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Monday, May 28, 2012
Please Remember Me
Most of the war dead of this Republic are entirely forgotten. I had never heard of our First Sumatran Expedition (there were others?), or the Coeur d'Alene War, or Shimonoseki Straits. Or most of the rest of these.
And I fancy myself as a student of military history. Ambisinistral sums the situation up, to perfection:
Most of the conflicts have been all but forgotten, but still there are the graves. May the veterans all Rest in Peace.
Amen. A lonely, foreign grave is not what we think is their due. Et lux perpetua luceat eis, Domine. Amen.
You do not need to know about a particular conflict to honor all of the war dead of our nation. Yet, I must admit, it would have been nicer, better, more patriotic, more educated,and more honorable to have known about more of these than I knew about before I saw your post. It is a shame that so much of history gets forgotten all to often. Thanks for the eye opener.
YOu don't remember the Coeur d'Alene War, but I do - I drive past the Steptoe Battlefield (Battle of Tehotinimme) almost every week.
You drive past it on a highway that overlooks the field of battle - a lowland area, wet from the creek that flows through it, surrounded on all sides by rolling Palouse hills hundreds of feet high. it is the only flat land for miles around.
I can picture the indians on the surrounding hilltops, descending on the troopers in the valley below and every time i drive past there, i get a shiver thinking about the hardness of the men that came west and conquered it. They were facing certain death for even the slightest of injury - hospitals weren't worth much back then, but they were worth far less when you were 500 miles from the nearest one.
You do not need to know about a particular conflict to honor all of the war dead of our nation. Yet, I must admit, it would have been nicer, better, more patriotic, more educated,and more honorable to have known about more of these than I knew about before I saw your post. It is a shame that so much of history gets forgotten all to often. Thanks for the eye opener.
ReplyDeleteGlenn, exactly. I feel like I should have know about many more of these.
ReplyDeleteYOu don't remember the Coeur d'Alene War, but I do - I drive past the Steptoe Battlefield (Battle of Tehotinimme) almost every week.
ReplyDeleteYou drive past it on a highway that overlooks the field of battle - a lowland area, wet from the creek that flows through it, surrounded on all sides by rolling Palouse hills hundreds of feet high. it is the only flat land for miles around.
I can picture the indians on the surrounding hilltops, descending on the troopers in the valley below and every time i drive past there, i get a shiver thinking about the hardness of the men that came west and conquered it. They were facing certain death for even the slightest of injury - hospitals weren't worth much back then, but they were worth far less when you were 500 miles from the nearest one.
Giants strode the Earth then.
Goober, they did indeed.
ReplyDelete