Did you know that Memorial day was instituted as result of the Civil War?

There is some debate about the origins of Memorial Day in this nation. Certainly families and those who served alongside servicemen who died in times past did their best to honor the dead in the civil war. Sometimes truces were made to bury the dead while other times savagery and revenge prevailed.
“Memorial Day was started by former slaves on May, 1, 1865, in Charleston, S.C., to honor 257 dead Union soldiers who had been buried in a mass grave in an upscale race track converted into a Confederate prison camp. They dug up the bodies and worked for two weeks to give them a proper burial as gratitude for fighting for their freedom. They then held a parade of 10,000 people led by 3,000 Black children, where they marched, sang and celebrated.”
To dedicate the cemetery to the Union’s war dead, Black and white leaders came together to organize a parade of 10,000 people, described in a New York Tribune account as “a procession of friends and mourners as South Carolina and the United States never saw before.” At the front of the parade were 3,000 Black children, laden with roses and singing “John Brown’s Body,” while bringing up the rear were a brigade of Union troops, including the Massachusetts 54th Regiment and the 34th and 104th United States Colored Troops. (The commander of the 21st United States Colored Infantry had been the one to formally accept the city’s surrender.) Following the parade and dedication in the cemetery, the crowd settled down to picnic, listen to orators and watch the troops march.
In the years to come, there would be many variations on Memorial (or “Decoration”) Day before the nation settled on the holiday’s current form.“
On memorial Day 2016 I pray that every family member and friend who served with each Soldier, Sailor, Marine and Airman is comforted by the Lord God and by human friends who will come alongside them as they mourn.

Pictures: 1865-5-1 The FIRST Memorial Day ever was marked by former Slaves of Charleston, SC;
1865 First-Memorial-Day-honoring-257-Union-soldier-martyrs-10000-freedmen-march-led-by-3000-children; 1865-05-02 charlestondailynews-short
The Black History of Memorial Day
New-York Historical Scholar Trustee David Blight speaks about a Memorial Day celebration that took place on May 1, 1865. That day, Black workmen went to the site of an outdoor Confederate prison and in Charleston, South Carolina, and reburied the dead Union soldiers that had been left in a mass grave. They built a high fence around the property to protect the site, then joined with white missionaries and teachers in a march of 10,000 around the grounds. Trustee Blight believes this event—which he discovered during the course of archival research—to have been the earliest Memorial Day, founded by African Americans in a ritual of remembrance and consecration.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JOXqoKmTNG0

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