Jasper County Democrat, Volume 23, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 May 1920 — MEMORIES OF MEMORIAL DAY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

MEMORIES OF MEMORIAL DAY

Written by One Who Thinks With Fondness of the Old Home Town’s Observances. While Memorial day has become a national holiday, observed as such In every city in the land, it is in the small town —the old home town —that one gets the proper conception of the spirit of the day, remarks the Kansas City Times. In the big cities there will be the hush of noise, the rest from the hurly-burly of the daily grind, and there will be gatherings in public places and in various cemeteries, and speeches, and the formal decorating of the graves of the veterans who fell In battles fighting for their country, and there will be an unusual number of informal visitors, too, who will scatter flowers upon the resting places of their dead. But the big city is a crowded place, full of strangers. Even the names on the marble stones in the cemetery are strange to us. There is no sympathy in the big city, save the common sympathy that binds those who sorrow. Out in the small towns our hearts turn to them for this day as naturally as they turn to the old home town and the old home folks at Christmastide. One’s Thoughts Go Back. It is one of the facts that has impressed itself upon the Industrial world that the rush Is out of, not into, the big cities on Decoration day. In that it is different from all other holidays. Travel takes the same course on this day that the feet of sorrow tread when the family chain is broken. We follow our dead to the old home towns and lay them to rest in the quiet cemeteries on the hills. Today we are taking the pilgrimage of love to the hill where they sleep. We know what is going on In the old home town today, even though we are shut up in the city. It Is much the same program we witnessed when, as lads, we learned to distinguish between Decoration day and any other holiday. Programs haven’t changed much. The parade In the morning, which never starts on time; the service at the graves of the soldiers who sleep there on Woodlawn hill, the salute to the dead by the firing squad of comrades from the G. A. R. —how the Une has thinned, and how feeble those remaining among them are becoming—and afterward, the address by the orator of the day. The parades and the program are Incidents of the day that make It appear like old .times to you, but that Is not the thing that takes you to the old home town today, nor takes your thoughts then;. If you cannot be “present in the body,” as ’Squire Woodbury will say, as chairman of the day—he is always chairman of this day, in the old home town —when he speaks of those who are not there to hear the speaking. That Remembered Parade. As you recall, or as you will see it, the parade is rather a simple one, compared to the big-parades you see in the cities. It is not a long procession, and there does not seem to be much order about IL The old home-town cornet band, which always leads the parade, is not the best band you ever heard, either. It needs tuning up, you judge by the discordant notes, but, for all that, you want to see the Decoration day procession. It is the old home-town’s way of doing things, and you have come to associate it as a part of Memorial day. But that scene at the cemetery: There’s a big bouquet of-flowers on every grave. Aunt Maggie Snow has arranged for that, bless her, for she has been president of the committee on decoration as long as ’Squire Woodbury has been president of the day.

Aunt Maggie has flowers hauled to the cemetery in wagonloads, and she knows the location of every grave on Woodlawn hill. “Now here Is a basket of flowers for the ‘Jap’ Burson lot; you know where it is, right over there by the Nickleson monument. Take these over,” Aunt Maggie says to a member of her committee, “for goodness knows the poor dears will have no one to remember them today, and ‘Kit’ Burson never neglected anybody when she was with us.” Day of Sweet Memories. And while Aunt Maggie and her committee are scattering flowers on every neglected grave, there is a stream of people coming and going, with their offerings of love — Well, it is a day of revival of memories worth while, a recalling of old friends who were worth recalling. You pass by and read the names on the stones, and you get a glimpse of a year that has gone forever, and yeL here’s some one at this grave scattering flowers, whose life is linked with that other year. And in some way that life and that year touched you for some lasting influence. For in the old home town no man llveth unto himself and no man dieth unto himself. It is that picture that drives your thoughts back to the old home towns everywhere, for dll old home towns are alike. The day will be the same in the one as in the other. It is the memorial day of a nation; it is the memorial day for the community ; it is the memorial day for the home. It does not belong to any one city, or state, or section, for now, thank God, no Mason and Dixon line divides the day between the North and the South. In the South wherever a once blue-clad soldier rests, his grave is decorated along with the graves of those who wore the gray. It is a day to be observed, “an holy day forever In all your generations.”

America had her first Memorial day in Europe last year. While military salutes were fired in honor of the dead, an American flag was placed over the grave of every American soldier in Europe. In the United States many service flag* are surrounded with laurel or flowers, in honor of American heroes who paid the price of democracy, and who sleep beneath the soil of France.

First to “Die" in Civil War. The first man “killed in action” in the Civil war Isn’t dead at all. He is very much alive and Is working every day in the Inquiry section of the Atlanta, Ga., post office. He recovered from his wounds, lived through the war and Is now eighty years old and in good health. This man is “Uncle” George H. Hammond, one of the three surviving members of the “Atlanta Greys,” known officially as company F of the eighth Georgia infantry, says an exchange. He enlisted May 1, 1861, and July 21 of the same year was reported officially as the first man to fall at the battle of Manassas. Only a youngster, he was shot through the shoulder and left on the battlefield as dead. Mistakes In casualty lists were made then as well as now, and when he returned home a few weeks later his mother was mourning his death. He read his own obituary in the papers. Hammond didn’t mind being considered officially dead, but what bothered him then was not being able to fight again, his wound preventing further service. He was an ardent patriot in the war against Germany and won many enlistments through his fervent speeches at the Atlanta recruiting stations.