The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-05-28
On flames eternal camping ground,

vi eleIudl camping STUuHu, b.
lhelr silent tents are spread,
And glory guards with solemn round
The bivoGac of the dead. --O'Hara.
To the women of Columbus, Miss, is
attributed the honor of being among
The first to decorate with flowers the
graves OF soldiers ana sailors who fell
n the civil war. To their praise be it
said, they scattered their beautiful
cfferinSs with impartial hands alike
over the graves of those who had
fought for the South and those who had
died fer the North. 1t was this touch
Ing incident that suggested to Francis
Miles Finch the fine poem entitled THE
Blue and the Gray" the last stanza of
which is:
40 more shall the war cry sever
Or the winding river be red;
They Danish OR anger forever
When they laurel the graves of our
dead
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment day;
Love and tears for the blue.
Tears and love for the gray.
The custom gradually spread
throughout the South-April 81 being
the date selected for its observance.
General John a. Logan. when COM
mander-in- chief of the Grand Army Of
the Republic, received. it is said, let
ter from a German residing in Cincin-
natl. in which the statement was made
that it was springtime custom OF the
people in the German fatherand to dec
crate with flowers the graves of their
soldiers. The writer suggested that
the custom be adopted in the United
States. The idea met with the approval
Of General Logan, and in 1868 he APP
pointed May 80 as the date of its OBJ
serVance.
t,ot Ia+a NTa,-
selected not only because of the album
dance of flowers at that season of the
year. hut also because on that day the
last soldier of the civil war was mus
tered out of service. The custom of
having parades was not introduced I'M
til 1882 Each year there are fewer old
soldiers to join in these professions,
and each year there are new graves to
receive the loving tributes of flowers
and tears from the living.
There are rs national cemeteries scat
tered throughout some IS states of the
union. and in them lie the remains of
$4,000 soldiers. Virginia has 16 in
which are buried $4,000 men; Tennessee
comes next with Z. in which are 5724S
dead; Mississippi has >, with 25,497;
Georgia 2. with 23,S69; Louisiana 4,
with 20,S61; North Carolina 4. with
1885; Missouri 3, with 14.151. 1t will
be seen that these seven states contain
within their borders more than half of
all the national cemeteries and that in
then are buried above two-thirds of
the entire number of soldiers who sleep
in government grounds In the ceme-
teries of no other single state are there
abouve 10000 soldiers buried. The
smallest number of men (43) are in the
battle-ground cemetery, District of Co
lumbia, and the largest number 1093S)
are in Arlington cemetery, Virginia
Sixteen thousand six hundred and fifty
six are buried at Nicksburg, Miss:
1858 at Nashville, Tenn, and 1928 at
Fredericksburg. Va.
The cemetery of Arlington, which. is
Just across the Potomac river from
Washington, was established May -,
1864. The property belonged to Gen.
Robert E: Lee, and before the war was
one of the finest homes in the South
About 1000 of the dead buried there
are unknown. Beneath single stora
less than four yards long and about
two wide ''lie the remains of ELL SOL
diers collected from the battlefield of
Bull Run and the route of the Kappa
hammock after the war;
Arlington is indeed a place for tender
memories, for thanksgivings and for
prayers, but it is no place for pride and