“Today is the day Americans collectively remember those who have made their supreme sacrifice for this nation. This is, in essence, a national day of mourning, but it is more. It is also a day to recognize those who represent our heritage of service and duty to country and to community. It is a day to remember those who mustered, those who answered the call to serve, those who answered the call to duty, those who answered the call to assemble, to enlist and those who made the final muster by making the supreme sacrifice.
It is our heritage to honor the memories of those who have served and sacrificed.
Today we meet on a site that is a symbol of a muster called 230 years ago when approximately 100 patriots from what is now Stokes, Forsyth, Yadkin and Surry counties gathered to march up the Yadkin River to muster in Wilkes County with another corp of patriots --- to then march again to muster in Morganton with the OverMountain Men from TN and Virginia to join arms with others from our state and upper South Carolina. It was these patriots who answered the call to service, to chase the British from the Yadkin Valley and the Carolina mountains.; to chase them to Kings Mountain, SC -- where the patriots won a battle regarded as the turning point in the war for American Independence.
This is a story from our heritage.
Today, we honor the memory of those patriots -- the men who gathered on this symbolic field, some armed only with axes and hoes and walking sticks -- gathering here, assembling here to defend their homeland.
This, too, is part of our heritage.
We meet to honor the million and more Americans -- men and women who have mustered for two centuries beneath the colors of this nation on battlefields at home and around the world.
This is our heritage.
We meet to honor the men and women who have served in civilian support roles, to assist our troops and the families at home.
This, too, is our heritage.
We meet to honor the wives and husbands, the fathers and mothers and uncles and aunts, the grandparents and younger siblings who remain at home, maintaining our families and communities --- those who are ever vigilant for the safe return of those who served or currently serve.
All who serve or assemble as we do today have answered the call to muster -- to meet, to come together, to answer the call to duty, to serve .....
Today, especially today, we honor the memories of nearly 1,316, 000 Americans who responded to their last muster, their final muster. And let us never forget that almost half that number, over 600,000 lives, were lost in our own Civil War. That harsh reality, too, is a lesson from our history.
For those of us who have gathered here today, I ask that you think of a fallen soldier, possibly a member of your family, a comrade who served with you, someone who may be deceased or living, possibly retired or continuing to serve. Someone present today ... Think of those you personally honor. Call out their names.
Those we honor today reflect our heritage. Their memories affirm our history, as a community and as a nation.
What I have learned to fear in my work with Jonesville's Bicentennial is that if we don't remind each other of our heritage, our history and our heroes, we will forget to tell our children about them .... And if our children, our youth, the young adults of this community never learn what and who we value in our heritage and history --- they will never know to appreciate or to teach their children about their heritage, their heroes, their values .... We call out the names of our heroes -- Mark Garner .... Gen. James Taylor .... Gen. Tom Metz .... names such as Bishop, Pardue, Hicks, Mathis, Ghant, Groce, Harrell, Thompson, Combs, Couch, James, Gwyn, Hutchens, Holloway, Crissman, Wilson, Jones, Wolfe, Layle, Brown, Minish, Day, Howell -- the honor roll goes on and on and on .....
I am going to tell you about 3 local heroes and a group I will never forget.
• David Allen built an iron forge up Elkin Creek near the Wilkes County line in the early to mid-1700's -- he is the namesake of Allen's Settlement, which was the name of the area that is now Jonesville - Elkin - Arlington; an area that stretched from near Starmount High School to the Brushy Mountains to the Wilkes County line. David Allen was wounded driving a munitions wagon to several battles in the Revolutionary War in which his two sons, one a Captain and the other a private, fought .... When his munitions wagon returned from the battlefield, it carried prisoners and wounded soldiers .... David Allen Sr. had no known rank --- but he served. He served by repeatedly driving a munitions wagon from this very site to battles across our state -- to King's Mountain, Guildford County and Fayetteville.
• LT. Richard Woodruff, step-great grandfather to Jonesville Mayor Lindburgh Swaim, was a local physician who mustered into the Confederate Army as a supply sargent .... After a promotion, he was one of the officers who surrendered at Appomattox in 1865 to end the Civil War. His remains are interred at Island Ford Baptist Church on N.C. 67. His sword and other uniform accessories will be displayed during the Jonesville Bicentennial next year.
This was written by a Union observer on the day of that surrender: "The emotions of that scene — a great general and his brave, faithful soldiers weeping farewell to each other — cannot be described. The soldier-victors were generous and gave rations to the half-starving Confederates without any insulting taunts. Would that the same could be said of the political victors who controlled affairs at Washington."
• Private Hurley Lovelace, a quiet and unassuming barber in Jonesville for almost 50 years, was among a select few Americans to be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. This award is the second highest military decoration, after the Medal of Honor, that can be awarded for extreme courage in combat: In 1918 in France, Pvt. Lovelace ignored a shrapnel wound which rendered one arm useless, and continued to use his other arm to carry ammunition to machine gunners, exposing himself to additional risk, until, against his protests, he was ordered to the rear for medical attention.
In 1993, 58 American women were honored as A CIRCLE OF SISTERS -- A CIRCLE OF FRIENDS for their service to the troops in Vietnam and to the Vietnamese people .... Eight of these women were in the military and are listed on the Vietnam Wall, but the other 50 were civilians .... journalists, government employees, the Red Cross volunteers, missionaries, nuns, or volunteers with the Special Services/USO -- the program with which I worked. It is believed that more American civilian women died in Vietnam, but familys' requests for privacy and national security regulations prevent their being identified as casualties.
After military troops were pulled out of Vietnam in 1973, thirty-eight civilian women remained to air-lift orphans out of Vietnam. In April 1975, a plane carrying these women and several children died in a crash outside of Saigon, ending the program called "Operation Babylift."
Throughout history and most notably in the Middle East Conflict, we have learned that women have lost their lives in both combat and military-support roles. We know, for example, that during World War II, women served as pilots to ferry planes across the Atlantic ... We know that as early as the Revolutionary War, women took up arms when their husbands and fathers fell in battle .... We know the roles that women have played throughout history as nurses, couriers, laborers and guardians of the homefront. Today we honor all our heroes and heroines .... you spoke some of their names earlier ....
For our youth, we pray they learn the values in answering the call to serve -- that they appreciate the reason David Allen drove a wagon of munitions from this very land to battlefields at the other end of this state, that they respect why Richard Woodruff cried unashamedly when leaving his troops at Appomattox; why Hurley Lovelace deliberately and repeatedly risked his own life to save his comrades, why 38 women, knowing they had no protection from an oppressive Communist regime, would even think of rescuing thousands of orphans, and, especially, that our youth understand why we meet here today.
At the conclusion of today's program, you will hear the playing of the bugle call, Taps --- this elegant, hauntingly-sad sound will again remind us of our heroes, our history, our heritage and especially those who have answered the final muster .....
If you know the lyrics, repeat them with me:
Day is done, gone the sun,
From the hills, from the lake,
From the sky.
All is well, safely rest,
God is nigh.
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Go to sleep, peaceful sleep,
May the soldier or sailor, God keep.
On the land or the deep,
Safe in sleep.
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Day is done, gone the sun,
From the hills, from the lake,
From the sky.
All is well, safely rest,
God is nigh.
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God bless our heroes: those who served, those who continue to serve and those who have answered that Final Call. God bless this community and this nation. Gentlemen, thank you for this honor. May God bless each of you.”
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