Monday Security Memo

Intellectual Firepower for Professionals

A Meaningful Memorial Day

“Our debt to the heroic men and valiant women in the service of our country can never be repaid. They have earned our undying gratitude. America will never forget their sacrifices.”

- President Harry S Truman

Today is Memorial Day in the United States. It is the day we honor those who have lost their lives while serving our country in the military.

According to the Memorial Day Foundation, Memorial Day was first called Decoration Day. It was a day set aside for us to honor those who died preserving the Union in the Civil War. It was called Decoration Day for the act of decorating the graves of dead soldiers with flowers. It was first observed on May 30, 1868 (a date in which no battles had been fought so that all battles could be included), per the order of General John Logan, National Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic.

President Lyndon B. Johnson proclaimed Waterloo, New York, the "birthplace of Memorial Day" on May 26, 1966, because records showed the village held one of the first observances on the local level a hundred years prior. Although, there is endless debate over where the first holiday observance actually occurred.

The most interesting story of the first Memorial Day was discovered in 1996. David Blight, an American History professor at Yale University, stumbled across a box of old newspaper articles marked "The First Memorial Day" in Harvard University's Library. According to two reports that Blight found in The New York Tribune and The Charleston Courier, a crowd of 10,000 people, mostly freed slaves with some white missionaries, staged a parade around the Washington Race Course and Jockey Club in South Carolina on May 1st, 1865, after the club had been turned into a prison by the Confederate Army. Two-hundred and sixty Union soldiers, who had been detained in the prison, had died of disease and were hastily buried in mass graves behind the grandstands. Following the Confederates defeat, the bodies of the Union soldiers were exhumed and given a proper burial by the freed slaves.

To honor the dead that day in Charleston, three thousand Black schoolchildren carried bouquets of flowers and sang “John Brown’s Body.” Members of the famed 54th Massachusetts - and other Black Union regiments - were in attendance and performed double-time marches. Black ministers recited verses from the Bible.

If the news reports are accurate, the 1865 gathering at the Charleston race track would be the earliest Memorial Day commemoration on record.

Take a moment today to visit a cemetery, say a prayer, raise a glass, and/or give a humble thank you to the brave men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country. They are America's true heroes.

Today, Memorial Day is now designated as the last Monday in May and also marks the start of summer.

Since the late 1950’s, the 1,200 soldiers of the U.S. 3rd Infantry Brigade place small American flags at each of the 260,000 gravestones at Arlington National Cemetery on the Thursday before Memorial Day. They then patrol the cemetery 24 hours a day during the Memorial Day weekend, to ensure that each flag remains standing.

While it is reported that $1.6 Billion worth of meat will be consumed at barbecues over this holiday weekend, please remember that at 3pm local time, all Americans should pause for a moment of silence in remembrance and respect.

Stay safe and vigilant!

Luke Bencie