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Memorial Day, 2015
Ladies and gentlemen,
My name is Todd Bryda, I am the history prof of that little college across the green.
I have been given the honor of addressing you on this most hallowed of days, and for that I have to thank Jack Bourque and Deb Kessler. Although unworthy of the task, I shall do my best to honor the subject.
Now for a quick history lesson:
Memorial Day was not always a day off from work or simply a day to BBQ.
It began as a Civil War day of mourning and a day to honor the 735,000 dead of that horrific war. Back then it was called Decoration Day. The first acknowledged Decoration Day in the United States was organized in April 1866 by women in Georgia to honor the Southern dead.
A month later in May 1866, the first Northern event to honor the Union dead was held in Waterloo, NY.
The first federal day of remembrance was proclaimed by Union General Jack Logan in May 1868. Gen. Logan was the commander of the Union veterans’ organization, the Grand Army of the Republic. After Logan’s proclamation this special day of honor grew more and more significant to the nation.
Decoration Day slowly evolved into Memorial Day as the United States went on to fight other and more horrific wars.
Now, I apologize for that history lecture, it is an occupational hazard. But I feel it is crucial to understand how events begin in order to find their significance.
This holiday, this day of remembrance sprung from the pain and suffering of a nation torn apart by Civil War. The families and friends of the fallen wanted to make some sense of the tragedy…the horror. They needed the sacrifice of their friends and brothers to have been for something noble.
Now, I will not debate nor will I discuss the myths and legends that grew from this need to make sense of the slaughter. I will not debate nor will I discuss the causes for the Civil War or any war that followed. Nor will I discuss why individuals chose to take up arms in these conflicts.
Instead, let us simply honor the sacrifice and the courage it took to leave home and sacrifice one’s self on the nation’s altar of freedom.
Congressman and future president James Garfield gave the first Decoration Day address at Arlington National Cemetery in 1868. Garfield had been a Civil War general who saw ghastly combat at places like Antietam. In his speech to the thousands of people gathered he simply tried to encapsulate the feelings of a nation. He tried to put the deeds of the dead into perspective for his audience. For Garfield, the war was simply about the love of country. In discussing the fallen, he said to the crowd,
“We do not know one promise these men made, one pledge they gave, one word they spoke; but we do know they summed up and perfected, by one supreme act, the highest virtues of men and citizens. For love of country they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and their virtue.”
Patriotism…virtue…love of country
These were not just words to Garfield and the gathered mourners. They were not just words on the fields of Flanders or on the beaches of Normandy and Iwo Jima. They were not just words in the air over Germany or at Midway. To those soldiers who died at the Chosin Reservoir in Korea or in the rice fields of Vietnam, from the deserts of Iraq to the mountains of Afghanistan- patriotism, virtue, love of country are more than hollow sentiments.
735,000 Americans died in the Civil War. Over 600,000 American men and women have died in war since the guns became silent in Virginia in 1865. Let us again honor their sacrifice for this nation. In Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address he tried in his own way to define the sacrifice of the nation’s fallen. In trying to explain the unexplainable, Lincoln succinctly pointed to what he saw as the real purpose of the war:
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”
Patriotism, virtue, love of country…and a lasting peace for all.
We honor the fallen by working for and achieving the seemingly unachievable.
Peace for all people and peace for all nations.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak to you today.
Ladies and gentlemen,
My name is Todd Bryda, I am the history prof of that little college across the green.
I have been given the honor of addressing you on this most hallowed of days, and for that I have to thank Jack Bourque and Deb Kessler. Although unworthy of the task, I shall do my best to honor the subject.
Now for a quick history lesson:
Memorial Day was not always a day off from work or simply a day to BBQ.
It began as a Civil War day of mourning and a day to honor the 735,000 dead of that horrific war. Back then it was called Decoration Day. The first acknowledged Decoration Day in the United States was organized in April 1866 by women in Georgia to honor the Southern dead.
A month later in May 1866, the first Northern event to honor the Union dead was held in Waterloo, NY.
The first federal day of remembrance was proclaimed by Union General Jack Logan in May 1868. Gen. Logan was the commander of the Union veterans’ organization, the Grand Army of the Republic. After Logan’s proclamation this special day of honor grew more and more significant to the nation.
Decoration Day slowly evolved into Memorial Day as the United States went on to fight other and more horrific wars.
Now, I apologize for that history lecture, it is an occupational hazard. But I feel it is crucial to understand how events begin in order to find their significance.
This holiday, this day of remembrance sprung from the pain and suffering of a nation torn apart by Civil War. The families and friends of the fallen wanted to make some sense of the tragedy…the horror. They needed the sacrifice of their friends and brothers to have been for something noble.
Now, I will not debate nor will I discuss the myths and legends that grew from this need to make sense of the slaughter. I will not debate nor will I discuss the causes for the Civil War or any war that followed. Nor will I discuss why individuals chose to take up arms in these conflicts.
Instead, let us simply honor the sacrifice and the courage it took to leave home and sacrifice one’s self on the nation’s altar of freedom.
Congressman and future president James Garfield gave the first Decoration Day address at Arlington National Cemetery in 1868. Garfield had been a Civil War general who saw ghastly combat at places like Antietam. In his speech to the thousands of people gathered he simply tried to encapsulate the feelings of a nation. He tried to put the deeds of the dead into perspective for his audience. For Garfield, the war was simply about the love of country. In discussing the fallen, he said to the crowd,
“We do not know one promise these men made, one pledge they gave, one word they spoke; but we do know they summed up and perfected, by one supreme act, the highest virtues of men and citizens. For love of country they accepted death, and thus resolved all doubts, and made immortal their patriotism and their virtue.”
Patriotism…virtue…love of country
These were not just words to Garfield and the gathered mourners. They were not just words on the fields of Flanders or on the beaches of Normandy and Iwo Jima. They were not just words in the air over Germany or at Midway. To those soldiers who died at the Chosin Reservoir in Korea or in the rice fields of Vietnam, from the deserts of Iraq to the mountains of Afghanistan- patriotism, virtue, love of country are more than hollow sentiments.
735,000 Americans died in the Civil War. Over 600,000 American men and women have died in war since the guns became silent in Virginia in 1865. Let us again honor their sacrifice for this nation. In Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address he tried in his own way to define the sacrifice of the nation’s fallen. In trying to explain the unexplainable, Lincoln succinctly pointed to what he saw as the real purpose of the war:
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”
Patriotism, virtue, love of country…and a lasting peace for all.
We honor the fallen by working for and achieving the seemingly unachievable.
Peace for all people and peace for all nations.
Thank you for this opportunity to speak to you today.
