Memorial Day

[Retired2Fish]

Freedom is not free, never forget the ones who served to protect our way of life.

[Dollfly]

Thanks to all who served and remember those that gave all.

[Eagle 1]

[cevans]

Today is the day we remember the million plus service members that gave their lives for our freedoms. Never forget!

[SpeckledSlab]

I honor and thank all of our military fallen. I hope all members have a safe and enjoyable Memorial Day weekend.

[Eagle 1]

[Slab]

Not sure where I found this but this image brought a tear to my eye. Never forget. Freedom ain’t free.


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[BuckeyeCrappie]

I thought that on this most important day I would share an excerpt from a speech I wrote and delivered in 2016 at the Veterans Home in Georgetown, Ohio. It was a humbling and beautiful experience to spend the day among heroes from many different walks of life, service branches, and different conflicts who had all served this nation.


The idea for Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, arose from the ashes of the Civil War. Following the Civil War, at least 620,000 Americans, both Union and Confederate, had been killed and hundreds of thousands more were maimed. Through the course of the war, Americans had blasted at each other’s lines with cannons and burned cities and towns on our own soil. Americans had locked each other in prisoner of war camps and torn up the railroads connecting north to south.


Homes, schools and churches from Antietam to Vicksburg were riddled with bullet holes. The war’s unprecedented carnage and destruction was on a scale not even imaginable a few years before, and it changed America’s view of war forever. From those dark times, it was the families who were honoring their dead that began to bring the light of reconciliation.

Although there are different versions of how Memorial Day began, one story goes that the grieving families, both Northern and Southern, began decorating the graves of their lost Soldiers with flowers and wreaths. In one city in Mississippi, people decorated the graves of both Union and Confederate troops, out of respect for the families of the Union Soldiers, and with the hope that someone would do the same for their lost loved ones in the North.

In 1966, Congress and President Lyndon Johnson declared Waterloo, N.Y., the “birthplace” of Memorial Day. There, a ceremony on May 5, 1866, honored local veterans who had fought in the Civil War. Businesses closed and residents flew flags at half-staff. By the end of the 19th century, Memorial Day ceremonies were being held on May 30 throughout the nation. State legislatures passed proclamations designating the day, and the Army and Navy adopted regulations for proper observance at their facilities. It was not until after World War I, however, that the day was expanded to honor those who have died in all American wars. In 1971, Memorial Day was declared a national holiday by an act of Congress, though it is still often called Decoration Day and placed on the last Monday in May.

To ensure the sacrifices of America’s fallen heroes are never forgotten, in December 2000, the U.S. Congress passed and the president signed into law “The National Moment of Remembrance Act,” creating the White House Commission on the National Moment of Remembrance. The commission’s charter is to “encourage the people of the United States to give something back to their country, which provides them so much freedom and opportunity” by encouraging and coordinating commemorations in the United States of Memorial Day and the National Moment of Remembrance.

We have awarded medals to many Soldiers, added their names to monuments and named buildings for them, to honor them for their bravery. But nothing can ever replace the hole left behind by a fallen service member, and no number of medals and ribbons can comfort the ones left behind.

I'd like to ask the service members and veterans in attendance here to stand or raise your hand. Thank you for answering the call to duty, and for your sacrifice. Please join me in a round of applause for the heroes gathered here today.

Now I’d also like to ask the family members of any service member to stand. We know you have lived through difficult times and often taken the heavy load to keep the home fires burning. Thank you for what you’ve done, the nation owes each and every one of you a debt of gratitude as well.

Today, people throughout the country will gather together to remember, to honor, and to pay gratitude to those who have served our country. Our gathering is just one small spark in the flame of pride that burns across the nation today and every day. It’s not a lot, but its one small way we can honor those who have made the ultimate sacrifice so that we can live in freedom.

Your presence here today and that of the people gathering all across America is a tribute to those lost troops and to their Families. It is a way to say we remember. From the Soldiers who shivered and starved through the winter at Valley Forge to the doughboys crouched in the muddy trenches of France, the GI's who fought in Europe and the Pacific theaters, those who stopped the North Koreans at the Busan perimeter and pushed them back north of the 38th Parallel and the platoon who patrolled the hazy jungles of Vietnam and most recently the American service members who have served or are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, we remember and honor them all.

Thank you for attending today. May God bless you and your families, God bless our troops and God bless America.

[DockShootinJack]

Let's not forget those that served and sacrificed this Memorial Day

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[6poundtest]

Found this on another forum.