MEMORIAL DAY
REMEMBERING THOSE WHO GAVE SO MUCH!
Boyer Writes salutes all who serve.
Music Video: Turn up sound and for best viewing, enlarge screen.
Memorial Day Words by Gen. MacArthur…Relevant Today
In 2015, I posted this tribute to those who serve. I think it is good for another year and maybe many more to come….for we must not forget.
On this MEMORIAL DAY, Boyer Writes honors all those who responded to the call of duty to country and all freedom stands for….especially those who paid the ultimate sacrifice.
After viewing the slide presentation, you may want to look at the different wars throughout history where and when the United States has sent troops to fight. We are just one country. Multiply this country and all wars of all countries in the world ….to make us one big, warring globe.
There are reasons, of course. Some fight for their independence. Others fight to maintain their freedom. Many fight to rule over the weak, sick, and impoverished.
There are those who fight and murder in the name of God…religious wars. Read your history and you will not be surprised for it happened when Muslims fought Christians; Christians fought in the Crusades; nations have tried to rid the world of Jews.
The Holy Scriptures tell us that we will call for “Peace…Peace….but there is no peace…” Those who make predictions believe that before the coming of Christ to the earth a second time, there will be the greatest of all wars….in the Middle East. This is not something for optimism. Nevertheless, we are also told to “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem”….and the world. We cannot control governments, groups, or individuals who hate and destroy…but pray we can do.
General MacArthur, the great general of World War II made this statement about war.
” I pray that an Omnipotent Providence will summon all persons of goodwill to the realization of the utter futility of war. We have known the bitterness of defeat, the exultation of triumph, and from both we have learned that there is no turning back. We must preserve in peace, what we won in war. The destructiveness of the war potential, through progressive advances in scientific discovery has in fact now reached a point that revises the traditional concept of war. War, the most malignant scourge, and greatest sin of mankind, can no longer be controlled, only ABOLISHED! We are in a new era. If we do not devise some greater and more equitable means of settling disputes between nations, Armageddon will be at our door…”
A MEMORIAL DAY TRIBUTE
( Click on arrow; turn on sound and enlarge picture for best viewing. Music by St. Olaf Choir) Warning: disturbing scenes of war wounded)
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Choose and click on a war listed to read information.
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- 2.1 Colonial wars (1620–1774)
- 2.2 War of Independence (1775–1783)
- 2.3 Early national period (1783–1812)
- 2.4 War of 1812
- 2.5 War with Mexico (1846–48)
- 2.6 American Civil War (1861–1865)
- 2.7 Post-Civil War era (1865–1917)
- 2.8 Modernization
- 2.9 Banana Wars (1898–1935)
- 2.10 Moro Rebellion (1899–1913)
- 2.11 Mexico (1910–1919)
- 2.12 World War I (1917–1918)
- 2.13 Russian Revolution
- 2.14 1920s: Naval disarmament
- 2.15 1930s: Neutrality Acts
- 2.16 World War II (1941–1945)
- 2.17 Cold War era (1945–1991)
- 2.18 Post–Cold War era (1991–2001)
- 2.19 War on Terrorism (2001–present)
- 2.20 Iraq
- 2.21 Libyan intervention
- The on-going war on terrorism The War on Terror (also known as the Global War on Terrorism) is a term commonly applied to an international military campaign which started as a result of the Sept 11,2001 terrorist attack on the United States. This resulted in an international military campaign to eliminate al-Qaeda; other militant organizations and jihadi groups. The United Kingdom and many other NATO and non-NATO nations participate in the conflict.
Small Towns Remember MEMORIAL DAY
Tucked away in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia are small towns with people who will never forget those brave men and women who left their farms and home places to fight for our country and freedom in the world. Throughout the rolling countryside and along the blue colored ridges of the mountains… filled with cattle, fields, and beautiful wildflowers, one will find small family graves with an American flag. This will always indicate that the person buried there served in an American war.
Military Memorial at Galax, Virginia
On this Memorial Day, the young Military Science students and the older men and women of this Blue Ridge area remember the Fallen of all wars and pray prayers for the many POW-MIA’s who are still missing. (Slide show below)
As my husband and I joined in this day of Remembrance, I’m in the midst of writing a new book about American military veterans, entitled Men and Women of Valor in the Blue Ridge, which should be on Amazon by July, 2018.
My interviews with those who went to serve during World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and more recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been eye-opening. These are people of great courage and fortitude. Millions did not return, but for those here in the Blue Ridge, these men forged new lives and continued to make our FREE America an even better place.
One chapter in my book will feature the Childress family in the Blue Ridge who had four men in the military at once during World War II. Paul (upper right picture and with wife and baby) served in Patton’s Command in France.
