Martin J. Cunningham lies in obscurity no longer.
The Irish immigrant who fought and died for the United States during World War I, but was in an unmarked grave at Mount Olivet Cemetery in Morgan Park since 1921, received a grave marker Sunday on the 100th anniversary of his death.
“Nobody deserves to be forgotten,” said Patrick Gorman, a researcher and genealogist from Dixon, Ill., who located Cunningham’s final resting place and ordered a headstone for him. “Especially someone like that, who gave his life for a country that wasn’t even his. He wasn’t even a citizen.”
A few dozen local residents, including a number of veterans and Chicago police officers, gathered for a service at Cunningham’s gravesite Sunday to reflect on the life of the 29-year-old “Irish lad,” who’d died a century earlier at the Battle of Soissons, France.
Though none of those gathered had known Cunningham, they said they felt a responsibility to attend the ceremony and honor his life.
“A lot of us here are veterans, and we just wanted to do the right thing,” said Tom O’Brien, a U.S. Navy veteran and Chicago police officer who grew up in the neighborhood and still lives there with his family.
“When you hear somebody who was in an unmarked grave for 100 years … and he’s a soldier,” O’Brien said. “We wanted to do something about it.”
The Rev. Gene Smith, a priest at St. Linus Catholic Parish in Oak Lawn who led prayers and blessing, said he was deeply touched and honored to preside over the service.
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“I’ve buried a lot of people in this cemetery — cousins, relatives, friends, neighbors, classmates, teammates and parishioners,” he told the gathered crowd. “But this is the most moving gravesite I’ve ever been to.”
According to Gorman, who has researched the lives of 365 soldiers and helped secure headstones for more than 100 of them, Cunningham was born Sept, 28, 1888 in Shanvally, Kiltimagh in County Mayo, Ireland.
He emigrated from Ireland at 16 and had found his way to Chicago by 1909, where he lived with his sister Margaret on South May Street, Gorman said.
Cunningham joined the Army in 1916 and was sent to France as a corporal with Company A of the 28th Infantry the following year, when the U.S. entered World War I. His division won the Battle of Cantigny in May 1918, the first major American offensive of World War I, but Cunningham was killed in action a couple months later on July 22, Gorman said.
He was initially buried in France, “in a five foot earthen grave, no box or blanket,” but his remains were later exhumed at the request of his father and sister, and returned to Chicago. He was buried at Mount Olivet on July 23, 1921 — three years and one day after his death.
“Sadly, Margaret and George could not afford a marker,” Gorman said at Sunday’s service. “So that’s why we’re here today, to pay homage to this young Irish lad who died in a foreign war, not of his making. Just like so many throughout history.”
Gorman, who serves as executive director of the Ronald Reagan Boyhood Home and president of the Lee County Historical and Genealogical Society in Dixon, said he began researching Cunningham’s life at the request of a friend in Ireland.
Years earlier, he’d helped get a headstone for Cunningham’s cousin, James Forkan, who is buried in Ireland.
“It’s just a passion,” Gorman said of his work researching and obtaining recognition for fallen soldiers. “Once you do one, it’s infectious.”
Cunningham is buried in Section 12, Lot 158 of the cemetery, right next to his sister Margaret and her husband.
The Department of Veterans Affairs paid for Cunningham’s headstone and Catholic Charities paid $275 for the marker’s setting, Gorman said.
After Sunday’s ceremony, attendees gathered at Kelly’s Tap in Morgan Park to host a befitting sendoff for their South Side Irish brethren.
“We’re going to go over there and have a toast, hoist a pint for Martin Cunningham,” O’Brien said.