Fayetteville is always known for a solemn remembrance of Memorial Day. The annual occasion held Monday morning at the city cemetery and attended by nearly 200 was no exception.
American Legion Post 105 in Fayetteville hosted the Memorial Day program. Post 105 member and former U.S. Navy nuclear reactor operator Erik Manning offered the reminder that freedom is not free and noted the service of military members who have paid the ultimate price for the nation’s freedom.
“God bless our fallen heroes,” Manning said.
The keynote speaker at the ceremony was Post 105 member Lt. Col. Ed Sherwood (U.S. Army retired).
Sherwood used the occasion to relate the circumstances of the death of his uncle, 2nd Lt. Peyton Turner, who along with six other members of his B-24 Liberator bomber crew, died in Bavaria near the end of World War II.
Within Sherwood’s family not much was known or spoken about his uncle’s death. But in 2008 Sherwood said he began researching his uncle’s service. And it was on July 13, 2013 that a tribute ceremony, which included 250 German citizens, was held in the village of Haselbach to honor the the service of the fallen airmen. It was a ceremony that Sherwood attended.
“It was one of the greatest moments of my life, to kneel at the grave of my uncle … and to thank him for his sacrifice,” Sherwood said.
Sherwood challenged those in attendance in the Fayetteville cemetery to preserve the memory of the men and women who have served their country, and the memory of those who had fallen.
“Each has a legacy to be remembered,” Sherwood said. “Their sacrifices are too great to be forgotten.”
As is customary at so many local events, members of the Sons of the American Revolution fired muskets near the end of the solemn ceremony.
Members of the Fayette County High School ROTC posted the colors and buglers from McIntosh High School played the National Anthem and “Taps.”
