Memorial Day

Commermorates U.S. Solders who give their lives while in the military services.

First enacted to honor Union soldiers of the American Civil War. First started as Decoration Day, and sponsored by the Women's Relief Corps, with 10,000 members.

In 1865, in Waterloo, NY, a social gathering was held to honor the patriotac dead of the Civil War by decorating their graves.

In Columbus, Mississippi in 1866, a group of women visited a cemetery to decorate the graves of Confederate soldiers who had fallen in the battle at Shilo. Near by were the graves of Union soldiers, neglected because they were the enemy. Disturbed at the sight of the bare graves, the women placed some of their flowers on those graves as well.

We cherish too, the Poppy red

That grows on fields where valor led,

It seems to signal to the skies

That blood of heroes never dies.

(Moina Michael, 1915)