This large veteran's memorial stands proudly on the northwest corner of the Briscoe County Courthouse grounds in downtown Silverton TX. It is made in five parts of dark polished granite, around a small plaza with benches.
The center of the monument is a square gate with square vertical pillars and a square horizontal stone forming the top of the door/gate. Seals of the US Army, US Navy, US Air Force, US Marine Corps, and the US Coast Guard and US Merchant marine are engraved along the top of the gate.
A triangular pediment is stacked on top of the gate. Names of those who died and the conflicts that they died in are engraved on the pillars.
Arranged in a semi-circle around the central memorial arch are four large rectangular upright flat stone tablets with pointed tops, like a 2-dimensional obelisk. The names of those who served from Briscoe County are engraved on these tablets.
From the Amarillo Globe-News, a story about the project from 2003: (
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"1,600 names to adorn Silverton veteran memorial
Posted: Tuesday, November 11, 2003
by JESSICA RAYNOR
SILVERTON - Veterans are buried here. American flags flutter on their graves on the appropriate days, honoring service to the country.
They live here, too, spending their retirement years making sure people don't forget the sacrifice.
But Briscoe County veterans do not have a monument dedicated to them, a place where they can remember their friends. Soon they will.
The Veterans of Foreign Wars Post No. 7839 recently started a $50,000 fund-raiser to build such a memorial on the courthouse lawn. The group has already raised $15,000 to that goal, said Fred Strange, commander of the local post.
"I thought it was time to do it (build a memorial)," he said. "It should have been done a long time ago."
Strange said that a few months ago, one of the post's members came by and asked about erecting a Veterans Memorial in town. Since then, Strange and fellow post members have sent brochures across the area, asking for donations and names of veterans, dating to the Civil War, to put on the wall.
Contributions
To contribute, send tax-deductible contributions to Veterans Memorial Fund, City Bank, Box 9, Silverton, TX 79257 or First National Bank, Box 540, Quitaque, TX 79255. For additional information, call Fred Strange at [number].
He expects to gather 1,600 names for the monument that will be placed on the northwest corner of the courthouse lawn and finished by August. That's only if they can get the money they need by the end of the year.
"I think we can do it," Strange said.
Briscoe County Judge Wayne Nance said that when the post brought the proposal to the county commission a couple of months ago, commissioners unanimously agreed to the idea.
"We're doing it to show our appreciation for the service these men and women provided to us," he said. . . . "