10/24/1921 Unknown Soldier is selected

[shanneba]

On October 24, 1921, in the French town of Chalons-sur-Marne, an American sergeant selects the body of the first “Unknown Soldier” to be honored.

The four bodies arrived at the Hotel de Ville in Chalons-sur-Marne on October 23, 1921. At 10 o’clock the next morning, French and American officials entered a hall where the four caskets were displayed, each draped with an American flag. Sergeant Edward Younger, the man given the task of making the selection, carried a spray of white roses with which to mark the chosen casket.

Bearing the inscription “An Unknown American who gave his life in the World War,” the chosen casket traveled to Paris and then to Le Havre, France, where it would board the cruiser Olympia for the voyage across the Atlantic. Once back in the United States, the Unknown Soldier was buried in Arlington National Cemetery, near Washington, D.C.

Unknown Soldier is selected | October 24, 1921 | HISTORY

On October 24, 1921, in the French town of Chalons‑sur‑Marne, an American sergeant selects the body of the first “Unknown Soldier” to be honored among the approximately 77,000 United States servicemen killed on the Western Front during World War I. According to the official records of the Army...

www.history.com

 

[shanneba]

Arlington National Cemetery history-

The nation’s most prominent military burial ground—Arlington National Cemetery, which officially opened on June 15, 1864—began with the seizure of a prominent Army officer’s hilltop home after he defected to the Confederacy during the Civil War.

General Robert E. Lee, a native Virginian who reportedly spent the night nervously pacing upstairs in his home, Arlington Estate, as he deliberated whether to lead the Union Army or fight for his home state’s Confederacy, resigned from the U.S. Army on April 20, 1861. He left for Richmond, Virginia, the next day, and told his wife, Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee, the great-granddaughter of original First Lady Martha Washington, to vacate their house. With the high hilltop position overlooking Washington, D.C., Lee knew the Union forces were likely to seize the property, which was in a mostly rural area at the time.

How Robert E. Lee's Home Became Arlington National Cemetery | HISTORY

When General Robert E. Lee left Arlington to lead Confederate forces, Union troops moved in and soon the general's estate hosted Civil War burials.

www.history.com

 

[Jester560]

Learn something every day. I did not know of the connection to General Lee.

 

[shanneba]

I didn't know Lee's wife was a great granddaughter of George Washington's wife Martha.

 

[Shibadog]

The government buried union deal in General Lee’s wife’s garden so that the house could never be reclaimed by the Lee’s. No doubt the combination of Lee’s refusal of command of the union army, plus his successes against said army played a role in the decision. Lee was a professional soldier and loved his country, but he loved his state more “I could never draw my sword against Virginia”. Different times indeed. You were not an “American”, you were a New Yorker, or a Pennsylvanian, or a Virginian or a Georgian. Federal government had been small and pretty much not involved in daily life of individual-the antithesis of what It became and remains.