This Memorial Day, I paid tribute to fallen New Mexicans at a ceremony at the New Mexico Veterans Memorial in Albuquerque.
New Mexicans have always stood up when called to service, and we remember their contributions and sacrifices for our country.
Below are my remarks from the ceremony, where I took time to highlight the service of a few very special New Mexican veterans.
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Rep. Heather Wilson (R-N.M.) and Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.) say the Pledge of Allegiance with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) at the New Mexico Veterans Memorial in Albuquerque. (By Jeff Chiu -- Associated Press) |
Remarks of Congresswoman Heather Wilson
Memorial Day Ceremony
Veteran’s Memorial Park
Albuquerque, New Mexico
May 26, 2008
Thank all of you who are here today to remember the service and sacrifice of our men and women who served in the military. And a special thank you to Senator Lindsey Graham and Senator John McCain for being with us here today.
When I was a child, Memorial Day was always special.
There was always a parade past the fire station and the court house to the biggest cemetery in town.
We’d sit, my brothers and I, on the sidewalk and watch the parade go by. And if we didn’t get to our feet fast enough when the flag approached, we’d get hauled up by the scruff of our necks.
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Then we’d take off our bikes along the parade route and down the back streets toward the cemetery. Red, and white and blue ribbons taped to our handle bars, baseball cards attached with clothes pins slapping the spokes of our bikes.
As the band entered the cemetery, the drummers would stop drumming and tap the edge of their snares with quiet clicks out of respect for the dead.
There were flags on every veteran’s grave – and often bouquets of lilacs cut from garden hedges or a child’s gift of dandelions wrapped in wet tissues, secured by cellophane and a rubber band.
We would flinch at the sound of twenty-one guns fired by the American Legion wearing their white spats and glistening helmets.
And we would stare at our shoes when taps echoed from behind the hill – counting the blades of grass, moving a stone with a sneakered toe, trying not to cry.
I take you back to that time because, too often today, Memorial Day is just another three day weekend – a chance to take the boat to the lake. When, it truth, it should be an opportunity to teach our children about service and sacrifice.
HISTORY
When the awful carnage of the civil war was over, the women of the north and the south began to decorate the graves of the fallen.
From the silence of sorrowful hours
The desolate mourners go,
Lovingly laden with flowers
A like for the friend and the foe:
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment-day;
Under the roses, the Blue,
Under the lilies, the Gray.
In 1868 General Logan of the Grand Army of the Republic called on Americans to decorate the graves of the war dead to remember them, and Memorial Day was born.
WORLD WAR II—AGAPITO ‘GAP’ SILVA’
Last year we lost a wonderful New Mexican. His name was Gap Silva. Gap was a World War II veteran. He was a POW in the Philippines – a survivor of the Bataan Death march. Gap always brought a quiet dignity wherever he went.
On December 8, 1941 -- the day after Pearl Harbor -- the Japanese attacked Clark Field in the Philippines. The air defense units protecting the field were the 200th & 515th Coastal Defense Artillery of the New Mexico National Guard.
Victory for the Japanese did not come as quickly as they expected because the Americans wouldn't quit. They withdrew to the Bataan peninsula and kept fighting for months until they were out of food and ammunition, becoming known as the "Battling Bastards of Bataan".
After three years of harsh captivity in Japanese prison camps, doctors told Gap Silva that he and his fellow prisoners would never have children. Gap used to laugh about that -- as do his five sons, two daughters, and twelve grandchildren.
Gap passed away last June and, a few months after his death, I went to the Philippines.
The National Cemetery in Manila stands on a quiet knoll in the center of a bustling Asian city. In the middle of the courtyard there is a beautiful acacia tree that reminded me of a cottonwood and the lawns are kept like putting greens. 
On walls of white marble around that acacia tree are the names of the missing -- over 56,000 names – just of the missing.
My husband and I walked around those marble walls looking for the names from the 200th and the 515th.
