Ok, so I just saw a tweet from Michael Moore that I found rather interesting.
@MMFlint It's true. The 1st Memorial Day was organized by freed slaves 2 honor the Union soldiers the South had dumped in a mass grave in Charleston.
But when I went to look it up just out of curiousity that's not what I found. From USMemorialDay.Org
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service. There are many stories as to its actual beginnings, with over two dozen cities and towns laying claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day. There is also evidence that organized women's groups in the South were decorating graves before the end of the Civil War: a hymn published in 1867, "Kneel Where Our Loves are Sleeping" by Nella L. Sweet carried the dedication "To The Ladies of the South who are Decorating the Graves of the Confederate Dead" (Source: Duke University's Historic American Sheet Music, 1850-1920). While Waterloo N.Y. was officially declared the birthplace of Memorial Day by President Lyndon Johnson in May 1966, it's difficult to prove conclusively the origins of the day.
....
Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, in his General Order No. 11, and was first observed on 30 May 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery.
So which is it, was it a Day that come from Slaves honoring the lives spent maintaining the Union and (incidentally) securing their freedom, or was it first foster by the wives and loved ones of Confederates who were fighting for the "State's Rights" (to defy the rights of some of it's citizens) against an "oppressive" Federal Government.
Which is it?
Obviously more sources are needed.
Westminster, MD's Carroll County Times States.
On May 5, 1866, the town of Waterloo, N.Y., closed all of the shops and businesses so that residents could take a day to decorate the graves and reflect on the sacrifice of soldiers who'd died in the Civil War.
A century later, President Lyndon Johnson and Congress recognized Waterloo as the official birthplace of the Memorial Day holiday.
The designation wasn't without controversy, as numerous towns in both the North and South staked claims as being the first to commemorate the war dead. Approximately 25 locations have been named in connection with the start of Memorial Day, according to the website for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
On April 25, 1866, more than a week before the Waterloo ceremony, a group of women had gathered in Columbus, Miss., to decorate the graves of Confederate soldiers who'd been killed in the 1862 Battle of Shiloh, according to the website. Noticing the bare graves of some Union soldiers nearby, the women spread flowers on the Yankee graves as well.
So this seems to confirm the earlier report which mentions the song from 1867, with an event from April 25, 1866 not where the Confederate Women decorated the graves of southern soldiers, but where they honored those who had fallen from the North as well.
Hmmm...
What about the VA? It seems to confirm the Shiloh Story.
Three years after the Civil War ended, on May 5, 1868, the head of an organization of Union veterans — the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) — established Decoration Day as a time for the nation to decorate the graves of the war dead with flowers. Maj. Gen. John A. Logan declared that Decoration Day should be observed on May 30. It is believed that date was chosen because flowers would be in bloom all over the country.
...
Local Observances Claim To Be First Local springtime tributes to the Civil War dead already had been held in various places. One of the first occurred in Columbus, Miss., April 25, 1866, when a group of women visited a cemetery to decorate the graves of Confederate soldiers who had fallen in battle at Shiloh. Nearby were the graves of Union soldiers, neglected because they were the enemy. Disturbed at the sight of the bare graves, the women placed some of their flowers on those graves, as well.
Today, cities in the North and the South claim to be the birthplace of Memorial Day in 1866. Both Macon and Columbus, Ga., claim the title, as well as Richmond, Va. The village of Boalsburg, Pa., claims it began there two years earlier. A stone in a Carbondale, Ill., cemetery carries the statement that the first Decoration Day ceremony took place there on April 29, 1866. Carbondale was the wartime home of Gen. Logan. Approximately 25 places have been named in connection with the origin of Memorial Day, many of them in the South where most of the war dead were buried.
Official Birthplace Declared In 1966, Congress and President Lyndon Johnson declared Waterloo, N.Y., the “birthplace” of Memorial Day. There, a ceremony on May 5, 1866, honored local veterans who had fought in the Civil War. Businesses closed and residents flew flags at half-staff. Supporters of Waterloo’s claim say earlier observances in other places were either informal, not community-wide or one-time events.
Carboondale, Ill claims to be first, yet it was dated 4 days later than Shiloh. The Official first location is Waterloo, NY, but that didn't occur until over a week later than that.
And what about Moore, is he making a big mistake with his claim however romantic it might seem?
I've recently been talking about Confirmation Bias, where people tend to believe only what they prefer were true.
Confirmation bias is a type of cognitive bias and represents an error of inductive inference toward confirmation of the hypothesis under study.
Confirmation bias is a phenomenon wherein decision makers have been shown to actively seek out and assign more weight to evidence that confirms their hypothesis, and ignore or underweigh evidence that could disconfirm their hypothesis.
As such, it can be thought of as a form of selection bias in collecting evidence.
