![\"Morris](\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Morris-head-new.jpg\")
<\/a>By Hobie Morris<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n(Brookfield, NY \u2013 May 2015) A small army of rambunctious and excited boys and girls decorated with colorful small American flags and bouquets of yellow daffodils, the grey gravestones of Civil War veterans lying in state in the quiet and peaceful Brookfield rural cemetery located at the edge of the village.\u00a0 Decoration Day was a full day unique American celebration.\u00a0 Hundreds of area people came into the village early that morning.\u00a0 The day included a parade to the cemetery to honor the veterans, numerous patriotic speeches often given by veterans themselves and mountains of food for all in attendance.<\/p>\n
The Town of Brookfield provided 350 soldiers and sailors to the Union cause; the last known Civil War veteran passing in 1933.\u00a0 These were the men who had rallied to President Lincoln\u2019s call and the nation\u2019s Old Glory.<\/p>\n
It was decided soon after the cannons grew cold and the muskets were laid down that the sacrifices of the nearly 450,000 New Yorkers who served in the Union cause would be remembered and their contributions preserved and passed on the future generations through such remembrance activities.\u00a0 Soon, of course, there would be other wars, new veterans and graves joining those of the past.<\/p>\n
The great American Civil War ended in April, 1865, 150 years ago.\u00a0 While the war ended in 1865, in fact America is still \u201cpaying for it\u201d through\u00a0 Civil War pensions to survivors of Civil War veterans.\u00a0\u00a0 Officially then the Civil War is still alive\u2014albeit barely.<\/p>\n
In July of 1913 some of Brookfield\u2019s Union veterans attended the greatest and last celebration of the men who wore the Blue and Gray.\u00a0 Nearly 50,000 men from all the States converged on Gettysburg and camped out in 5,000 tents.\u00a0 This reunion was in remembrance of the 50,000 casualties in this epic three-day crucial battle.<\/p>\n
During these centennial years, 1911-1915, 200,000 men living in 1911 had fought their final battle.\u00a0 A Civil War veteran died every 10 minutes.\u00a0 In another 10 years only a few stragglers were left; strangers to the post World War I and Roaring Twenties generation.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s difficult for today\u2019s generation to realize just how gigantic a conflict the Civil War was.\u00a0 While the Civil War lasted a little less than 1,500 days, there were 3,261 engagements in which life was lost and with minor actions and skirmishes, the total came to 6,800.\u00a0 There were on average two battles fought every 24 hours.\u00a0 The total death figure is between 750,000 and one million casualties, including civilians.\u00a0 There was one Civil War death every three-and-a-half minutes.\u00a0 Both the Union and Confederate armies lost nearly 14 percent of their fighting men during the war.\u00a0 At Shiloh the combined casualties amounted to 30 percent. The 1st Texas Regiment at Antietam lost 82.3 percent of its men.<\/p>\n
If miraculously we could return to life all those Civil War \u201cBilly Yanks\u201d and \u201cJohnny Rebs\u201d for one final fall-in tribute to each other, what an amazing scene it would be.\u00a0 There would be no muskets, swords, pistols or cannons present.\u00a0 Just the flower of youth who perished young and those valiant veterans who survived the war and had their individual battles during the aging years until called home to reunite with friends and foes, and now all brothers.<\/p>\n
First, I\u2019ll line up my two Central New York great uncles and brothers.\u00a0 I\u2019ll put them four-and-a-half feet apart and continue on, each Union soldier four-and-a-half feet from his comrade in blue.\u00a0 The not so numerous Confederates I\u2019ll place 12 feet apart, facing their one-time Yankee foes.\u00a0 On and on I\u2019ll place these two lines.\u00a0 If I got them all on one flat plain, it would have to be 1,700 miles long.<\/p>\n
America can never forget the men and women in both war and peace who put their country first in time of danger.\u00a0 America\u2019s history, although with flaws, has been a continual striving for betterment.\u00a0 While we have occasionally failed, far more often we have succeeded and we continue to push on.\u00a0 Our veterans, beginning with the honored Civil War soldiers, gave us time to make America better and provide new opportunities for all, regardless of color, religion, nationality, etc.\u00a0 We salute and thank you, all, you silent heroes.<\/p>\n
Hobie Morris is a Brookfield resident and simple country man.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Musings of A Simple Country Man By Hobie Morris (Brookfield, NY \u2013 May 2015) A small army of rambunctious and excited boys and girls decorated with colorful small American flags and bouquets of yellow daffodils, the grey gravestones of Civil War veterans lying in state in the quiet and peaceful Brookfield rural cemetery located […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42368,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-61890","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=61890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/42368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=61890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=61890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=61890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}