"UP WITH THE SUN ON MEMORIAL DAY"...GAZETTE

By Jon Haglof, Editor, Middleboro Gazette

.............MIDDLEBORO — Memorial Day starts early for the Middleboro Veterans’ Council Honor Guard.

.....Each year, this group of veterans, the same who serve up 21-gun salutes at the annual Memorial Day and Veterans Day gatherings at Middleboro Town Hall and a long list of other events in the area, gather at the American Legion Hall on Thatcher’s Row just past 6 am and set out on a tour of Middleboro’s cemeteries.

.....Officially described as “the rendering of honors to deceased local veterans,” the early-morning Memorial Day meet-up is a longstanding tradition — 75 years or more, according to the group — where the Honor Guard and a handful of representatives from various veterans groups in the area visit four prominent local cemeteries and the Wareham Street Bridge to honor the dead, say a few words and prayers and place wreaths and flowers. Each of the short, heart-felt services is concluded with a 21-gun salute and the playing of Taps.

.......Monday morning’s tour had all the usual stops: St. Mary’s Cemetery to Cemetery at the Green to Nemasket Hill Cemetery and then Central Cemetery, which played a featured role in the town’s Memorial Day observances years ago. The early-morning light and quiet set the scene at each spot — rolling hills in soft shades of green and yellow and blue skies above at the Cemetery at the Green, and at Nemasket Hill, shady and still with sparse, speckled sunlight finding its way to the grave markers and illuminating American flags adorning the final resting spots of local vets.

......After visiting the cemeteries, a short breakfast break at the Middleboro VFW Hall, and from there, the ceremonies conclude with a stop at the Wareham Street Bridge and the Nemasket River to honor those who lost at sea.

......Walter Campbell, who served with the United States Navy in Korea in 1953/54 and later in Vietnam in 1967/68, remembers taking part in the rendering of honors each Memorial Day as a boy in the 1930s, with the Sons of the American Legion.

......It was big deal back then, he says, but the participating group has seen numbers drop over the years, for the obvious reasons related to the passing of time, and maybe because getting up at the crack of dawn to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice isn’t something people think do to anymore.

......“They’re used to be a lot more patriotism, in a sense,” Campbell said, “because we used to have the old World War I vets and the ladies and Ladies Auxiliary used to march down to the river, and everyone knew about it, so it was a much bigger congregation.”
Campbell missed the rendering of honors for a 26-year stretch between 1950 and 1976, while serving in the Navy, but it’s been an annual rite ever since. In that time, it seems to have become less and less a public event and more a tradition the Honor Guard carries on behalf of the town.

.......“The same group has been doing this for as long as I can remember,” Campbell said, noting he’d love to see more local folks come out for the event and share in the remembrance.
Officially, it is a public event, and Campbell and fellow honor guard member Fred Roberson say the invitation is open and standing to one and all.

.......Of course, it’s a more-solemn companion to the day’s featured events, the parade and the services at Veterans Memorial Park and Middleboro Town Hall. But someone looking for something more on Memorial Day — a deeper connection, some quiet reflection, maybe a chance to read the names of the local vets who served and died serving — might do well to tag along with the Honor Guard some Memorial Day morning. They'll be happy to see you there.

......As to why it’s an important ritual for those in attendance each time around, Roberson sums up nicely.

.......“Walt knew people who didn’t come back, I knew people who didn’t come back and it’s a way of remembering them and paying tribute or honoring the fact that we were the lucky ones, we came back, and they’re the heroes that gave anything.”

.......Roberson is a United States Army vet who served in Vietnam in 1966/67.
Mary Standish, a veteran of the United States Air Force and Senior Vice Commander of the American Legion, has been a part of the event for a few years now. She says visiting the grave sites and the rendering of honors is just one example of the commitment and devotion of the Honor Guard and the many other organizations that do the work of looking after American veterans, both living and departed. And it’s that work, those acts — given some consideration every day — that separate the living memorials from the lonely memorials.

.......“It’s very emotional,” she said. “It’s all brothers and sisters that have fallen, who gave their life for this country, and really, for our freedom. And it’s just to remember them… and we should remember them every day.” (Posted By Bob Lessard Historian Post 64)