Evening capital and Maryland gazette., 1915-05-29
Decoration Day.


cept Florida, Georgia, Louisiana,
Mississippi. the Carolinas and Tennes-
see Monday is a legal holiday. Mon
day the veterans Of the Union Army
will decorate the graves Of their dead
wherever they lie.
April 26 was legal holiday-Con-
federate Memorial Day--in Alabama,
Florida. Georgia, and Mississippi;
MAY 10 in the Carolinas and the second
Friday Of May in Tennessee. In
Maryland the Confederate Memorial
Day falls on June 8.
Fittingly symbolizing the complete
union Of great country, sons Of the
Blue and the Gray will march side by
side to decorate the graves, too, Of
their deGd in later warfare; and sons
Of Northerner and Southerner, Union
ist and Confederate, will join in the
events Of Decoration Day just as they
Joined in Confederate Memorial Days
of the last month And the sons of
sons, the Boy Scouts in their khaki and
carrying their little guns proudly, TO
whom the strife of SO years ago
is schoolboy history. will march in
many cities, babes of patriotism who
to be the men Of tomorrow.
The ranks are thinning
The man of 65 was drummer boy
Of Is when thelwar was ended; he of
70, the full three-score and 10 years
allotted TO an earth-dweller. was not
yet man when he was taken from his
home To face fire and to handle
musket. So that il is no wonder
these are so comparatively few at the
meetings of the Grand Army. the
campfire gatherings of those who sup
ported the Lost Cause.
Men Of today can remember what
the children of this generation never
saw thousands of square-shouldered
vigorous, strong-limbed soldierly vet
Grams of both sides annually going to
the graves of their comrades with all
the spirit of youth. In that time the
veterans of the Civil War were as are
now the veterans of the Spanish-Amer-
lean War, the full-blooded youth of the
Maryland Line and similar veteran"
associations.
The Grand Army of the Republic,
with a membership of 400, 900 in 1890,
had only 800, ,O55 in 1905, and since
that time deaths have piled up rapidly
at the rate of 5000 annually. Only
few more years is given by statisti-
clans until some one or two men, or a
small group of half dozen, will be
making their last stand against the
advance of the common enemy.
The organization was launched in
Decatur, III, on April 8, 1866, pri
marily through the efforts of DR.. b.
r. Stephenson and Chaplain w. j.
Rutlege of the Fourteenth Illinois In
fantry, who in 1864 conceived the
idea. IL was then not even as popular
an idea as that organizing veterans of
the Spanish-Americsn War; witness
that it required two years to float it.
The principal object was to main
tain and strengthen fraternity among
soldiers and sailors of the Civil War,
% perpetuate the memory of the |
lead and 10 lend assistance to the |
needy. Any soldier or sailor who |
served between April IL, 1861, and |
April 9. 1865, and who was honorably /
discharged, was eligible to member
hip. The organization was divided /
nto department representing the
States and Territories, with 1000 |
ocal societies. To this organization
vas due the establishment as a legal |
holiday of May so, and its political
influence has been tremendous. Every
elected Republican President from
irsnt to Mckinley. served in the Civil
Var, and polled practically the solid
Grand Army vote. In 1869 a rule was
aid down against political interfer-
,nce, but while the letter was kept,
he spirit bobbed up on every occasion
# important elections or legislation.
An the pension laws and the dis
IbiIity act were due to Grand Army
ictivity.
Ir.o.L,s 49,, :. -. s.a -. |