They should have flown by, but in the legion of the forgotten dead, all must walk in ghostly procession to their final encampment. Isn’t that a flight jacket? And those men aren’t keeping in step…Oh, that explains it. And so the silent ranks of the legion of the forgotten dead were swollen with those who march forever in World War I garb of drab khaki. But no matter what the term employed, they did die, did American men by the thousands, in France to make the world safe for democracy. Then, in a more sentimental age, a buddy never was killed in Flanders mud, young life cut short by an impersonal artillery shell flung into the air from miles distant. Any military man knows that, and so we hear the faint chorus as they move by with their round helmets and brown puttees, the wide-eyed innocence with which they approached the grim tasks of war erased by the stark reality of the Argonne and Soissons. Somehow it makes the march seem shorter if the men can sing. These came back…In metal boxes did those legions of the forgotten dead return. Isn’t that the chorus of “Over There,” so softly you can barely hear the words that… “The Yanks are Coming?” Seems you can hear them singing it softly as they step along…and we won’t be back till it’s over, over there. They march eternally for they are the forgotten legion of the dead. They step silently along, slouching, yet moving with deceptive swiftness. Little remembered are Antietam, Shiloh, obscure place names made immortal because of the bravery of valiant opponents who died there, convinced that theirs was the only right. The passions which set men from north and south at each other’s throats are erased by the chill of death. And they march past.ĭirty gray coasts, butternut trousers, mingle now with the uniforms of blue in the still columns filing past. See their bloody, bare feet, which left such grim footprints in the Pennsylvania snow. Those ragged fellows there at the front were at Valley Forge. And now he keeps step with his comrades, forever, as the legion of the forgotten dead marches by.
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