They Also Sacrifice

A Ranger is pinned at graduation

Today, Nov. 11, 2009, is Veterans’ Day.

Today is the day we – most of us anyway – thank those living and dead who have served in our nation’s many wars. Memorial Day is the one where we only thank those who died in service.

If you don’t fly Old Glory on Federal holidays like today, nobody knocks on your door wondering why not. That’s the way it should be. I have to admit that I have forgotten a time or two. But for the most part, I’ve remembered by unfurling the standard three-by-five Stars and Stripes and affixing the pole to the side of our house.

But there’s no Federal Holiday for the folks who are left behind while the soldier, sailor, airman, Marine or Coast Guardsman goes into harm’s way. There should be, but then again, there’s probably enough holidays.

Parents, like my wife and I, with a child at war, worry every day. We know our son, an Army Ranger on this third combat tour, is well-trained and well-equipped to do his job. But parents worry about their kids if they have “safe” jobs, too.

It’s the spouses who truly sacrifice, though. Though we will love our son forever, and we’re as proud as any parents can be, it is his wife who has it the roughest.

She’s the one with the legal and moral expectation of his companionship, protection, and comfort. Instead, he’s on the other side of the world, doing a job American soldiers have done many times: Fighting not for the sake of conquest, but for an ideal.

As my wonderful daughter-in-law counts down the days until her husband – our son – comes home for R&R, I am reminded of an Army wife named Sarah Ballou.

Sarah was the loved one left behind when Sullivan Ballou, the judge advocate of the Rhode Island Militia, went off to fight for the Union – and an ideal – in the U.S. Civil War.

He was 32 years old when he wrote these words, just before the first Battle of Bull Run.

July the 14th, 1861
Washington DC
My very dear Sarah:
The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days - perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more.
Our movement may be one of a few days duration and full of pleasure – and it may be one of severe conflict and death to me. Not my will, but thine 0 God, be done. If it is necessary that I should fall on the battlefield for my country, I am ready. I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American Civilization now leans upon the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing – perfectly willing – to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt.
But, my dear wife, when I know that with my own joys I lay down nearly all of yours, and replace them in this life with cares and sorrows – when, after having eaten for long years the bitter fruit of orphanage myself, I must offer it as their only sustenance to my dear little children – is it weak or dishonorable, while the banner of my purpose floats calmly and proudly in the breeze, that my unbounded love for you, my darling wife and children, should struggle in fierce, though useless, contest with my love of country?
I cannot describe to you my feelings on this calm summer night, when two thousand men are sleeping around me, many of them enjoying the last, perhaps, before that of death – and I, suspicious that Death is creeping behind me with his fatal dart, am communing with God, my country, and thee.
I have sought most closely and diligently, and often in my breast, for a wrong motive in thus hazarding the happiness of those I loved and I could not find one. A pure love of my country and of the principles have often advocated before the people and "the name of honor that I love more than I fear death" have called upon me, and I have obeyed.
Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me to you with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield.
The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long. And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when God willing, we might still have lived and loved together and seen our sons grow up to honorable manhood around us. I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me – perhaps it is the wafted prayer of my little Edgar – that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed. If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name.
Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless and foolish I have oftentimes been! How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm. But I cannot. I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you, while you buffet the storms with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more.
But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the garish day and in the darkest night – amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours – always, always; and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.
Sarah, do not mourn me dead; think I am gone and wait for thee, for we shall meet again.
As for my little boys, they will grow as I have done, and never know a father's love and care. Little Willie is too young to remember me long, and my blue eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him among the dimmest memories of his childhood. Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care and your development of their characters. Tell my two mothers his and hers I call God's blessing upon them. O Sarah, I wait for you there! Come to me, and lead thither my children.
Sullivan

Not long after Sullivan Ballou wrote those words, he was killed in battle. The letter was never mailed, but was found among his effects later.

The war lasted four more years, and cost more than 600,000 American lives.

Sarah died in 1917. She and Sullivan are buried next to each other in Swan Point Cemetery in Providence, R.I.

If you forget to put the flag on your house today, it’s no big deal. But if you know a wife or husband of a military member, be sure to thank them for their sacrifice, too.