Recalling a time when setbacks didn't deter us
Memorial Day in my corner of New Hampshire is always the same. A clutch of veterans from the Second World War to the Gulf march round the common, followed by the town band, and the scouts, and the fifth-graders. The band plays ''Anchors Aweigh," ''My Country, 'Tis of Thee,'' ''God Bless America'' and, in an alarming nod to modernity, Ray Stevens' ''Everything Is Beautiful (In Its Own Way)'' (Billboard No. 1, May 1970). One of the town's selectmen gives a short speech, so do a couple of representatives from state organizations, and then the fifth-graders recite the Gettsyburg Address and the Great War's great poetry. There's a brief prayer and a three-gun salute, exciting the dogs and babies. Wreaths are laid. And then the crowd wends slowly up the hill to the Legion hut for ice cream, and a few veterans wonder, as they always do, if anybody understands what they did, and why they did it.
Before the First World War, it was called Decoration Day -- a day for going to the cemetery and ''strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion.'' Some decorated the resting places of fallen family members; others adopted for a day the graves of those who died too young to leave any descendants.
I wish we still did that. Lincoln's ''mystic chords of memory'' are difficult to hear in the din of the modern world, and one of the best ways to do it is to stand before an old headstone, read the name, and wonder at the young life compressed into those brute dates: 1840-1862. 1843-1864.
In my local cemetery, there's a monument over three graves, forebears of my hardworking assistant, though I didn't know that the time I first came across them. Turner Grant, his cousin John Gilbert and his sister's fiance Charles Lovejoy had been friends since boyhood and all three enlisted on the same day. Charles died on March 5, 1863, Turner on March 6, and John on March 11. Nothing splendid or heroic. They were tentmates in Virginia, and there was an outbreak of measles in the camp.
For some reason, there was a bureaucratic mixup and the army neglected to inform the families. Then, on their final journey home, the bodies were taken off the train at the wrong town. It was a Saturday afternoon and the stationmaster didn't want the caskets sitting there all weekend. So a man who knew where the Grants lived offered to take them up to the next town and drop them off on Sunday morning.
When he arrived, the family was at church, so he unloaded the coffins from his buggy and left without a word or a note to anyone. Imagine coming home from Sunday worship and finding three caskets waiting on the porch. Imagine being young Caroline Grant, and those caskets contain the bodies of your brother, your cousin and the man to whom you're betrothed.
That's a hell of a story behind the bald dates on three tombstones. If it happened today, maybe Caroline would be on Diane Sawyer and Katie Couric demanding proper compensation, and the truth about what happened, and why the politicians were covering it up. Maybe she'd form a group of victims' families. Maybe she'd call for a special commission to establish whether the government did everything it could to prevent disease outbreaks at army camps. Maybe, when they got around to forming the commission, she'd be booing and chanting during the officials' testimony, as several of the 9/11 families did during Mayor Rudy Giuliani's testimony. All wars are messy, and many of them seem small and unworthy even at the moment of triumph. The unkempt lice-infested Saddam Hussein yanked from his spider hole last December is not so very different from the Jefferson Davis captured in May 1865 while skulking away in women's clothing, and thereafter depicted by gleeful Northern cartoonists in hoop skirts, petticoats and crinolines. Conquered and captured, an enemy shrivels, and you question what he ever had that necessitated such a sacrifice. The piercing clarity of war shades into the murky grays of postwar reconstruction. You think Iraq's a quagmire? Lincoln's ''new birth of freedom'' bogged down into a centurylong quagmire of segregation, denial of civil rights, lynchings. Does that mean the Civil War wasn't worth fighting? That, as Al Gore and other excitable types would say, Abe W. Lincoln lied to us?
Like the French Resistance, tiny in its day but of apparently unlimited manpower since the war ended, for some people it's not obvious which side to be on until the dust's settled. New York, for example, resisted the Civil War my small town's menfolk were so eager to enlist in. The big city was racked by bloody riots against the draft. And you can sort of see the rioters' point. More than 600,000 Americans died in the Civil War -- or about 1.8 percent of the population. Today, if 1.8 percent of the population were killed in war, there would be 5.4 million graves to decorate on Decoration Day.
But that's the difference between then and now: the loss of proportion. They had victims galore back in 1863, but they weren't a victim culture. They had a lot of crummy decisions and bureaucratic screwups worth re-examining, but they weren't a nation that prioritized retroactive pseudo-legalistic self-flagellating vaudeville over all else. They had hellish setbacks but they didn't lose sight of the forest in order to obsess week after week on one tiny twig of one weedy little tree.
There is something not just ridiculous but unbecoming about a hyperpower 300 million strong whose elites -- from the deranged former vice president down -- want the outcome of a war, and the fate of a nation, to hinge on one freaky jailhouse; elites who are willing to pay any price, bear any burden, as long as it's pain-free, squeaky clean and over in a week. The sheer silliness dishonors the memory of all those we're supposed to be remembering this Memorial Day.
Playing by Gore-Kennedy rules, the Union would have lost the Civil War, the rebels the Revolutionary War, and the colonists the French and Indian Wars. There would, in other words, be no America. Even in its grief, my part of New Hampshire understood that 141 years ago. We should, too.
