What Memorial Day Means to Me

Memorial Day hit me kind of differently this year. While it has always been sobering to think about the countless soldiers who gave that “last full measure of devotion”, it was even more meaningful this time having recently discovered that I have two ancestors who had lived out the verse: “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.” (John 15:13) It made the day feel more real, more personal. These soldiers we were remembering and honoring on this special day were no longer just a bunch of men I didn’t know or have a connection to, but they had a name and a face and a very personal connection…

William Drewry Silvey

Born: 1752

Died: 1789

Originally from Fetteresso, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. He fought and was wounded in the Revolutionary War, dying years later from his wounds.

“When the war came to Laurens (a county in South Carolina), he joined the county militia in defense of his family and home. He was severely wounded at the Battle of Hammond’s Store in Clinton on December 30, 1780. He never fully recovered and succumbed years later to his injuries.”

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Charles Valentine Thompson

(my great-great grandfather on my paternal grandmother’s side)

Born: February 14, 1888

Died: November 4, 1918

He was killed in action in France during WWI, just seven days before the armistice.

“After arrival in France, his company was used as replacement troops in the 2nd Division and attached to the 9th Infantry. During the night of November 3-4, the 9th advanced about three miles through a dense wood north of Nuart and established a line on the hills just south of Beaumont in front of the German second line of defense. The enemy at daybreak opened a terrific shell fire and brought into play a number of machine guns. It was during this action that Pvt. Thompson was killed. The Corporal in charge of the machine gun he was on having been wounded, Private Thompson took charge of the gun and was in the act of operating it when he was hit by the enemy machine fire which killed him instantly. He was buried later near where he fell. This was at La Tullerie farm, a mile south of Beaumont, on the Meuse, France.”

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I recently watched the movie A Great Awakening (for about the third or fourth time now 😁), and I was struck by a powerful scene where George Washington is talking to Ben Franklin and Franklin’s grandson about the dark valley in their nation’s history – the bitter winter at Valley Forge. He pointed out that they faced an even darker valley with the disunity at the Constitutional Convention…

“We planted a tree that has been watered by the blood of patriots. We did not plant it for ourselves, we planted it for him, and his children and their children, that they may have shelter under its branches. The tree we planted is hardly grown, and already each state has taken an axe to its trunk…if this convention fails, the sacrifice of those men at Valley Forge and so many others will be in vain.” –George Washington, The Great Awakening

I believe that today, we are in one of the darkest valleys in our country, one that Washington probably never imagined – where instead of protecting life, we kill the most defenseless (babies in their mother’s wombs), we do not acknowledge Jesus as Lord, and we call evil good, and good, evil.

May we honor the memory of the brave soldiers who have watered the tree of liberty with their blood, and not let their sacrifice be in vain. And let us not honor them just with nice words one day out of the year, but with how we live day in and day out. May we never esteem too lightly, or misuse, the liberties given to us by our Creator God, and that these men gave their lives to defend.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”

-Thomas Jefferson