The Associated Press

BRYAN, Ohio - For nearly 90 years, the story of John Henry Stewman was buried in an unmarked grave.

Now the former Confederate soldier will be remembered with a Confederate memorial service today and a grave marker reflecting his military history.

Stewman was wounded in the Civil War's Battle of Shiloh in Tennessee in April 1862. His wounds led to an honorable discharge, and he spent nearly all of his life as a farmer in Tennessee.

Just before his death in 1915, he moved north to Ohio to live with his son, Wallace Stewman. When he died, local Civil War veterans helped his son with the funeral.

Stewman's story was uncovered when Rosie Alexander of Bryan was researching family history. She found his obituary and realized he was the great-great-great-grandfather of her son and daughter.

She was even more surprised to learn Stewman was a Confederate Civil War veteran.

"That's when I started searching," she said. Alexander spent two years piecing together Stewman's life.

She contacted the Tennessee State Library and Archives and learned that his pension application was on file.

The paperwork there confirmed his Confederate service, and gave details of his wounding.

Stewman was in an artillery unit attached to Gen. George Crittenden's brigade.

"At the battle of Shiloh," Stewman wrote, "I was wounded from the effects of the explosion of a shell or boom, and by the concussion was knocked down and rendered unconscious, and knew nothing for 10 days, and was carried to hospital and remained there."

Stewman was discharged from the Confederate Army on May 3, 1863, and exempted from the draft. He said he was on crutches for two or three years.

He returned to his home in Franklin County, Tenn.

After the area fell into Union hands, Stewman wrote that he was forced to take an oath of allegiance to the U.S. government "or go to prison."

Plans for a memorial marker and ceremony started when Alexander met Scott Showen, a Civil War re-enactor who is commander of the Auburn, Ind., Veterans of Foreign Wars post.

Showen helped apply for a Veterans Administration marker and organized Confederate re-enactors to place the marker and assist in conducting the service.

Holding with tradition, the gravestone will be set in a particular way, Alexander said.

"No matter where in the cemetery the stone is situated, it is to lean toward the south."