Very few towns in America can claim a Medal of Honor recipient.
Dorchester is one of the handful of towns that can.
The Medal of Honor is the nation's highest award for valor in action against an enemy force. It has been awarded fewer than 3,500 times.
On July 1, 1863, young 20-year-old Sgt. Jefferson Coates found himself in the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The Union soldier displayed heroism and "unsurpassed courage in battle, where he had both eyes shot out," according to a citation from the U.S. Government. After Sgt. Coates was removed from the battlefield by the comrades who had witnessed his heroic actions, doctors determined that an enemy ball had passed though both of his eye sockets.
Sgt. Coates was born in Grant County, Wisconsin and entered the U.S. Army from Boscobel, Wisconsin. He served in Company H, 7th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, which was part of the Army of the Potomac’s famous "Iron Brigade."
Following the war, Sgt. Coates moved west to Nebraska, despite his blindness. A homesteader, he settled southwest of Dorchester in rural Saline County. He died young on Jan. 27, 1880, at the age of 36, and was laid to rest in the Dorchester Cemetery.
According to a 1999 article by Dorchester's Jan Stehlik, Sgt. Coates was the first soldier buried in the Dorchester Cemetery. The Dorchester Star reported on May 5,1882, that "Mrs. Coates has had a fine monument in memory of her deceased husband erected".
When Dorchester's last "Old Soldier," Jeremiah Wilhelm, was buried 60 years later in 1942, the number of Civil War veterans resting in the town's cemetery had grown to 49.
Only 32 Medal of Honor recipients are buried in Nebraska. Dorchester is honored and privileged to serve as Sgt. Coates' final resting place. So the next time you're at the cemetery, take a few minutes to honor one of America's most decorated heroes. And count your blessings that there are still defenders of freedom like Sgt. Coates.