of Governor Herbert R. O'Conor 401

MEMORIAL DAY EXERCISES

May 30, 1941
Taneytown

MEMORIAL Day, 1941, finds us standing, with mixed emotions, beside the
resting places of our heroic dead. Even while we pay them respectful
tribute, our minds cannot dismiss the thought of new wars now raging, of other
Memorial Days now m the making.

We have come today to the graveside of patriots with a deep sense of rever-
ence and a devout feeling of gratitude. We come with a full realization of the
inescapable truth that all the blessings we now enjoy, the blessings of freedom
and individual initiative, exist only because men have gone to war to procure
and protect them for us. We come with a thorough understanding of the fact
that we would be neither independent nor a united Nation, nor the most favored
Democracy under the sun, unless there had been men who died in battle.

Today flags wave anew in all our cemeteries; flowers brighten the narrow
plots wherein sleep the heroes of past wars; band play and remembrance brings
reminiscent tears to the eyes of those gathered to honor our veterans of by-
gone campaigns.

Wars and memories of wars, honors to the heroes of those wars, form
that long line of history that reaches back so far with its repetitious pattern!

Down through the corridor of memories, each one here today could wander
and read traced on the cold hard walls, the stories, and the causes, of these
deaths which we memorialize now. No doubt, many of you remember the first
Memorial Day after the Armistice. In every community citizens watched the
long lines of khaki-clad soldiers march along, and there was a catch in many a
throat for the gallantly-smiling disabled veterans, who rode with their crutches
beside them or with empty sleeves pinned to their coats.

There were Gold Star Mothers in the watching throng, trying in vainxto
conceal the tears that blurred their eyes. And the cheer that went up for the
few bent, old veterans of wars long past who insisted on marching with their
grandsons! There was sorrow in the occasion, but there was glory as well.

The story of today's wars is not new. -National prides, nationalistic ambi-
tions will always be a source of conflict. Man must at all times be ready to
defend his home. The soldier who dies in battle lives forever in the memory
of his fellow-citizens. Our heroes' names carry on with escutcheon burnished
bright by song and story.

So, again this year, the bands play, and guns and swords gleam and flash in
the sunlight as the veterans march by. American youths newly in the service
of their Country, thrill in martial airs, while their loved ones gaze with pride
and hearts filled with anxiety.