Gettysburg Address

"Fourscore and seven years ago..."
87 years.  Really, had it only been eighty-seven years since fifty-six men had pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor?  Was it really possible that there were men and women whose first memories were that of muskets firing at Redcoats had some of their last be of cannons firing at Rebels?

"...our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation..."
A new country.  A republic, unlike the monarchies, principalities, and empires of Europe and Asia.  This was a republic in a New World

"...conceived in Liberty..."
A country whose goal was freedom from a European power.  Free to be represented in the government.  Free to choose their leaders.  Free to travel where they wanted.  Freedom!

"...and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
All men?  Powerful words to be written by a slave owner such as Jefferson.  But now, maybe, just maybe, the bloody conflict raging from Virginia to New Mexico would create a path for all men in this country to be seen as equal.  Yes, all men had been created equal, but this country did not yet treat them as such.

"Now we are engaged in a great civil war..."
Father against son, brother against brother, neighbor against neighbor.  The house was divided, and this way it could not stand.  And who would win?

"...testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure."
Oh, how Europe watched in interest as the American conflict raged.  Would this experiment in a republic last?  Or, like Rome, would the civil war cause it to fall?

"We are met on a great battle-field of that war."
A great battlefield.  This would become the great battlefield.  Those three early July days  cost the lives of over 50,000 men.  It was the bloodiest battle of the war.  Big Round Top.  Little Round Top.  Seminary Ridge.  Cemetery Ridge.  Devil's Den.  Peach Orchard.  Wheatfield.

Gettysburg Battlefield

My friend Cody and I at Gettysburg

"We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place..."
And such a small portion that is.  You walk the battlefield, see the memorials, tour the museum, imagine the carnage.  And then the cemetery is such a small part, almost insignificant in comparison to the expanse of the Gettysburg Battlefield.

"...for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live."
And the nation has lived.  The lives of these Union soldiers were not spent in vain.

"It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this."
And thank you for doing this.  Some may take it as a mere tourist attraction, but for a few, this battlefield represents a war that divided a nation so it could be united stronger than before.  No longer would the United States be plural but singular.  The war took the country from being an "are" to being an "is."

Pennsylvania Memorial

"But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate--we can not consecrate--we can not hallow--this ground."
We are setting it aside, but why is this even possible?  Who did already dedicate this ground?

Iron Brigade Memorial

"The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract."
 Those thousands of lives had already dedicated this ground.  They proved the North would fight when invaded.  Not all the men had chosen to fight, some had been drafted, but they had still accepted their lot in life and fought, and as such became part of the great struggle to preserve or destroy the Union.

Edward Everett's Speech

"The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here..."
Oh sweet precious irony!  These words are still memorized by schoolchildren one hundred fifty years later.  Mr. Edward Everett's two hour speech lies largely forgotten, but Lincoln's two minute speech (or as much as we could piece together) is forever preserved and recited.  We remembered what was said there that November day.

Devil's Den

"...but it can never forget what they did here."
We cannot forget.  We must not forget.  If we forget history, we are doomed to repeat similar circumstances.  As history is pushed more and more aside in American education, will one day the sacrifices of Gettysburg, of the whole Civil War, of all wars, be forgotten to satisfy some legislation's vision of what children should learn?  NEVER forget the past.

"It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced."
How much war was left at this point?  No one could know.  The victories at Gettysburg and Vicksburg had turned the tide in the Union's favor, but the South still fought.

"It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us..."
A task that would drag on for another two years and thousands more lives

"...that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion..."
America was to fight in memory and honor of those who served at Gettysburg, who had fought until their last breath or the final bugle called them off the field.  They fought until the battle was over.

"...that we here highly resolved that these dead shall not have died in vain..."
These lives were not to have been useless wastes.  Many could have had decades ahead of them, but had their lives cut short.  But they had fought for a cause--that the United States was one, and that no man needed be a slave.

"...that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom..."
And America would rise after four years of conflict as a united country under one flag.  The Revolutionary War had granted America its freedom from Britain, but this war would create a nation to see the need to work as a unit--North and South, East and West, black and white, rural and urban, factory and farm.  Their diversity would become their strength.  E pluribus unum.  And this nation would not be able to endure if it were not for the all-powerful God, Sovereign over all nations, choosing to keep it together.  "In God We Trust."

"...and that the government of the people, by the people, for the people..."
The people make a democracy.  We, although often deceived by empty promises and flashy campaigns, choose the leaders.  We call on these men and women to make the decisions we desire.  We can write and lobby them with what we feel as important.  We have a voice.

