The African American Roots Of The Memorial Day Holiday

Edited by Azizi Powell

This post provides historical information about the African American roots of the Memorial Day holiday. A sound file of Joan Baez singing a song entitled "Free At Last" is also featured in this post.

Click http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2014/05/free-at-last-spiritual-gospel-song.html for a pancocojams post about the African American Spiritual & Gospel song "Free At Last".

The content of this post is provided for historical, cultural, and aesthetic purposes.

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Thanks to all those who are honored by the celebration of the holiday now known as "Memorial Day". Thanks also to those who helped create the Memorial Day holiday, including those Black residents of Charleston, South Carolina who organized a May day celebration to honor Union prisoners who had died in that city during the Civil War. Thanks also to Joan Baez for her performance of the song that is featured in this post. This video is an example of pancocojams featuring an artist who isn't Black.

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INFORMATION ABOUT THE AFRICAN AMERICAN ROOTS OF THE "MEMORIAL DAY" HOLIDAY
From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memorial_Day
"Memorial Day is a US federal holiday wherein the men and women who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces are remembered.[1] The holiday, which is celebrated every year on the final Monday of May,[2] was formerly known as Decoration Day and originated after the American Civil War to commemorate the Union and Confederate soldiers who died in the Civil War. By the 20th century, Memorial Day had been extended to honor all Americans who have died while in the military service...

The first widely publicized observance of a Memorial Day-type observance after the Civil War was in Charleston, South Carolina, on May 1, 1865. During the war, Union soldiers who were prisoners of war had been held at the Charleston Race Course; at least 257 Union prisoners died there and were hastily buried in unmarked graves.[12] Together with teachers and missionaries, black residents of Charleston organized a May Day ceremony in 1865, which was covered by the New York Tribune and other national papers. The freedmen cleaned up and landscaped the burial ground, building an enclosure and an arch labeled, "Martyrs of the Race Course." Nearly ten thousand people, mostly freedmen, gathered on May 1 to commemorate the war dead. Involved were about 3,000 school children newly enrolled in freedmen's schools, mutual aid societies, Union troops, black ministers, and white northern missionaries. Most brought flowers to lay on the burial field. Today the site is used as Hampton Park.[13] Years later, the celebration would come to be called the "First Decoration Day" in the North."

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SHOWCASE EXAMPLE: JOAN BAEZ ~ Free At Last ~



Scout4Me1's channel, Uploaded on Nov 5, 2009

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LYRICS: FREE AT LAST
(as song by Joan Baez)

Free at last, free at last
Free from the world and all it's sins
Free, free at last, free at last
I've been to the top of the mountain

Hatred had me bound, had me tied down
Had me turned around, couldn't find my way
Then you walked with me and You set my spirit free
To me and my family down that long highway

Free at last, free at last
Free from the world and all it's sins
Free at last, free at last
I've been to the top of the mountain

I will never forget when the voices called
I will never forget how the night did fall
I will never forget when you rose to the call
You lived and loved and sang and preached and died for us all

Free at last, free at last
Free from the world and all it's sins
Free at last, free at last
I've been to the top of the mountain

Free at last, free at last
Free from the world and all it's sins
Free at last, free at last
I've been to the top of the mountain

Free at last, free at last
Free from the world and all it's sins
Free at last, free at last
I've been to the top of the mountain

http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/joanbaez/freeatlast.html
-snip-
This song appears on Joan Baez's album Honest Lullaby (1979). I'm not sure whether Joan Baez composed this song or not. The "free at last" line is probably lifted from the African American Spiritual entitled "Free At Last" and the phrase "I've been to the top of the mountain" probably alludes to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s 1963 "I Have A Dream Speech".

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