This Memorial Day, almost every major retailer is trumpeting opportunities for savings, demonstrators will protest in cities throughout the land to express their disapproval of President Donald Trump’s policies, and more than 45 million Americans will travel at least 50 miles from home.
Underscoring all that, some Americans will stand in reverent silence before headstones that stretch across green fields and distant hills.
The ceremonies, conducted in communities large and small, are not only acts of remembrance—but of reckoning.
The fallen are not mere names etched in stone; they are voices, speaking across time of courage, sacrifice, and the unfinished work left to the living.
Among the stories told was that of Mary Siezgle, one of five women known to have fought in the Battle of Gettysburg. Disguised as a man to serve beside her husband, she was wounded and discovered in a field hospital, her courage nearly erased from the official narrative.
Her tale reminds us that valor is not confined by sex or status—it is defined by action, by sacrifice, and by the willingness to stand for something larger than oneself.
There’s Nathan Hale, Staff Sergeant Ronald J. Shurer II, Captain Kimberly A. Hampton, Lance Corporal Richard A. Anderson, Corporal Freddie Stowers, Third Class Cook Dorie Miller, Sgt. First Class William Sitman, and many more who died famously, anonymously or in obscurity, but whose humanity and heroism are beyond question.
The Baylor Massacre was a surprise British attack on Continental Army troops in River Vale, New Jersey, that resulted in 15 American deaths on September 27, 1778.
John Basilone made his way from Somerset County, New Jersey, to Iwo Jima to become one of 3,536 Americans awarded Medals of Honor.
There were 57,939 names inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall.
During World War II, 407,316 American service members died.
Approximately 360,222 Union soldiers died, as did 258,000 Confederate traitors, waging the American Civil War.
George Bush wasted 4,424 American lives in a snipe hunt to eliminate Iraq’s nonexistent weapons of mass destruction.
From those earliest days of revolution through civil conflict to modern battlefields overseas, the thread of service runs unbroken, and the debt can never be repaid.
On this day, the nation turns its gaze toward those who stepped forward when called—and who paid the price in full.
Henry Gunther was an American soldier believed to be the last of any of the belligerents to be killed during World War I.
We remember Master Sergeant George A. Bannar Jr., a Special Forces medic killed in 2019 while evacuating civilians under fire in Afghanistan.
We remember Sergeant Nicole Gee, captured in her final act of compassion during the chaotic Kabul withdrawal, cradling a baby in her arms and saying simply, “I got you.” Her last post read, “I love my job.”
And we remember Captain Kimberly A. Hampton, the first female combat pilot lost in Iraq, and Staff Sergeant Ryan C. Knauss, who died defending the gates of the Kabul airport from terrorism.
These are not merely heroes of their generation—they are exemplars of the American spirit: selfless, brave, and resolute.
Their sacrifice joins a long procession of lives offered for the defense of liberty. From the trenches of France to the rice paddies of Vietnam, from the Korean Peninsula to the sands of the Middle East, the stories echo with unyielding dedication.
As John F. Kennedy once said, “A nation reveals itself not only by the men it produces, but also by the men it honors, the men it remembers.”
Today, we remember and aspire to be worthy of their sacrifice and service.
Yet not all losses come at the hands of the enemy. Pat Tillman, who left a professional football career to serve as an Army Ranger after 9/11, died by friendly fire—his death obscured by misdirection and spin.
His mother, Dannie, spent years demanding truth from an institution unwilling to offer it. “They trivialized his death,” she said, “to sell a war.”
Tillman’s story, and that of the Niger Four—Staff Sergeants Bryan Black, Jeremiah Johnson, Dustin Wright, and Sergeant La David Johnson—remind us that accountability is not a political luxury; it is a moral imperative.
These fallen did not choose their fates for parades or medals. They served for love of country, for those beside them, and for ideals that too often go unfulfilled.
Nearly 1,500 soldiers of the 3rd U.S. Infantry Regiment, known as “The Old Guard,” placed over 260,000 flags across Arlington National Cemetery, Virginia.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will serve as grand marshal at NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600.
Among the displays may be a gold star, red poppy, or an American flag, but if we are to truly honor the people who gave their lives, it must be with more than symbols and ceremonies.
As Abraham Lincoln urged at Gettysburg, “It is for us, the living, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.”
That unfinished work calls us to confront hard truths.
It demands that we reject comfortable myths and face institutional failures that send young Americans into danger without clarity or purpose. It requires that we recognize the invisible service of those who paid the highest price and the quiet burdens borne by families who must go on without their loved ones.
We must resolve to never deploy forces for impossible or ridiculous tasks and never resort to violence when other means can resolve international disputes.
And it calls us, finally, to action.
Not everyone will serve in uniform—but all can serve.
In schools and shelters, in courtrooms and city halls. In defending truth, mentoring the next generation, or simply showing up for those whom war has touched, on whom hard times have fallen, or fight against demons, injuries, and illnesses as varied as snowflakes.
Our government is in disarray, so we have the duty to make amends. It’s time for Americans to rise to the responsibility of citizenship by replacing the people who dominate the political establishment in service to plutocracy with individuals who possess integrity and common sense. It’s time for honest people to make good trouble.
As Frederick Douglass said, “Those who profess to favor freedom, yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing the ground.”
Let this day not end in silence alone, but in resolve. As the bugle’s final note fades, let us pledge together:
No more wasted lives.
No more unmarked graves.
No more lies draped in flags.
The fallen ask not for tears—they ask for courage. They ask that we live fiercely, question boldly, and hold sacred the hard-earned peace they never came home to enjoy.
May we, the living, prove worthy of their silence.