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March 17, 2007
In Honor Of The Brigade At The Battle of Fredericksburg on St. Patrick's Day
Mark thank you for posting this in the comments. It is so good I wanted to put it as a post. Thank you so much.
In honor of St Patricks day, a day early since I won't be at my terminal. To all the Legal Immigrants who made this country possible.
Briefly this was written, after the Battle of Fredericksburg, in honor of the Brigade that put it on the line for their adopted country. Before the Battle General Maehger ordered all of his Brigade to put sprigs of 'Boxwood' in their caps, so that the whole world could see that the Irish died facing the enemy. On that fateful day the made 13 assaults on Maryre's Heights all were dismal failures.
THE IRISH DEAD ON FREDERICKSBURG HEIGHTSSoftly let thy footprints fall,
Upon this holy ground,
In reverence deep,
For those who sleep,
Beneath each lowly mound
Here hath many a noble son,
Of trodden mother land,
Whose joy thro' life,
Was hope of strife.
For their love of native land.
They came from Carlow's fertile plains,
And Wexford's woody vales,
From Innisbowen,
And green Tyrone,
And Wicklow's hills and dales.
They came to seek amid the free,
Homes to reward their toil,
In which to see
That liberty
Unknown on Erin's soil.
And well they loved the chosen land;
When menaced was her might,
Each grsteful heart
A willing part
Took in her cause to fight.
And her they lie in unblessed earth,
No kindred eye to weep,
Far, far away,
From the abbey's grey.
Where the sires and grandsires sleep.
Oh! Many a matron, many a maid,
Mourn in their native isle,
For the dear ones here,
Who no more shall cheer
Their hearts by their gladsome smile.
In many an ancient chapel there,
Nestled on the green hill side,
Will the good priest pray,
On the Sabbath day,
For his boys who in battle died.
Let us offer too, our orisons,
For each of the mayyr band,
Who nobly gave
Their lives to save
The might of their adopted land.
Kate M. Boylan
Jersey City, New Jersey
St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1863
Posted by Wild Thing at March 17, 2007 12:47 AM
Comments
Happy St Patty's Day, WT ~
Posted by: yankeemom at March 17, 2007 09:54 AM
Poetry is not one of my interests, but I did enjoy this one. Thank you Mark.
Posted by: TomR at March 17, 2007 01:04 PM
Lest we forget, they were legal immigrants.
Back when, I served with two foreign enlistees, one Canadian one German who put it all on the line to earn their United States citizenship the hard way as part of their immigration process.
During an Ambush near Pleiku these two men, who were the best of buddies and worked as a pair, stayed with their burning load of 175mm howitzer ammo and fought it out toe to toe with the NVA, there isn't a place on that M60 machine gun mount they used where you can put the tip of your finger without covering a bullet hole, yet they stayed firing at the enemy while the load of ordinance was cooking off, both were injured, miraculously not from enemy fire but from the ordinance explosions and were back on duty the next day. They won and the enemy lost that battle.
That gun mount is on display at my old company unit headquarters and those two men are loyal U.S. citizens. We owe a debt of thanks to all legal immigrants who have stepped up to the plate for this grand country, they assimilated very fast and have made this a free country.
Thank you Mark and thank you Chrissie from reiterating this important fact.
Posted by: Jack at March 17, 2007 11:05 PM
Wow Jack that is such a wonderful and interesting story, thank you so much. I love that too about the gun mount being on display like that.
Posted by: Wild Thing at March 18, 2007 12:38 AM