At one point Jay touched my arm and there, on a single panel, were the names of twelve Garcia’s from New Mexico.
Twelve Garcia’s -- just among the missing.
We laid a wreath at the grave of a New Mexican who seemed to represent the suffering and service of all the rest.
His name was Staff Sergeant Jimmie Lujan and he enlisted in the 200th from Taos County. Like many in the Guard, he was older when he was mobilized -- 33 and married.
Sergeant Lujan survived the initial attack of the Japanese, endured the Bataan death march, was a prisoner of war and died in captivity the day before the Japanese finally surrendered.
The final resting place of our New Mexicans in the Philippines is a beautiful place, well cared for by people respectful of the sacrifice of those who are buried there and their families so far away.
It was an honor to place a wreath there on behalf of all New Mexicans.
KOREAN WAR VETERAN – RAYMOND “JERRY” MURPHY
In a few weeks we will honor another New Mexican – a Marine who many in this audience came to know and love.
On February 3, 1953 Second Lieutenant Jerry Murphy positioned his reserve platoon above the Imjin River in Korea while two assault platoons went up the hill to face the Chinese Communist troops dug in on the high ground.
After a time, sensing the operation was not being executed as planned; Jerry Murphy led his reserve platoon up the hill, where he found most of the officers and noncoms of the two assault platoons dead or wounded.
Jerry ordered his men to find their comrades and evacuate the area. In the midst of heavy machine gun fire, Jerry made several trips to rescue his fellow marines, refusing medical attention for his own wounds.
Jerry was the last one to leave the hill.
Second Lieutenant Jerry Murphy earned the Medal of Honor for his actions that day.
But here in Albuquerque, we remember him not for what he did that one day, but for what he did with the rest of his life.
For 23 years Jerry Murphy served as Director for Veterans Services at the VA. And when he retired, he served as a volunteer at the VA hospital.
One of the gals at the VA once told me that most of the time veterans had no idea that the volunteer in the smock humbly pushing their wheelchair down the hall was a Medal of Honor winner.
And when he died, this Medal of Honor winner was not buried in his Marine dress blues with a sky blue medal around his collar.
He was laid to rest wearing his VA volunteer smock.
That’s just the way Jerry was.
And that’s why the Albuquerque VA Hospital is being renamed in his honor later this year.
VIETNAM WAR VETERAN – GLENN McGEE
Many Vietnam veterans did not receive the welcome home they deserved and it is important to make sure they are honored now.
Today I am privileged to present several medals to Navy veteran Glenn McGee.
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Petty Officer McGee served on the USS Dale worked the 3 and 5 inch guns providing fire support during his four deployments in Vietnam and one in Lebanon.
Two of Glenn’s medals were lost in a house fire and the others were never issued. Today, we will correct that and thank him for his service.
MEMORIAL DAY
Today is not about the sale at JC Penny’s.
It’s about Gap Silva and Jimmie Lujan and Jerry Murphy and the special person you remember today, in your heart, and so may others loved and lost.
For those who grieve, the Gold Star Mothers, the Gold Star Wives, the Dad’s and husbands, the brothers and sisters and high school buddies, may God’s grace ease your sorrow and light your way.
When I was a child, Memorial Day was always special.
After the parade was over, our extended family would often come to our house. There were hamburgers and hotdogs and macaroni salad and deviled eggs. I would always make sure that my cousins took the left-over deviled eggs home. I can’t stand deviled eggs.
And then, in the afternoon, my mother would pile her three kids into the back seat of the Jeep Wagoneer and drive to the small cemetery across from the elementary school.
There, under an ancient maple tree, was a veteran’s marker. And we would leave lilacs and dandelions on my father’s grave.
When I was a child, Memorial Day was always special.
Truth to tell, it still is.
And because of all of you here, it always will be.
To all those who wear or have worn the uniform of the United States and to your families, thank you for your service. May God bless you and those we remember and may God bless the United States of America.
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