I have to admit as a Black American, I would prefer if the slave story were true since it would certainly provide a huge shove back to the entire movement to treat me and my ancestors as somehow "Less Than Real American". That's goes from the incessant attacks on our President's legitimacy and origin to the associations with "Socialism" and "Communism" linked to many minority and progressive positions.
But in order for it to be true, just about everyone else has to be wrong or else, essentially Lying About it. Is that possible? Is that likely?
Here's Moore's Proof via Brian Hicks at Post and Courier.
On a Monday morning that spring, nearly 10,000 former slaves marched onto the grounds of the old Washington Race Course, where wealthy Charleston planters and socialites had gathered in old times. During the final year of the war, the track had been turned into a prison camp. Hundreds of Union soldiers died there.
For two weeks in April, former slaves had worked to bury the soldiers. Now they would give them a proper funeral.
The procession began at 9 a.m. as 2,800 black school children marched by their graves, softly singing "John Brown's Body."
Soon, their voices would give way to the sermons of preachers, then prayer and — later — picnics. It was May 1, 1865, but they called it Decoration Day.
1865, almost a year prior to the earliest other event. That would seem to be the winner, but how could it be lost and forgotten - even to be supplanted by the "Official Birthplace" announcement, which didn't occur until the following year? How did this happen, is it it a hoax - a misnomer?
For years, the ceremony was largely forgotten.
It had been mentioned in some history books, including Robert Rosen's "Confederate Charleston," but the story gained national attention when David W. Blight, a professor of American history at Yale, took interest. He discovered a mention of the first Decoration Day in the uncataloged writings of a Union soldier at a Harvard University library.
He contacted the Avery Research Center in Charleston, which helped him find the first newspaper account of the event. An article about the "Martyrs of the Race Course" had appeared in the Charleston Daily Courier the day after the ceremony. Blight was intrigued and did more research. He published an account of the day in his book, "Race and Reunion." Soon he gave lectures on the event around the country.
"What's interesting to me is how the memory of this got lost," Blight said. "It is, in effect, the first Memorial Day and it was primarily led by former slaves in Charleston."
Well. Isn't that something. There are multiple points of documentation from history books and local newspapers, and now newer books on the event including Blight's which is here on Amazon.
Then I had another thought, if this was 1865, would they still be "Slaves"? Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 which supposed "Freed The Slaves", so shouldn't they be referred to as "Former Slaves"?
Well, maybe not.
The Emancipation Proclamation isn't really what's it's been chalked up to be. It didn't free all the slaves, it was in fact - a Military Ultimatum by the North against the South as was only possible under Lincoln's "Commander in Chief" powers.
Whereas, on the twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit:
"That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom.
The proclamation only granted freedom to slaves who were within counties that remained part of the rebellion after December 31st, 1863, not every slave in the nation. It actually listed them, country by county, and if any state or County ended their rebellion, the Proclamation wouldn't count. So is Charleston County South Carolina on the list or not?
Now, therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief, of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days, from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and parts of States wherein the people thereof respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United States, the following, to wit:
Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, (except the Parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James Ascension, Assumption, Terrebonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the City of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth[)], and which excepted parts, are for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued.
So I would say that Charleston was included an in fact Moore is wrong Right - these were not slaves, they were former slaves under the EP.
In the end though, maybe it doesn't matter who was specifically "First" - the fact that these events were occurring in various parts of the nation spontaneously in the aftermath of the Civil War from slaves burying and honoring the dead, to formerly confederate women decorating the graves of Union Dead as well as their own... maybe it's more about how we are all American and how we should honor the ultimate sacrifices of all our fallen warriors even if we disagree with the reason and rationale for their sacrifice
Be it being on the "wrong" side in the Civil War. Vietnam. Iraq or Afghanistan.
All of our fallen should be honored - politics and what makes of "feel better" about it be damned.
Vyan
3:50 PM PT: Another point on the "Freeing of the Slaves", is the point of fact that they still aren't Free, their status has simply been returned to what it was before the Virginia Slave Codes were established in 1701.
"All servants imported and brought into the Country...who were not Christians in their native Country...shall be accounted and be slaves. All Negro, mulatto and Indian slaves within this dominion...shall be held to be real estate. If any slave resist his master...correcting such slave, and shall happen to be killed in such correction...the master shall be free of all punishment...as if such accident never happened."
Prior to this persons could be required to work as an indentured servant if they owned debts or committed a crime. Well, that's what it was returned to with the 13th Amendment
1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation
When you realize this, it doesn't seem like exactly an accident the U.S. Laws and Sentences have long been written and implemented in so biased (prejudiced/profiled) a manner that there are more black men in prison today (800,000) than are in College (600,000) and 1/5 of those that were slaves in 1860 (4 Million).