Seattle Honors Its Civil War Veterans
A massive Memorial Day parade and solemn ceremony at Lake View Cemetery mark the city's largest-ever tribute to fallen Union soldiers.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The nation's dead soldiers were remembered yesterday in the true spirit of patriotism by the people of Seattle. The Grand Army of the Republic took the initiative in the management of the celebration, but the result was that Memorial Day of 1892 was the most perfect success for an event of the kind in the history of the city. By 10 o'clock, Second street, Yesler avenue, Front and Union streets were lined on both sides with thousands of people eagerly waiting to watch the procession march. The parade included police, the First Regiment, Seattle High School cadets, and various veterans' posts, including twenty-one survivors of Andersonville prison. After marching through the streets, the crowds moved into the Armory, which was soon packed to capacity. Inside, children from the city's public schools sang 'My Washington,' and orator James Leddy delivered a stirring address on the cost of the Union and the duty to support disabled veterans. Following the indoor exercises, the focus shifted to Lake View Cemetery, where over 2,000 people gathered to decorate twenty-two soldiers' graves, concluding with a three-volley salute fired by the Sons of Veterans.
“A land without ruins is a land without memories; a land without memories is a land without liberty.”
Memorial Day in 1892 served as a bridge between the trauma of the Civil War and the growth of a young, booming Seattle. While the scale of the public spectacle was immense, today's remembrance highlights the city's continuity; the soldiers buried in Lake View Cemetery remain part of a landscape that has changed from a frontier town to a global tech hub.
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