Here Lies, In Honored Glory, an American Soldier Known But to God
On October 24, 1921, Sgt. Edward F. Younger,
approached four identical caskets laid in the city hall of Chalons-sur-Marne in
France. Sgt. Younger had, himself, been
badly wounded in combat, been highly decorated for valor and received the
Distinguished Service Medal. But he was
alive, and on this day he had an awesome task.
The four caskets before him had each been exhumed, quite at random, on
Memorial day, 1921, from four World War I American cemeteries in France. Each contained the remains of a soldier who
had been unrecognizable and unknown at the time of his burial. All anyone will ever know about these four
bodies is that they were American soldiers and had fallen in “The War to End
all Wars.” Younger’s task was both
simple and agonizing. He would select
one of these caskets for internment in the newly created Tomb of the Unknown
Soldier. Sgt. Younger moved forward (at
what impulse we will never know) and placed a spray of white roses on the third
casket from the left.
That
casket was transported to Washington, D.C. on the USS Olympia, while the
remaining three were entered in the Meuse Argonne Cemetery in France. The casket Younger chose lay in state at the
Capitol until Armistice Day, November 11, 1921, when President Warren G.
Harding interred the body in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
This
national memorial to all of America’s fallen and unknown soldiers has since
grown to include unknowns from World War II, the Korean Conflict and (briefly)
from the Vietnam War. [The remains from
that tomb were exhumed and identified through DNA analysis in 1998. That crypt has been empty ever since and
replaced with a plaque that simply says “Honoring and Keeping Faith with
America’s Missing Servicemen, 1958-1975.”]
This weekend, and every
weekend. Today and every day. Despite
the weather, unrest at home or abroad, calm or danger, heat or intense cold, in
Arlington Cemetery, the soldiers who keep eternal watch over the Tomb of the
Unknown Soldier, continue to march their constant, steady, sharp-eyed
detail. They never stop. Covered in snow, pelted in rain, buffeted by
wind, on the hottest days and the coldest, they never stop. They marched during Hurricane Sandy. After the September 11 terrorist
attack on the Pentagon, all the Tomb’s honor guard were summoned to duty. Their duty alternated between helping at the
Pentagon and guarding the Tomb of the Unknown’s, even though the cemetery
itself was closed to the public. They
did not march the mat that day, but they stood in constant vigil, guarding the
Tomb, perhaps more aware than usual of their solemn charge.
The tomb sentinels, from
the “Old Guard” the Army’s 3rd Regiment, are selected from across
the country. It is rigorous training and
most who enter it don’t make it to the end.
Those who do become a brotherhood of fierce pride. A “relief” of six soldiers will guard the
tomb for a 24-hour shift. They will gracefully
march 21 paces on “the mat” turn to the north at attention for 21 seconds, and
return 21 paces back, facing the tomb at each turn and counting the 21 seconds
of tribute.
The way these dedicated
soldiers guard the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is a metaphor for how all of us
must guard this nation and the best it stands for: quietly, relentlessly,
unstintingly, lovingly.
Let’s keep the faith because,
“Here
rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God.”
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