There is a long tradition of military service in my family. I have relatives who served in the Gulf War, the Korean Conflict and World War One with others that had peacetime service in between. I tried to join the military out of high school, just as the draft had ended but my extremely poor eyesight made me an undesirable recruit. My great-grandmother never knew me really, she always thought I was her son Chester who had been a doughboy in WWI, who was gassed and taken prisoner. That worked well for me because when I didn’t respond quite right to one of her questions about the names of the horses or farm life – none of which I had shared with her – she would say in an aside to others in the room, “Chester has never been the same since the War you know.”
Memorial Day is the day set aside for remembrance of all those who have served our great nation in the Armed Forces and now have left this mortal coil, especially those who died in combat. The wives of dead Confederate soldiers were the first to begin decorating graves to honor their fallen men. The north got into the act in Waterloo, NY on May 5, 1866. Waterloo, NY has been called “birth place” of Memorial Day, known then as “Decoration Day” because that’s when graves were adorned with flowers in commemoration of the service of those who perished in the Civil War. In 1868 the date was moved to May 30th where it stayed until 1971 when Memorial Day became a federal holiday celebrated on the last Monday in May.
Initially the former Confederate States weren’t all that happy because those damn Yankees had usurped their tradition and so they refused to celebrate Memorial Day on the same date as their former Union foes. As a result, the former Confederate States of America had their Memorial Day on June 2nd, Confederate President Jefferson Davis’ birthday, and continued to do so for years. Even today these States have a “Confederate Heroes Day”; for Alabama and Florida it is the fourth Monday in April, the last Monday in April for Mississippi, May 10th for North and South Carolina, June 3rd for Kentucky and Tennessee and January 19th for Texas.
Eventually the country got on together on the same date to honor veterans who have served this nation and died. The first celebrations only commemorated those who had died in combat. The Veterans’ Administration estimates that 647,000 Americans have died as a result of combat and another 539,000 have died in military service from non combat causes – like dysentery back in the day, training and other accidents today etc. Now the nation mourns all who have served and have moved on to the after life regardless of the circumstances of their death. It is their military service and their willingness to serve that we celebrate while at the same time we mourn their passing.
I’m old enough to remember the draft and a time when military service was something that all of us may have been called upon to perform. There were 3.5 million people in the Armed Services in 1968 and about 1.4 million today, less than 1% of the adult population. The Veterans’ Administration estimates that 42 million Americans, throughout our history, have served this nation during times of war. Today there are 19 million or so living veterans, about 5.5 million of which served in peacetime the rest saw action of some kind; the VA estimates that currently 1.4% of women and 13.4% of men have served in the military.
Think about the hardships of a military life. A life constantly on the move, separation from family, the grueling physical demands, poor living conditions – especially in the field, the stress and danger as well as the bodily mutilation, disability and death. We are the land of the free because of the brave. We are the beacon of democracy and the hope of the world because of the willingness of a tiny minority of our fellow citizens to give, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, “Their last full measure of devotion” to this country. Take some time this Memorial Day to say a prayer of thanks to all the veterans, – past, present and future – that safeguard our great nation and your freedoms. We owe them more than we can ever repay. Taking some time out one day a year to say “thank you” is not too much to ask in return for all they’ve given us.