Illustrated on this Page are the Camp Commanders and most distinguished members, friends and colleagues of Camp 7 since 1990.   Next to the images of each man are the badges and medals of the Order often worn by the recipients in accordance to perscribed rules and regulations, as well as other patriotic membership badges and awards related to honoring America's historic and Civil War Past.   The "KEY" explaining the meaning of each badge shown is located at the bottom of this Webpage.   Our Camp Commanders are listed in the numeric order of their service as Commander of Camp 7 and their commitment to the GAR & SUVCW, starting with Commander Aram A. Plante up to our current Camp Commander, Gregory H. Payne, PCC.   Also included are short biographies of each man with the patriotic badges and the badges of the Order they have earned.   All Hereditary and Associate members of Camp 7 are eligible to become Camp Commander.

Serving the R.I. communities of:
Providence, East Providence, Pawtucket, Central Falls, Cranston, Warwick, Johnston, Rumford,
parts of West Warwick and Coventry

The Motto of all Camp Commanders of R.I. SUVCW Elisha Dyer Camp No. 7 since 1909 has been:
"Working hard to preserve the memory of our GAR Fathers in Blue".

      Brother, Aram A. Plante, 61st Commander 1988 to 1992:     As the most senior hereditary member and mentor of Camp 7, Brother Plante was considered by all to be the father of the Camp for nearly a decade.     He became the 61st Camp Commander of R.I. SUVCW Elisha Dyer Camp No.7 since 1909, and served 5 consecutive terms as Commander, from 1988 to 1992.     He was elected and re-elected unanimously by the entire Camp membership at the 78th, 79th, 80th, 81st, and 82nd Annual Camp 7 Veterans Day Bivouacs (annual Camp Conventions).     Brother Plante was born in Providence, R.I. on November 22, 1922, and lived in Cranston until his death on June 23, 2002.     He was a retired supervisor of the Davol Rubber Company of Providence during the years he served as Camp 7 Commander.     He first applied for membership to the Order in November 1940, and was inducted on December 4, 1940, but left the Order in April 1947.     He was reinstated October 5, 1951, but left the Order again on January 1, 1954, due to work responsibilities to support his family.     Thirty-one years later in honor of his mother Katherine Plante, who was a life long member of the R.I. Auxiliary to the SUVCW, the R.I. Women’s Relief Corps, and the R.I. Ladies of the Grand Army of the Republic, he reinstated his RI SUVCW Camp 7 membership a second time on April 4, 1985, whereby he maintained continued membership in the Order until his death in 2002.     He served two enlistment periods in the United States Coast Guard, Stateside, during World War II and the Korean War.     He was the first Camp Commander to coordinate annual Camp 7 summer outings designed to increase the fellowship within Camp 7, foster very close fraternal relations with Elisha Dyer (ladies) Auxiliary No.2, and he laid the foundation for Camp 7-Auxiliary 2 joint patriotic efforts that continue today.     Due to the size of the State and the Department Membership, as Dept. Commander, he formalized a system of Camp Districts or areas of focus for Camp activities and Civil War Veteran Grave maintenance for the 4 remaining Camps of the Department to concentrate, based on the informal system inwhich all RI SUVCW Camps had been functioning since 1893.     He was inducted in to Camp 7 as a hereditary member of the Order by lineage to Private Henry Millett, Battery A, 1st Regiment Rhode Island Light Artillery.     He was a Life Member of the Order, No. 291, and held a commission of Major of the SVR from 1996 to his death in 2002.     He was a 32nd Degree Master Mason and Shriner, and was an original Charter Fellow of the National Congress of Patriotic Organizations.     He also served 2 consecutive terms as R.I. SUVCW Dept. Commander, 1992 through 1993, and was Commander of the SUVCW New England Regional Association in 1994.     As R.I. SUVCW Dept. Commander he was also a member of the Camp 7 Camp Guard, and an original member of Battery A SVR in homage to his ancestor, when it was a part of the SVR.     He authorized the original Battery A Guidon pole to be permanently maintained under the care of Battery A members of Elisha Dyer Camp No.7.     Brother Plante and Major General N. Andre Trudeau, Adjutant General of the R.I. National Guard, jointly authorized the pole and exact replica of its colors (researched and hand painted by Brother Gregg Mierka) back in to official State service at Remembrance Day, 1993, during the re-dedication ceremony at the Battery A Monument on the Gettysburg Battlefield.     He personally knew the last Rhode Islander to be elected Commander-in-Chief of the National SUVCW, Harold E. Arnold, a State Official who co-occupied the second floor Headquarters Office of the Old Arsenal on Benefit Street in Providence.     Both Brothers Plante and Arnold developed a personal mission to secure and recover all property and records of the R.I. GAR and the R.I. SUVCW, a policy carried on today by their successors.     Brother Plante was also a recipient of the National SUVCW War Medal (2 war bars for World War II and Korea) and in 1998, National SUVCW Jr, Vice Commander-in-Chief Alan E. Peterson awarded Brother Plante the coveted National SUVCW 50 year membership medal.     Brother Plante transferred to R.I. SUVCW E.H. Rhodes Camp No.11 to assist with rebuilding Camp 11 in 1997; completing his final service to the Order there until his last tattoo.     Brother Plante’s wife Marguerite Plante is also Past President of Elisha Dyer Auxiliary No.2, Past Department President of the R.I. Dept. Auxiliary to the SUVCW, and Past National Patriotic Instructor of the National Aux. to the SUVCW.