Excellent article. It should be mandatoring reading this week end. Infuriates and saddens me that we have people like Gore and Kennedy spewing their hatred and it being lapped up by the libs. Sad, sad, sad.
There's so much in this Mark Steyn that hits home I don't see any one particular point to re-emphasize. It's a perfect Memorial Day piece from a man who understands this country better than most of the leaders on the Dem side of the aisle, and he's a foreigner (Canadian) to boot.
Thank you Mark Steyn.
And thank you to all our soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, and coasties serving us today. God Bless You All!
I wish we still did that. Lincoln's ''mystic chords of memory'' are difficult to hear in the din of the modern world, and one of the best ways to do it is to stand before an old headstone, read the name, and wonder at the young life compressed into those brute dates: 1840-1862. 1843-1864.
When I was young (born in '41) there were still Civil War veterans alive (even if most had been "bugle boys", not riflemen). The Civil War now seems so long ago, but one is still reminded when walking through a cemetary and coming across an old gravestone with a GAR (Grand Army of the Republic) medallion on it. I had several relatives/ancestors in the war (28th Wisconsin volunteer infantry), though thankfully none died in the war.
But that's the difference between then and now: the loss of proportion. They had victims galore back in 1863, but they weren't a victim culture. They had a lot of crummy decisions and bureaucratic screwups worth re-examining, but they weren't a nation that prioritized retroactive pseudo-legalistic self-flagellating vaudeville over all else.
Just so.
This is a quote worth keeping.
"pseudo-legalistic self-flagellating vaudeville"
Best description yet of the political environment we've had to endure this year. As excruciating to watch as the Wellstone memorial, may it yield the same result.
Like the French Resistance, tiny in its day but of apparently unlimited manpower since the war ended,
Pithy, quick, and so, so meaningful. Brilliant.
Steyn is remembering the time before this new Doctrine was in force:
"The Kerry/Fonda/Kennedy Doctrine" as written by John Kerry (with a little help from his friends):
1. No civilian casualties or collateral damage.
2. No soldier deaths for the US. Nothing more serious than "invisible shrapnel" wounds requiring Bactine and a Purple Bandaid.
3. 100% cooperation of all countries- even those in the employ of the enemy.
4. Treat all Prisoners gently- even the ones that just ambushed and killed your buddies.
5. All negative news must be reported immediately so the enemy can get the most mileage from it.
6. No interrogation of suspected spies.
7. No interruption of food or medical deliveries.
8. Enemy country must be brought above the economic level of Massachusetts within 30 days.
9. 100% of the enemy civilian population must sign off on the action before any evil dictator may be removed.
10. All soldiers must be of the highest caliber, no bad eggs allowed, 100% angels.
11. US troops have 180 days MAX to be out of the country after the "action".
12. Both sides must be considered as morally equivalent. People using the word "evil" are reprehensible, on the level of Hitler.
13. We must give the enemy sufficient time to hide his WMD and establish his plans before any surprise attack. (the Colin clause) The UN is the preferred vehicle for this delaying tactic.
14 The opposition party gets to second-guess every decision but never has to state its own position.
15. The opposition party may also support and take at least half the credit for every thing that goes well, but do not need to go on the record ahead of time. (also known as the "I was for it before I was against it clause)
16. Religious builldings, schools, and hospitals are considered "Home Base" and safe, and we must yell "Ollly Olly Oxenfree" before uncovering our eyes in an enemy neighborhood.
17. All classified information shall be released to Sixty Minutes for review prior to being given to the President.
18. All bi-partisan commissions must be made up of partisan ex-Politicians (and spineless RINOpublicans) who are either hiding something that is being investigated, are sleeping with someone who is being investigated, or whose FBI files are safely stored in the "file wing" at Chappaqua.
19. All environmental laws must be followed, and war areas cleaned up to the level of "pristine" within 10 days or fines will be levied.
20. Medie shall spike all negative news about the enemy, especially beheadings and other forms of getting medieval on our @sses.
(to be) Implemented this 20th day of January 2005, 12:42pm
by His ROyal Highness the Reverent "Hanoi John" Kerry
Founding Member- Dipcusp (because all Caps would be too angry)
Dorky Imbecilic Peacenik Cowards against US Security and Prosperity
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1144392/posts?
ping to a foreigner with a clear and patriotic mind who says it better than I can even think.
More than 600,000 Americans died in the Civil War -- or about 1.8 percent of the population. Today, if 1.8 percent of the population were killed in war, there would be 5.4 million graves to decorate on Decoration Day.
Think about this.
Ping
It seems that the time of Reconstruction saw the systematic denial of civil rights to the whites in the South (e.g. the ability to vote for the candidate of one's choice) could have led to a lot of bitterness and resentment toward black Southerners, for whom the federal government was seen as patron and protector. The segregation, denial of civil rights to blacks, lynchings, etc. were unforgivable infamies, but neither were they unexplainable.
There is something not just ridiculous but unbecoming about a hyperpower 300 million strong whose elites -- from the deranged former vice president down -- want the outcome of a war, and the fate of a nation, to hinge on one freaky jailhouse; elites who are willing to pay any price, bear any burden, as long as it's pain-free, squeaky clean and over in a week. The sheer silliness dishonors the memory of all those we're supposed to be remembering this Memorial Day.
Bears repeating.