(Click > to Play)
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of
remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service and has its origins
in the American Civil War.
The almost overwhelming number of soldiers, more than
600,000 from both sides, who died in that war, a war sometimes described as a
war of brother against brother, meant that burial and memorialization of fallen
soldiers took on a cultural significance bordering on the sacred. During the
war women of the Confederacy made the decorating of soldiers' graves an increasingly
formal practice.
After the war, the first well known organized observance of
a day to memorialize the sacrifices of Union soldiers was in Charleston, South
Carolina. At least 257 of the Union soldiers held as prisoners at the
Charleston Race Course died and were hastily buried in unmarked graves. On May
1, 1865, black residents of Charleston, together with teachers and
missionaries, organized a May Day ceremony. The freedmen cleaned up and
landscaped what was a crude, makeshift cemetery, building an enclosure and an
arch labeled, "Martyrs of the Race Course." Nearly ten thousand
people, mostly freedmen including about 3,000 school children newly enrolled in
freedmen's schools, members of mutual aid societies, black ministers, white
northern missionaries, and Union soldiers gathered to commemorate the war dead.
Most brought flowers to lay on the graves. Years later in the north, the
celebration would come to be known as the "First Decoration Day."
In 1865, the federal government began creating national
military cemeteries for the Union war dead. In the summer of that year a Waterloo,
New York, druggist Henry Welles, while talking to friends, suggested that it
might be good to remember those soldiers who did not make it home from the war.
Not much came of it until he mentioned it to General John B. Murray, a Civil
War hero, who gathered support from other surviving veterans. On May 5, 1866,
they marched to the three local cemeteries and decorated the graves of fallen
soldiers.
On May 5, 1868, in his capacity as commander-in-chief of the
Grand Army of the Republic, the organization for Union Civil War veterans,
General John A. Logan issued a proclamation calling for "Decoration
Day" to be observed annually and nationwide. It was observed for the first
time that year on May 30 when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and
Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. The date was not chosen to
commemorate a battle but as the optimal date for flowers to be in bloom,
emphasizing the custom of decorating the graves of fallen soldiers. The first
state to officially recognize the holiday was New York in 1873 and by 1890 it
was recognized by all of the northern states. The South refused to acknowledge
the day, honoring their dead on separate days until after World War I when the
holiday changed from honoring just those who died fighting in the Civil War to
honoring Americans who died fighting in any war.
The preferred name for the holiday gradually changed from
"Decoration Day" to "Memorial Day." It was first used in
1882 but did not become the more commonly used name until after World War II.
It was declared the official name by federal law in 1967. On June 28, 1968, congress
passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, which moved four holidays, including
Memorial Day, from their traditional dates to a specified Monday in order to
create convenient three-day weekends. The change moved Memorial Day from its
traditional May 30 date to the last Monday in May. After some initial confusion
and unwillingness to comply, all 50 states adopted congress' change of date
within a few years.
Many feel that when Congress made the day into a three-day
weekend in with the National Holiday Act, it made it easier for people to be
distracted from the spirit and meaning of the day. As the VFW stated in its
2002 Memorial Day address: "Changing the date merely to create three-day
weekends has undermined the very meaning of the day. No doubt, this has
contributed greatly to the general public's nonchalant observance of Memorial
Day."
With that in mind and to help Americans remember of the true
meaning of Memorial Day, the "NationalMoment of Remembrance" resolution was passed in December 2000. The
resolution asks for all Americans "to voluntarily and informally observe
in their own way a moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever
they are doing for a moment of silence" at 3 p.m. local time. Still many
feel the "Moment of Remembrance" is a only a small step in the right
direction to return the original meaning to the day.
What is needed, they contend, is a full return to the
original day of observance. Setting aside one day out of the year for the
nation to come together to remember, reflect, and honor those who have given
the ultimate sacrifice in service to their country. To return the solemn, and
even sacred, spirit to Memorial Day
Waterloo, New York, still celebrates Memorial Day on May 30.
