Yankee battle flag conserved

The town of Norwich, New York celebrated Memorial Day yesterday by unveiling the recently conserved 143-year-old flag the 114th New York Volunteers. This flag had been kept by the Per Lee fammily since the end of the War Between the States.

Flags of the Day

Today we fly the flag of Sultanate of Brunei for Armed Forces Day; and the flag of the Republic of South Africa for their Independence Day. South Africa was granted independence by Great Britain in 1910. However, that holiday is not on the list of holidays adopted in the Public Holidays Act of 1994, and appears to have passed with the old regime.

Animated flags provided courtesy of Pascal Gross.

Memorial Day at the Lee home

Dappled Things, the blog of Father Jim Tucker, has a fine post on the history of Arlington Cemetery. The cemetery is on the grounds of the Custis/Lee home, from which Arlington takes its name.

Flags of the Day

A regular feature of Vexillarium will be the Flags of the Day. Today we fly the Flag of the United States of America for Memorial Day; the flag of Crown Colony of Anguilla for Anguilla Day; and the flag of the Republic of Croatia for their Statehood Day celebration.

Animated flags provided courtesy of Pascal Gross.

How to Fly the Flag on Memorial Day

The United States Code prescribes that the flag should be flown at half-staff on Memorial Day until noon, at which time it is raised to the top of the staff. See, 4 USC §6.

Decoration Day

Today is Memorial Day, which was originally known as Decoration Day, it being a day set aside to decorate the graves or our war dead.

The first to establish the practice apparently were some ladies in Mississippi sometime between 1865 and 1867, who decorated the graves of the Confederate dead. In 1868 the Grand Army of the Republic established May 30th as Decoration Day for the Federal dead. After World War I it became a day to recognize all American war dead. Eventually, the name Decoration Day was replaced by Memorial Day, and in 1971 Congress set the date as the last Monday in May.

The day set aside as Confederatre Decoration Day varies from state to state. In Kentucky, Louisiana, and Tennessee, the date is set by law as this Friday, June 3rd, the birthday of President Jefferson Davis.

Flag Blogging

As editor of FlagWire, I have closely followed flag related news for a number of years. This is a new twist on that activity.

Vexillarium is a Latin based word of my own creation, meaning Flag Room. It might also be translated into the naval term, Flag Locker. With the opening of Vexillarium, I welcome you into my Flag Locker.