By Mike McCombs
The Island News
It’s less that two weeks before Wreaths Across America Day on Saturday, Dec. 13, 2025, and David Edwards is in an unusual position.
The Beaufort coordinator for the event at Beaufort National Cemetery, Edwards admits he’s worried that they won’t be able to place a Remembrance Wreath on every headstone at this year’s event.
“Were at 19,000,” Edwards said by phone Monday, Dec. 1. “I need 5,600 more and I’m not sure if I’m going to get there or not.”
According to Edwards, there are roughly 30,000 interned at Beaufort National Cemetery, and roughly 25,000 wreaths are needed to cover all the headstones.
Should Edwards and the Beaufort community close the gap in time, it would make six straight years every headstone had been covered.
Despite the streak, Edwards did not take for granted that all the headstones would be covered this year. Edwards has had this job for 18 years and he remembers how difficult it was to even get to that point to begin with.
“I thought it would get easier but it really gets more stressful every year,” he said. “Some of the people that used to sponsor the wreaths … well, they’re out there with their loved ones now and they can’t sponsor a wreath.”
And he said other National Cemeteries are facing the same challenge.
“It seems like sponsorships are down everywhere across the U.S.,” he said. “Not just here. It’s everywhere.”
Edwards was grateful for the people that have sponsored wreaths. He said the Sun City community, long a big supporter of Wreaths Across America, made a huge contribution Monday to help get them as close as they are.
“Sun City has been gracious, they’ve always been great,” he said.
And there are other dedicated sponsors. Edwards talked about a woman from Massachusetts that discovered her great, great, great grandfather was buried at Beaufort National Cemetery.
“Now, she comes to the cemetery every year,” he said.
While Edwards is stressed, he’s not close to giving up. And doesn’t want anybody else to give up either.
“This is to honor the families and the veterans,” he said. “Go online and start pounding the buttons.”
According to Edwards, the drop dead latest you can sponsor wreaths is Monday afternoon, Dec. 9, when the last wreaths are shipped.
“As long as the trucks are not loaded, and the doors on the trucks aren’t closed, they’ll call in donations and they’ll put them on the trucks,” he said.
To sponsor a Remembrance Wreath, which costs $17, click on the QR code on Wreaths Across America Beaufort’s Facebook page or visit www.wreathsacrossamerica.org/GA0175P. That code at the end of the web address guarantees the wreaths purchased make their way to Beaufort.
Wreaths Across America Beaufort is in its 19th year of attempting to make sure all veteran heroes buried in Beaufort National Cemetery have a Remembrance Wreath on their headstones.
Wreaths Across America is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded to continue and expand the annual wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery begun by Maine businessman Morrill Worcester in 1992. The organization’s mission – Remember, Honor, Teach – is carried out in part each year by coordinating wreath-laying ceremonies in December at Arlington, as well as at thousands of veterans’ cemeteries and other locations in all 50 states and beyond.
“This is my way of honoring them. It’s all can do,” Edwards said. “[It’s a] little tough knowing I’m this far behind at this time of year. It’ll be really tough to tell everybody we haven’t got the wreaths.”
Mike McCombs is the editor of The Island News and can be reached at TheIslandNews@gmail.com.
