A law passed last year by the South Carolina General Assembly gives veterans’ organizations the right to receive the unclaimed remains of veterans from funeral homes and coroner’s offices and to bury them in a national cemetery.
South Carolina has three: Beaufort, Florence and Fort Jackson in Columbia. Neal, LeMaster and Gray, along with three other veterans whose remains were in storage in Richland County, will be buried on June 6 at Fort Jackson with full military honors.
“They served their country. They came home. They were different,” said Larry Truax, who spearheaded the bill.