CARTHAGE — Caretaker Victor Dwinal said he was up early doing work Sunday and decided to weed-whack the stone wall around the town’s small cemetery around 7 a.m..

When he made it to the top of the wall, he saw overturned and broken stones. He also saw that some of the small American flags that had been put on graves for Memorial Day were broken and thrown on the ground.

Dwinal lives across the street and was the first to see the damage to the Storer Hill cemetery Sunday. Franklin County Sheriff Scott Nichols said in a press release Monday that the vandalism, which included overturned headstones and ripped flags, most likely happened sometime after dark Saturday.

Dwinal came back Monday afternoon to replace the flags that were destroyed.

“I checked it Friday because I was going to mow it, but I figured I’d wait until the weekend and this is what I found,” Dwinal said Monday.

Dwinal said he has no idea who would have ransacked the small, out-of-the-way cemetery with headstones dating back to the early 1800s.

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Unsure where the town will go from here, Dwinal said the stones will be repaired and said he will return on Tuesday and attempt to restore some of the unbroken stones to an upright position.

“As soon as I’m able to clean everything up, I’m going to come in and mow,” he said.

With 15 years as caretaker of the small cemetery, Dwinal said he has a connection with the cemetery. According to Dwinal, when he took over, the now neatly manicured plots were overgrown with trees and other vegetation.

“To me it’s a bad disgrace. I can’t see why they couldn’t find something else to do,” Dwinal said of the vandals.

Nichols asked anyone with information regarding the vandalism to contact the sheriff’s office at 778-2680 or leave a tip on their tip line tipsubmit.com/webtips.

Douglas McIntire — 861-9252

dmcintire@mainetoday.com

Twitter: @CD_McIntire


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