A Request...

I received the following message in an email yesterday from this gentleman. I am uncertain whether or not the Society will become involved in this at this time. I post it here for your consideration...
(You will have to contact Mr. Licameli directly. Not through this site)



My name is Frank Licameli and I'm a retired Army Lieutenant Colonel working with the Newburgh Preservation Association and the community of Newburgh, NY in preparing a Memorial Day commemoration, tentatively scheduled for Saturday, 23 May 2015 at the Old Town Cemetery in Newburgh.  The reason I am contacting you is two fold.

First, Private Frederick E. Wright, a member of Company B, 84th NY, who died of wounds from Gettysburg, and whose picture you may have used on your websites or Facebook pages, is buried at Old Town and we want to recognize his sacrifice and have reenactors provide a memorial commemoration and discuss his life and the role of the 14th Brooklyn at Gettysburg. 

Second, his tombstone, a limestone column, was knocked down and broken into three pieces in a storm a few years ago, and we would like to get this information out to the entire 14th Brooklyn reenactment community, to see if interested members can assist us, financially or otherwise, with restoration of Private Wright's stone.

The event we are planning for 23 May 2015 looks to be a pretty big one and will honor veterans of all wars.  At Old Town itself we have about 45 veterans of the American Revolution, including one who fought at Lexington and Concord and Bunker Hill, we also have some War of 1812 veterans, one of whom was killed in action.  The other, whose remains were recently located, will be reinterred in his family mausoleum at Old Town with full military honors expected to be provided by the Veteran Corps of Artillery in uniforms from the War of 1812, along with a cannon salute.  There are also a number of Civil War veterans at Old Town, two of whom were killed in action.  Besides Pvt Wright at Gettysburg, there is another veteran who was killed at Fredericksburg.  We plan to commemorate all the Civil War veterans buried here.  There will also be other community activities programmed that day, including historic and art displays, as well as one or two tall sailing ships (possibly the new replica of the Hermione which brought Lafayette to America) being moored on the Newburgh waterfront (3 blocks from the cemetery) for people to tour.

I hope that I have peaked your interest, and that members of the various 14th Brooklyn organizations will be able to attend and support this event.  I'd appreciate it if you could pass this message along to the appropriate representatives in other 14th Brooklyn groups, and ask that you provide me their contact information so that I may follow up.

We hope that one or more of your organizations or individual members might be interested in adopting PVT Wright and supporting our efforts to honor his sacrifice at this and future events.

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me any time.

Very respectfully,


Frank Licameli, LTC (R)
Old Town Cemetery Committee Chair, Newburgh Preservation Association