Veterans Remembrance Days

Among our national holidays are several that celebrate the beginnings and ends of military conflicts. These include Memorial Day (May 30), Independence Day (July 4), and Veterans’ Day (November 11). Both Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day are days of remembrance for the war dead, rather than commemoration of a military event.  Memorial Day was once known as Decoration Day, for the day families visited to decorate the graves of fallen loved ones. Veteran’s Day, originally known as Armistice Day, is celebrated by many countries as Remembrance Day for the fallen dead of World War I.  The armistice was marked on the eleventh hour of the eleventh month of 1918 and at the time was hailed as the end of “the war to end all wars.”

Independence Day of course marks the beginning of the Revolutionary War.  It’s celebrated with parades, fireworks, and patriotic music, the very opposite of the somber nature of both Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day.

The Revolutionary War also came to an end, when General Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown.  Outside of Yorktown, very few Americans know anything about October 19, 1781. According to the Department of Defense, about 217,000 Americans served in the Revolutionary War, a little over five per cent of the population of the colonies.  The colonies suffered over ten thousand casualties (dead and wounded), about five per cent of soldiers serving, comparable to our losses in the world wars of the twentieth century.  The war ending at Yorktown created a new country and caused the resignation of the government of the former mother country.

Figure 1. Musket Firing at Yorktown Victory Center

Yorktown Victory day is celebrated locally in Yorktown with a parade and a commemorative ceremony. Military units representing all branches of the U.S. military, the fife and drum corps, ROTC units and various patriotic organizations march to the Yorktown Victory monument.  This year, as in most previous years,  the government of France, the key American ally at Yorktown, participated by sending special greetings.

Three years ago marked the 225th anniversary of the victory at Yorktown, and a reenactment took place on the grounds of the actual site (now a national park).  Soldiers, dressed in the uniforms of the different state militias and foreign governments, marched to the same music and drums and performed the full ceremony. Actors impersonating General Washington and the British officers appeared in full dress.

Figure 2. Washington being Greeted by his Troops

Victory at Yorktown occurred because the French fleet commanded by Admiral De Grasse blockaded the Chesapeake Bay, stopping any possibility for the army under Cornwallis to escape or be resupplied. Cornwallis found himself besieged by American armies under Washington and Lafayette, and a large French force under General Rochambeau.  Cornwallis did not personally surrender on October 19.  He sent his second –in –command, Charles O’Hara, to deliver a sword of surrender.

Figure 3. British Officers Surrender at Yorktown

According to myth, the British bands played “The World Turned Upside Down,” on the way to the surrender.  The song was a royalist ballad of the 1600’s, protesting the end of Christmas traditions when Oliver Cromwell overthrew and beheaded King Charles I and became dictator of England in 1645. Possibly American bands played “Yankee Doodle.”

For the principals at Yorktown the world indeed soon turned upside down.  General Rochambeau, the French hero, returned to France to be honored by King Louis XVI.  King Louis was overthrown by the French Revolution of 1789 and lost his head; Rochambeau barely escaped with his.  Lord Cornwallis returned to England and was appointed Governor General of India.  The Cornwallis estate still has his sword.  It was either returned to him by Washington, or he never gave it up at Yorktown.

Victory at Yorktown occurred because the French fleet commanded by Admiral De Grasse blockaded the Chesapeake Bay, stopping any possibility for the army under Cornwallis to escape or be resupplied. Cornwallis found himself besieged by American armies under Washington and Lafayette, and a large French force under General Rochambeau.  Cornwallis did not personally surrender on October 19.  He sent his second –in –command, Charles O’Hara, to deliver a sword of surrender.