      Brother, Gregg A. Mierka, 62nd Commander 1993:     As one of the senior members of Camp 7 today, he first became the 62nd Camp Commander of R.I. SUVCW Elisha Dyer Camp No.7 since 1909, elected at the 83rd Annual Camp 7 Veterans Day Bivouac, and served as Commander in 1993.     Afterwards he served 10 years as Camp 7 Secretary and 10 years as Camp 7 Treasurer.     He was also honored by the Camp Membership elected to serve a second term as Camp 7 Commander for the Camp's 100th Anniversary Year at the 99th Annual Camp 7 Veterans Day Bivouac for 2009.     Brother Mierka was born in Detroit, Michigan, on September 21, 1950 and currently resides as Curator in Residence of the General Nathanael Greene Homestead Museum, Spell Hall, in Coventry, R.I.     He applied for membership to the Order in September 1990, and was inducted on March 30, 1991.     He worked closely with Brother Plante to re-build Camp 7 and the SUVCW in Rhode Island.     He earned a Bachelor of Arts and a Master of Arts Degree at Central Michigan University in 1972 and 1974, a Master of Fine Arts Degree in 1980 at Rhode Island School of Design, began EdD Doctoral study in education administration but completed a Certificate of Special Graduate Study at Harvard University in 1981 to 1984.     He also completed a Certificate of Advanced Graduate Study in administration at the University of Rhode Island in 1984.     Brother Mierka was also certified as a teacher in Michigan, New York and Rhode Island.     He also taught for the Midland Center for the Arts & Northwood Institute, Cornell University, Ithaca College and Rhode Island School of Design.     He was in the first class of "Leadership Rhode Island" while serving as Director of the Warwick Museum in the early 1990s and worked in the movie Gettysburg nearly the entire length of the film in Skip Cosper’s Corps of Civil War Specialists.     In Undergraduate School he studied two terms in the advanced college Military Science Army ROTC Program and volunteered for the Special Army ROTC Counter Insurgency Training Program during in his freshman & sophomore years, and refused his 2-S college military deferment status.     He decided to concentrate on his career goals and left the ROTC Program in his Junior college year at CMU and was not drafed to serve in Vietnam.     In Rhode Island, he led the development of the R.I. GAR Civil War Museum Project, from 1993 through 2000.     He organized and developed the first through the 7th New England Civil War Expos, 1993 to 2000.     In 1990 he was elected as a hereditary member of the SUVCW by lineage to William W. Servis, Drummer, 24th Michigan Volunteer Infantry, also with lineage to Private George Lester Winslow, Jr., Co. H, 94th NY Volunteer Infantry; David H. Servis, Co. K, 6th Michigan Vol. Infantry, Corporal Henry (Heinrick) Mierke, Co. A, 2nd Wisconsin Independent Light Artillery, Color Sergeant Gustavus A. Gessner, Co. H, 72nd Ohio Vol. Infantry (Fremont GAR, Andersonville and Florence POW Survivor) and Private John Mierke, Co. G, 16th New York Heavy Artillery.     Brother Mierka has ancestors who fought on both sides of the Civil War, north and south.     He is a Master Mason and a Knight Templar, and he is an original Charter Fellow of the National Congress of Patriotic Organizations.     He was co-founder of the R.I. Civil War Roundtable in 1992 and is a hereditary Life member of the Military Order of the Iron Brigade.     He is also a Life Member of the SUVCW, No. 436.     In 2001, he led the founding of the R.I. Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States (RI MOLLUS) and serves as its first State Commander, hereditary MOLLUS No. 22108, by lineage to Dr. Louis S.J. Gessner, Assistant Surgeon, 32nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry, Volunteer Surgeon Camp Chase, and Chief Surgeon Nashville Union Hospital No.11.     His father, Robert J. Mierka, also a Past Camp Commander, is a member of Camp 7 and RI MOLLUS as well.     He also served 6 consecutive terms as R.I. Dept. SUVCW Commander, the longest in the State’s history, from 1994 to 2000.     He held a commission of 2nd Liut. as the former Battery A commander and member of the SVR in 2001.     He is the senior Camp 7 inductee to the U.S. Army Field Artillery Assoc. of Ft Sill, Oklahoma, Military Order of St Barbara, awarded in 1993, and he received the R.I. Militia Medal-Governor’s Historic Commands.     He served as SUVCW New England Regional Assoc. Commander in 1998, and is the Adjutant of Battery A, 1st Rhode Island Light Artillery, Unit Assoc. of the R.I. GAR Civil War Museum Assoc.     The primary mission of Brother Mierka’s tenure as Camp 7 Commander and as Dept. Commander was to rebuild the SUVCW in Rhode Island, educate Rhode Islanders about the State’s great Civil War legacy, and work for State recognition of the RI SUVCW and RI MOLLUS.     Brother Mierka’s wife Mary Mierka is also Past President of Elisha Dyer Auxiliary No.2, and Past Dept. President of the R.I. Dept. Aux. to the SUVCW.

