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burialstate

The County Must Bury a Veteran Who Dies Without Means — and Not in the Pauper Ground

County commissioners have a statutory duty to cause the decent interment of an honorably discharged person from a named list of conflicts, or of that person’s spouse or parent, who dies without leaving sufficient means to defray funeral expenses. The burial may not be made in any cemetery, burial ground or portion of one used exclusively for the pauper dead, and the county must move a veteran already lying in such ground.

Verified August 23, 2026

What this benefit is

County commissioners have a statutory duty to cause the decent interment of an honorably discharged person from a named list of conflicts, or of that person’s spouse or parent, who dies without leaving sufficient means to defray funeral expenses. The burial may not be made in any cemetery, burial ground or portion of one used exclusively for the pauper dead, and the county must move a veteran already lying in such ground.

What it's worth: A decent interment at county expense, outside the pauper ground

  • The statute names no current figure. The only sum written into this article is the hundred dollar cap in K.S.A. 73-301, which applies to the civil war provision and has stood since 1927.
  • K.S.A. 73-304 sends the amount payable to a cross-reference — K.S.A. 39-713(l) of the 1955 General Statutes Supplement — and the Revisor’s own note beside it reads that the section is now repealed. What a county actually pays is therefore set by that county, not by this article.
  • The value is the difference between a county-funded funeral and a pauper burial, plus the removal duty where a veteran is already in pauper ground.

Who is entitled to it

  • The duty is written around an honorably discharged person.
  • You are in this state.

Not sure whether that describes you?

Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.

How to claim it

  1. 1Raise it before the arrangements are made, not after. The duty is to cause the interment; a family that pays first is arguing about reimbursement rather than about a duty owed.
  2. 2The gate is means, not income: the section reaches a person who dies "without leaving sufficient means to defray funeral expenses". Nothing in the article sets a figure, a test or an asset limit.
  3. 3It runs to family too. The body of the SPOUSE or the PARENT of a qualifying honorably discharged person is inside K.S.A. 73-304 on the same terms.
  4. 4The pauper-ground bar is the sharpest part and is worth quoting: the burial shall not be made in any cemetery, burial ground, or that portion of a burial ground used exclusively for the burial of pauper dead.
  5. 5The family may conduct the funeral themselves. Where surviving relatives wish to and are unable or unwilling to pay the charges, the section permits it and the expense is met in the manner the statute provides.
  6. 6Ask about removal separately. K.S.A. 73-304 also covers causing the removal of a qualifying body already buried in ground reserved exclusively for the pauper dead to another portion of a cemetery, and K.S.A. 73-306 puts a parallel duty on township trustees and on mayors for remains in an abandoned cemetery or pauper burying ground.
  7. 7Which county pays depends on the section. Under K.S.A. 73-305 the expenses for a burial or removal under K.S.A. 73-304 are paid by the county where the burial or removal takes place; under the civil war provision at K.S.A. 73-303 it is the county of residence at the time of death.
  8. 8Ask about a headstone in the same conversation, and expect a discussion rather than a right — see the note below on K.S.A. 73-302.
Form
No prescribed form — approach the board of county commissioners
File with
The board of county commissioners for the county
Documents you will need
dd214
No renewal
Once granted it does not need renewing.
CorrectionThis is widely summarised as "Kansas counties must bury any indigent veteran". Read the list. K.S.A. 73-304 names the Spanish-American war, the Philippine insurrection, the expedition to China, world war I, world war II, and operations in Korea or other places under the flags of the United States and the United Nations or under the flag of the United States alone. Vietnam, the Gulf, Iraq and Afghanistan are not named, and neither is peacetime service. A family relying on this section for a recently deceased veteran should raise that with the county before assuming the duty is owed.
CorrectionThe headstone is a weaker right than the burial. K.S.A. 73-302 caps a headstone at twenty dollars — a figure from 1885 that has never been raised — and the Attorney General opinion printed beside the section, 96-63, is summarised there as holding that a county is AUTHORIZED but NOT REQUIRED to provide a marker under K.S.A. 19-101a. Treat the marker as something to ask for, not something to demand.
Worth knowingThe federal route usually matters more and is not affected by any of this: a headstone or marker from the national government, and the burial allowances a claim can attract, sit outside the county duty. Ask the county what it will add rather than what it will replace.
Known gapNo county’s actual funeral cap, indigency test or procedure was read this session, and there are 105 of them. The article states the duty; the number lives in county resolutions that are not in the statutes.

Sources

This finder provides an informational match, not a government eligibility determination. The responsible agency decides your application.