aMemorial Day:
A Memorial For Those Who Died
Prepared by:
Kim Cox
For most of us,
Memorial Day means a day off work, a holiday.
And for me, it used to mean a day off of work while the kids were in
school. But the true reason to celebrate
this day is to honor those who died in wars to protect us, our homeland and our
rights.
I’ll first tell you a
little background about Memorial Day.
Originally called Decoration Day, the Memorial Day holiday was first
proclaimed on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan in his General Order No.
11. This day was first observed on May 30, 1868. Flowers
were placed on the graves of Civil War soldiers who had died for both the Union and Confederate armies. Until
after World War I, the South refused to recognize Decoration Day and honored
their dead on separate days. Today it is
now celebrated in almost every state on the last Monday in May.
Flags are used to
decorate graves and should be flown half-staff until noon during Memorial Day.
New York City has quite a number of World War I memorials. Reasons for this vary from many feelings
about the war—idealism, patriotism and/or sorrow. New Yorkers had two hometown regiments in the
middle of the fighting, the “Fighting 69th” and the “Harlem
Hellfighters.”
These memorials can be
found hanging high on the sides of public buildings in downtown Manhattan and at remote street crossings in Queens and Brooklyn. Where some
have become part of their community, others are hidden and forgotten.
Most of New York City’s memorials had been put up by the local regimental
armories. A group of mothers whose sons
had been killed in the war, “The Gold Star Mothers,” donated a statue of a
doughboy. It stands in Park Slope, Brooklyn in front of the 14th New York regiment armory.
Today a wreath is laid on the statue during a Memorial ceremony led by
the community and a veterans group.
In front of the Health
Department in Chelsea, lower Manhattan stands a typical World War I monument of bronze and heroic with a
bayonet flourished. This statue is
dedicated to the “Soldiers and Sailors”, but the dates on the statue, cover the
period before the United States entered the war.
Though this could be to cover the period of neutrality when many died
from German ship sinkings.
The clock in the tower of Pier A, Battery Park,
lower Manhattan, dedicated in 1919 was the first World War I
memorial in the United States. Now the
tower can only be viewed from a distance due to the decline in port traffic,
causing the pier to be closed to the public.
The 7th
Regiment memorial on Central Park and East 67th Street is similar to the Chelsea statue and is a block away from their armory.
Unlike the armory
statues, Brooklyn’s official war memorial (produced in 1921 in Prospect Park), is sort of
cabalistic and lugubrious. There’s an
angelic figure supporting, protecting or drawing in a weary soldier. Behind the angel are the names of the
borough’s war dead on long panels. The
inscription at the bottom reads that they died for “the cause of universal
peace.” Although there was only one
woman listed, it was dedicated to the men and women who died in conflict.
On the edge of Forest Park in Queens, the Richmond Hill statue wasn’t put up by the city or an armory, but
by the community of Richmond Hill. It’s inscription talks about
wars fought with noble self-sacrifice and determination.
Then there are
probably more than a hundred plaques of testaments to the soldiers of times
gone by. Across the front of one of
these is P.S. 134 plaque, on 18th Avenue in Brooklyn. This plaque has a quote from the Gettysburg address with a suppressed design and mostly English
and Irish names.
Dedicated to the
Merchant Marines is a plaque garnished with a quote from President Warren G.
Harding, “These men rendered one of the greatest services that could have been
done for our nation and civilization’s cause.
Hundreds of precious lives were lost—a loss that can never be made up by
their country.” The plaque was attached
to the Customs House in 1921, where all ship passengers had to pass. But due to a recline in traffic, as with the
Pier A in Battery Park caused the building to be changed to the National Museum
of the American Indian.
The John Purroy
Mitchel plaque, near 95th Street in Central Park is extremely
noticeable and is passed by joggers on their daily run. Who is John Purroy
Mitchel you might ask? In 1913, at the
age of twenty-five, he was elected mayor of New York City—youngest person to hold that office and thereby
nicknamed, “the Boy Mayor.” In 1917 he
lost the election and volunteered for the Army Air Corps. He was killed while in training in 1918,
seemingly from falling out of his plane.
Recognition of
soldiers were also done with street names.
Michell Place in Manhattan was name after John Purroy Mitchel. Avenue A was name York Avenue after Sergeant York in 1928. The “Fighting 69th” were the most
celebrated of the city’s regiments. This
was primarily an Irish regiment from Manhattan. Father
Duffy’s (a chaplain) statue adorns Times Square. Two New York City boroughs named street lineaments after Sergeant
Joyce Kilmer who was in fact from New Jersey. One that
sits alongside the courthouse is the Bronx’s Joyce Kilmer Park and the second is a shopping district along King’s Highway, Brooklyn’s Joyce Kilmer Square. Henshaw and
Staff streets in upper Manhattan and Finn Square in Tribeca, lower Manhattan (not marked now) were other streets named after soldiers.
In conclusion, I feel
these are wonderful tributes to the men who died to save us from sure
devastation had the course of events been different. So lets remember on this coming Memorial Day
to say a prayer of thanks for the Veteran’s of World War I and those of other
wars that were fought for our country.
Sources:
Memorial Day Flag
Etiquette
http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/~dmdragon/flagetiq.html
Memorial Day History
http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/background.html
Trenches on the
Web—Special Survey of New York
WWI
Monuments/Memorials by Laura Canon
http://www.worldwar1.com/sfnycm.htm