      Brother, Ross S. Dent, Connecticut SUVCW Dual Member:     As one of the most respected members of Camp 7 in the mid 1990s, Brother Dent was a Dual Hereditary Member of R.I. SUVCE Elisha Dyer Camp No.7 from 1993 to 1998.     He was born in 1946, and lived in Vernon Connecticut.     He was a member of his primary Connecticut SUVCW Camp, Alden Skinner Camp No.45, until his sudden and unexpected death on June 12, 2003.     He was just 57 years old.     He served several terms as Camp Commander of Camp 45 and two terms as CT. Dept. Commander.     He was one of the chief architects of the development of the Rockville GAR Hall, as well as its historic library and Civil War Museum in the town of Rockville, Connecticut.     He was a recipient of the National SUVCW War Medal as a Veteran of the War in Vietnam, United States Navy, awarded a combat star, deployed to sea duty in the South China Sea Combat Theater of Operations and the Gulf of Tonkin.     Our Brothers of Camp 45 re-named the Rockville GAR Hall Library the Ross S. Dent Memorial Library in his honor.     The last Camp 7 meeting Brother Dent attended was actually held at the Rockville GAR Hall in Connecticut three months prior to his death.     Brother Dent invited Camp 7 to hold its March 2003 Camp meeting in the Connecticut GAR Hall to experience the historic surroundings the “Old GAR Fellows in Blue” regularly experienced each month at their Post meetings.     This was the only time members of Camp 7 were able to experience meeting amidst a highly honored GAR environment since losing its headquarters at the Benefit Street Arsenal in Providence where much of the Camp 7 - Post 4 memorabilia and artifacts are still housed.     The Camp 7 meeting in Connecticut was presided by the Camp 7, 2003, Camp Commander David J. Duggan.     The special meeting was also attended by many of our Connecticut Brothers of Camp 45 as guests in their own facility at Brother Dent’s insistence and in respect for the close bond between Camp 7 and Camp 45.     For several years Brother Dent was the liaison between R.I. SUVCW Camp 7 and CT. SUVCW Camp 45, and he helped organized other Camp 7 and Camp 45 visitations.     He advised Past Dept. Commander Gregg Mierka on the creation of the R.I. GAR Civil War Museum Project as a new Camp 7 headquarters, a proposed facility for its R.I. GAR Arnold Post No. 4 and R.I. SUVCW records and artifacts.     He was a former member of the Battery A Unit Assoc. of the R.I. Civil War Museum Assoc.     He was also a member of the Connecticut Sons of the American Revolution and the Society of the Cincinnati, as well as the Connecticut Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States.     Brother Dent was in the process of making preparations and planning for his next Camp 45 meeting on the evening he herd his last tattoo.     Although he was not a Past Commander of R.I. SUVCW Elisha Dyer Camp No.7, as a Past Camp Commander of CT SUVCW Alden Skinner Camp No.45 and Past CT Dept. Commander he ranks as one of the eminent men of Camp 7 Honor Roll since 1990.     The passing of Brother Dent, especially on the heels of losing Brother Aram Plante, has left a hole in the hearts of all the members of Camp 7 and we mourn his loss.