We use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) during our scanning and processing workflow to make the content of each page searchable. You can view the automatically generated text below as well as copy and paste individual pieces of text to quote in your own work.
Text recognition is never 100% accurate. Many parts of the scanned page may not be reflected in the OCR text output, including: images, page layout, certain fonts or handwriting.
THE
MOTION PICTURE
STORY
MAGAZINE
Vol. Ill
JUNE, 1912 |1
No. 5
The Sunset Gun
A Story of Memorial Day
(Edison)
By GENERAL HORATIO C. KING
From the Photoplay of Bannister Merwin
The custom of planting and strewing graves with flowers is of remote antiquity, but its adoption as an annual memorial followed the Civil War. Many claims to priority have been set up, and these have been carefully sifted by Veteran John B. Lewis, National Patriotic Instructor, G. A. R., from whose little book I compile these facts.
The prison pen near Charleston, S. C, was the site of the old racecourse between the Ashley and Cooper rivers. The ' ' God 's Acre ' ' of the victims of disease was enclosed by the colored people. On May 1, 1865, three thousand colored children, under the lead of their superintendent, Historian James Ridpath, marched to the cemetery, bearing floral gifts, and, after addresses, of which one was made by Col. James C. Beecher, in the presence of ten thousand persons, the flowers were placed upon the graves, among which the children . marched, singing patriotic songs. In 1867, Gen. John B. Murray established the ceremony in Waterloo, New York, his home. In the same year the ladies of Columbus, Miss., in the true spirit of fraternity and womanly tenderness,
17
placed flowers upon the graves of both Union and Confederate soldiers.
Sadly, but not with upbraiding,
The generous deed was done ; In the storm of the years that are fading
No braver battle was won.
But it remained for the Grand Army of the Republic to give a national and permanent character to the beautiful ceremony. In 1868, Gen. John A. Logan, then Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, by a General Order set apart the 30th of May, in which he said, among other things : " If other eyes grow dull, and other hands slack, and other hearts grow cold in the solemn trust, ours shall keep it well, as long as the light and warmth of life remain to us." Congress the same year recognized the day, and speedily the States North and West established it as a legal holiday. Perhaps the most touching ceremonials are those at Arlington, when, on May 30th, the graves of Union and Confederate alike are decorated with flags by the Grand Army of the Republic, while in June the Confederate veterans reciprocate in like manner, the bands playing
My country, 'tis of thee."