Memorial Day is observed In the US on the last Monday of May. It’s a time set aside to honor and mourn military personnel that have died in the line of duty.

Stones River Fence line

Lynn, MK, and I visited the Stones River National Battlefield (https://www.nps.gov/stri/index.htm) and Cemetery (https://www.nps.gov/stri/learn/historyculture/nationalcemetery.htm) on our recent trip. Photos from there seem fitting for a Memorial Day post.

Stones River National Cemetery

The Civil War Battle of Stones River was fought from December 31, 1862, to January 2, 1863. There were 24,645 casualties in the battle (12,906 Union and 11,739 Confederate). That’s 31.4% of all troops and the highest percentage of casualties of any major battle in the Civil War.

Fields of fire

Tactically it was inconclusive, but strategically it was very important to the Union. The Confederate threat to Kentucky and Middle Tennessee was neutralized, and the Cumberland River wharfs and Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad were secured as major Union supply routes for the rest of the war. After the battle, Abraham Lincoln wrote to General Rosecrans saying: “You gave us a hard-earned victory, which had there been a defeat instead, the nation could scarcely have lived over.”

Cart

There’s a lot of talk nowadays about how divided we are in the US – and I suppose we are. But we all must search for common ground and strive to overcome our differences so that as Lincoln also said: the “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Artillery

This last photo (and the header image) are also appropriate for Memorial Day. Lynn and I made a habit of pulling off at rest stops along the Interstate. We almost didn’t visit this one in Kentucky, but I was really glad when we pulled into the parking lot and saw a beautiful field of poppies overlooking the road. I crouched down low to hide the traffic and emphasize the flowers and made this image:

Plentiful poppies II

“In Flanders Fields, the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row, 

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.”

From the poem “In Flanders Fields” by John McCrae, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Flanders_Fields)

Ever since Lt. Col. McCrae’s poem was published in 1915, poppies have been a symbol of soldiers lost in war.

You can see other Memorial Day related posts at this link: https://edrosack.com/?s=memorial+day

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. Take care of yourselves and each other. And remember the fallen.

©2021, Ed Rosack. All rights reserved