Time and Honor

By Anna Cooper

Your “Youth” has fallen from its shelf,

And you have fallen, you yourself.

They knocked a soldier on the head,

I mourn the poet who fell dead.

And yet I think it was by chance,

By oversight you died in France.

You were so poor an outward man,

So small against your spirit’s span,

That Nature, being tired awhile,

Saw but your outward human pile;

And Nature, who would never let

A sun with light still in it set,

Before you even reached your sky,

In inadvertence let you die. 

—Killed in Action

Isaac Rosenberg: 1890-1918

Freedom. The United States was founded on that simple concept. So much sacrifice has been needed to secure such freedoms. On December 14, 2019, the Shiloh National Cemetery took part in National Wreaths Across America Day to honor fallen soldiers. The wreaths placed at the graves of fallen soldiers honor their sacrifice to our great nation. 

The Shiloh National Cemetery was ordered to be established in 1866 by the War Department on the grounds of the Shiloh battlefield. This cemetery was to contain the fallen from the battle of Shiloh on April 6-7, 1862, but also from similar operations along the Tennessee River. It was started under the name Pittsburg Landing National Cemetery, but it was changed to Shiloh National Cemetery. By 1889, 3,584 Civil War soldiers had been buried there with 2,359 of them being unknown. The soldiers had been re-interred from 156 battlefield locations, another 565 locations along the Tennessee River followed.

National Wreaths Across America Day will be on December 19, 2020. They will honor all of the fallen soldiers by laying over 10,000 wreaths. Shiloh usually asks for volunteers for the ceremony; it’s a great way to teach future generations about our nation's history and the measures necessary to keep our freedom.