"...shall not perish from the earth."
Oh, all things will end, but a republic does not end unless the people want it to.  It is your job, my job, every American citizen's job, to keep our country running.  And this cannot be done without a reliance upon God to guide the country.  God creates and destroys nations, and the only way to make this nation endure is to rely upon Him--not upon politicians and petitions and protests, but upon the Prince of Peace.

Lincoln leaving stage after giving Gettysburg Address

Abraham Lincoln gave the Gettysburg Address on November 19, 1863, at the dedication of the National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.  He did not actually write hurriedly it on the back of an envelope on the train the night before but wrote several drafts.  The exact wording Lincoln used that day is lost to history.  Five copies exist in Mr. Lincoln's handwriting, each slightly differing.  His invitation to speak "a few appropriate remarks" at the event was almost an afterthought, but even Edward Everett acknowledged that Lincoln said more in his two minutes than Everett had said in his whole speech.  In fact, Lincoln's speech was so short that the photographer at the event had no time to take a picture before Mr. Lincoln began walking down the steps to leave the stage.

Memorial Day

Do you really know why we started having this holiday?
I mean, do you really know?

"It's a day to honor the military, right?"

You're halfway to being correct.  It's a day to honor the military dead; a day to remember those who paid the ultimate sacrifice.  It's not technically a day to honor veterans (That's Veterans day on November 11.), although it is a lot easier to thank them for what they did than thanking the dead because they can actually hear you.  So, I'm not saying you're terrible and wrong for thanking our veterans.  It's just a friendly reminder because, ironically, we sometimes forget what Memorial Day is really about.

Memorial Day's origins date back to the Civil War.  Some say it is inspired by Southern women who would go and decorate the graves.  Eventually this practice spread to the North, and the first formal Decoration Day, as it was originally called, took place on May 30, 1868.  Eventually, this got changed to being the last Monday of May so we can have three day weekends.

Because that's what's important right?  Having days off and barbecuing and going to parades and whatever else it is Americans do to celebrate the holiday.  I mean, that's what this is for, right?

Allow me to cite you some statistics:
Number of fatalities in the Civil War:  Approximately 620,000

• 2% of the population died in the conflict
• The combined total of fatalities in all other American wars did not exceed this total until the Vietnam War.
• In today's numbers, imagine if over the last four years, America had lost six million men and women in war.
• One in four Civil War soldiers did not return home; approximately three and a half million men (and a few disguised women) fought in the Civil War
• In today's numbers, that would mean we would have sent approximately thirty-four million servicemen and women out.
• The  US military only has approximately one and a half million active duty personnel.
• Two thirds died from disease.
• That's approximately 413,333 dead from disease; only 206,667 from battle.
• Our today numbers would then translate to four million dead from disease and a "mere" two million dead from battle.
• These statistics are only the fatalities, not the casualties (which includes those killed, wounded, and captured/missing), whose numbers were not matched in all other wars combined until our current War on Terror.

Do you understand the price that was paid alone in the war that inspired this holiday?  I'm not even citing you the statistics from the Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Mexican War, Spanish-American War, World War I, World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War, Persian Gulf War, the War on Terror, and any other conflicts (i.e., the Quasi War with France, the Indian wars) that Americans have been involved with.

Maybe America is not the country she started out as.  Maybe we romanticize the way things were in the past.  But the fact still remains that the freedoms we have have been preserved because of the sacrifice millions of men and women have made.  This sacrifice has not just been made by those who enlisted and paid the ultimate price of their lives--their families and friends also felt the pain of that sacrifice.  Although I can't think of anyone I personally know who has died in war, I have had lifelong friends who have been deployed, and I have prayed for their safety because I know how devastated I would be if anything happened to them.  But I'm lucky.  Not everyone my age has been so lucky.  The current war has roots in an attack that took place on my country when I was eleven.  How many other twenty-two year old women, both nowadays and throughout history, have had to hear the terrible news that their brother, their sister, their husband, their father, their boyfriend is now dead?

I have been interested in history since I was seven, and my first fascination was with World War II.  Now my main fascination is the Civil War.  Not a generation of Americans has not felt the horrors of war to some extent.  We have either romanticized or demonized it.  But at the end of the day, no matter how good a cause was fought for, no matter who won or lost, no matter how the war was perceived by the public, every war has required its participants to sacrifice.

And the ultimate sacrifice is what we honor on this Memorial Day.

Sources

The Civil War. Dir. Ken Burns. PBS. 1990. DVD-ROM. 
"Civil War Casualties." Civil War Trust. N.p., 2013. Web. 26 May 2013.
"Memorial Day History." Memorial Day. N.p., 4 Apr. 2009. Web. 26 May 2013.