CROOM, Md. — Police want the public’s help in finding vandals responsible for tipping 24 tombstones at St. Thomas’ Episcopal Church, in Upper Marlboro, sometime last weekend.
The cemetery and church date back to 1745 and are on the National Register of Historic Places.
“This is our collective heritage,” Prince George’s County Police Chief Hank Stawinski said. Those interred at the cemetery include soldiers from the Revolutionary War, The War of 1812 and the Civil War.
Calling the vandalism a careless, wanton act, Stawinski said investigators will work aggressively to solve the case, and he encouraged anyone with information or the people responsible to come forward.
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Investigators believe more than one person was involved, because some of the toppled gravestones weigh several hundred pounds. After another recent incident of vandalism, in which a BB gun was fired into a building on the property, church leaders began to consider adding surveillance cameras.
“A church is supposed to be open to the public,” church senior warden Steven Kensinger said. “The thought of having to lock gates or install video cameras has never been on our forefront, but [it] will be now.”
Kensinger said it appears none of the damage will require historical restoration. He expects insurance will cover the cost of putting the monuments upright.
St. Thomas’ is the second-oldest continuously active church and cemetery in Prince George’s County.
“We have services here every Sunday; we still have weddings; we still have funerals — this is not a monument,” Kensinger said. “It’s unfathomable that someone could come in and do this.”