Francis Childress
The women of the Blue Ridge served as well, including Francis Childress, a cousin to Paul. Other chapters will take notice of a female military nurse who was awarded the Bronze Star. The Bronze Star Medal is a decoration awarded to members of the United States Armed Forces for either heroic achievement, valor, heroic service, meritorious achievement, or meritorious service in a combat zone.
As I read memoirs and listened, I learned that fighting on Heart Break Ridge in Korea with legs frozen, slipping out of camp at night in France during World War II to find food for hungry soldiers, spending weeks in the confines of a submarine, fighting off boredom and jungle heat in Vietnam or losing limbs in Afghanistan or Iraq were difficult and in most cases horrible experiences. It was their part of life that they were willing to share with me and I am grateful because I will never look at a veteran again in the same way.
This is why I write this blog to encourage you to take an hour or so on Memorial Day from your interest in sports events, picnics or other activities to give our military the honor they so deserve. Your freedom today is what they did to keep us free. It is important that our children and grandchildren are taught history and the meaning of our national Memorial Day. I was amazed to see that since the last Memorial Day ceremony of 2017, in the small town of Galax, VA. that 90+ people had died who were veterans in this part of the Blue Ridge. We are rapidly losing those who fought in World War II and their stories should be told.
To those whose lives and deaths were the ultimate sacrifice….there is not enough thanks in heaven or earth to give to you…but we will try.
To the gravely wounded warriors who have come home and forged new lives, we give you honor. We have contacted this brave warrior for an interview that will shed light on all those who have suffered so much.
On April 7, 2011, J. B. Kerns, a combat engineer, and fellow Marines moved into the notoriously dangerous Ladar Bazaar in Afghanistan to attempt to clear it of improvised explosive devices. A soldier near Kerns stepped on a pressure plate and triggered an IED. (Credit to Roanoke Times full story)
Thank you to all veterans…men and women. We give tribute to all the wives and families that were left behind to faithfully live and wait for their loved ones to return home.
VIDEO Turn up sound (Credit “American Soldier” by Toby Keith)
The Heaviness of Commitment
To those who gave it all for the sake of freedom…You and the heaviness of your commitment is what we honor today. To those who have been laid to rest…to those who are trying to recover in body and mind…we give you honor. You, the Veterans, are your brother’s keepers. Thank you.
Video: Turn on volume
Overcoming and Pressing On
Four Chaplains
Today is Memorial Day. My husband and I will attend a service for our fallen where he will be a guest speaker. Bill is a retired Navy Chaplain who never has really retired from sharing with others on this day the dedication of our service men and the story of the Four Chaplains who linked arms and went down to a watery death, after giving away their life jackets, on the USAT Dorchester in the North Atlantic during World War II.
As a wife, I am always proud of my husband’s service to his country. As a woman and mother who knows how difficult it is to raise a family to have values and goals that will make a difference, I dedicate this writing to one woman who beat the odds, met the challenges in her own career, and instilled in her family not only the desire to serve their country, but to honor our country with their life choices.
I think you will find this video a joy to watch. Happy Memorial Day from Boyer Writes!
Click on this link
Tribute to American fallen and Those who serve
Along with the dead of many wars, our soldiers are lovingly placed in the graves of their homeland, the United States of America. The story of how Memorial Day began may not be known to everyone. Below is a short history: 
Ceremony At Columbus , Mississippi Inspired Memorial Day
America has remembered its war dead since 1776. But the remembrance did not take official form until after the Civil War.
( For our international readers: The War between the North and South in the USA. The North were the Union troops, the Blue and the South, the Grey, were the Confederates.)
And the event which most historians credit as the first step toward national observance occurred before the guns were silenced in a Confederate cemetery holding the fallen of both North and South.
It came suddenly in two furious days of bloodshed at Shiloh Church, just across the border in Tennessee.
Then it passed on, leaving behind its legacy of death.
Some of the dead were taken to Columbus, Mississippi to be buried amid the rolling, magnolia-scented hills on an 18-acre plot once used by the Odd Fellows Lodge as a recreation ground.
Now it was April 1863. The agony of Shiloh was a year in the past. But it remained fresh in the minds of a small group of Southern women who moved quietly among the graves in the hastily prepared cemetery.
Ladies of the South
Led by Miss Matt Morton, they scattered spring flowers on the graves of the Southern soldiers who had died in their defense.
Then someone found two Union graves. The women placed flowers on them, too, and quietly they went away.
The simple act by the women of Columbus, transcending wartime bitterness, grew until it became a ceremony honoring all the American dead of all wars. 
It was first called Decoration Day, but later became known as Memorial Day. 
This weekend many will gather to hear a tribute to our soldiers who died in all wars. There will be music, speeches, prayers and salutes to give them the honor they deserve. Without them, we would not be the free and united country that we are today. Thank you to all the military, their families, and those who gave the ultimate sacrifice…their lives. 
See the video tribute shown previously, but worth viewing again.
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