All Those Names

Deborah Venable

09/19/02

Recently I had occasion to visit The Moving Wall, the traveling replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, which is in Constitution Gardens, Washington, D.C. This traveling replica goes all over the country so that people can experience the kind of eerie healing that the original Wall has been responsible for since its dedication in 1982 without having to travel to Washington D.C.

My husband and I went to see the Moving Wall in Florence, Alabama, a short drive from our new home. We were accompanied by another couple, (dear friends), and felt the trip was definitely worthwhile. Since our husbands are both Vietnam Veterans, my friend and I knew that it could be a difficult day for them, but it was something they wanted to do. This traveling memorial is well named – it is indeed “moving.”

My initial reaction to the Wall was mostly negative I must admit. It seemed like a poor example of too little too late in an attempt to right a terrible wrong. But the simple design is certainly not repugnant, and the work involved in choosing the design was extensive as was the work on the original Wall itself. The very fact that it was built without any Federal funding speaks volumes about those involved in the project. One of the design criteria was that this memorial should make no political statement. It doesn’t.

One of the most startling things about even the replica is the successfully reflective quality of the memorial, both physically and emotionally. As clearly as your own face looks back at you from behind all those names, so do the memories of young soldiers leaving America to fight in an awful war for America’s honor come rushing into your mind with bone crushing emotional pain. That is the point of a memorial, is it not - to remember and honor? The pain part is probably necessary also. There were many tears shed on that warm September day in that quiet place on the river as the traveling wall “moved.”

I am quite sure that visitors were running the gambit of emotions from sorrow to anger and leaving with maybe a little less guilt than they had arrived with. The healing is in the remembering and the witnessing of all those names. To take the time to find one name within the thousands listed, to satisfy yourself that others know the name that person represents to you – therein lies some healing.

Some of the ex-soldiers were gazing at the map hanging at the accompanying visitor center and pointing out familiar locations to companions - some older, some younger – parents perhaps and children who were experiencing a history lesson without realizing it. They all belonged there at this memorial on that day for whatever reason brought them there. It was a day to remember fallen heroes, courageous sacrifice, and yes, horrendous mistakes.

All those names. And all the others who came back to an ungrateful country that treated them with less respect than slaves were treated a century before. A government that did not even have the common decency to validate the mandate that sent all those soldiers to die, by following the Constitution they were sworn to uphold and defend, still has not learned its lesson. Some of the representatives who have repeatedly and continually withheld that official declaration against our known enemies were soldiers themselves once. They now place more value in securing a political future than they do in healing the scar of defeated honor. All they have to do is what they are sworn to do when they take the job – defend the Constitution and commit themselves to righteous wars or withhold the power of making unrighteous war if those they represent say so. They should not be able to have it both ways. That is not “representation” and it does not honor the courage of those sent to foreign lands to die.

All those names. And the many others who have died for this country before and since deserve a living memorial to their sacrifice – the salvation of our liberties they died to secure and a return to a Representative Republic that will stand any test, meet any challenge, fight off socialism and communism restructuring of our culture and our society as long as there remains a breath of life in her honorable and unique founding principles.

That’s what they deserve – all those names. In the meantime, if the Moving Wall comes to a town close to you, go and let it move you. All those names – they will, you know.

Excerpt From – The Moving Wall, an article by Gerry Stegmaier

The Wall is solid, its granite face designed to resist the elements for all time. Yet, as visitors touch its surface, the Wall becomes almost fluid. Small ripples of hope and healing spread ever out-wards. Like the concentric circles created when a stone is tossed into a pond, the impact of the Wall grows and grows.

In 1982 John Devitt, a former helicopter door gunner and Army veteran, visited Washington, DC for the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and to participate in the National Salute to Vietnam Veterans. This visit and experience changed Devitt's life and led to the creation of the "Moving Wall," which has since moved millions of people.

For more information about the Moving Wall, click here.

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