum
Mackinac Art Museum
Mackinac Island in
Winter
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