Independence day

235 years years ago our fathers set forth to achieve something which was before nothing more than an inconceivable notion.  That spark of an idea was freedom.





I cannot say it any better, so let us take a note from history:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

- Abraham Lincoln.

Please take a moment of silence today for those families that have been called upon to make the great sacrifice, and for those that while living have served freedoms cause.

Thank you to those of my family who served:

Senator Richard Henry Lee - Signer of the Declaration of Independence, author of the Lee Resolution.
Senator Francis Lightfoot Lee - Signer of the Declaration of Independence.
General Henry"light horse," Lee - 1st continental light Dragoons "Lee's Legion,"
General Robert E. Lee - General-in-Chief of the Confederate Forces.
General George Washington Custis Lee - Commander of Richmond defenses.
Senator Blair Lee II- United States Senator, Governor of Maryland.
Admiral Willis Lee - Vice Admiral, Battleship division 6 


And the many many other members of my family who have not been members of the military and continued to serve freedoms cause so that this nation "shall not perish from this earth."

Duke