thisnewday

A favorite youngest son dies in the battle of Ypres, blinded by mustard gas and cut in half by German machine gun fire. His heart is cut from his dismembered body and sent home, preserved in candle wax and encased in an ammunition canister. Several weeks later, it arrives back in the States, accompanied by an older brother who is a non-combat casualty of the same battle.

                                                                                        Early the next morning, a brilliant spring morning with the fresh green pastels of budding
                                                                                        aspens and new grass, they buried Samuel's heart up in the canyon near the spring....
                                                                                        One Stab watched Decker fill the hole from up on the hillside. When everyone left he
                                                                                        walked down the hill and looked at the stone but could not read the words.

SAMUEL DANT LUDLOW 1897-1915
WE WILL NOT SEE HIM
BUT WE SHALL JOIN HIM

[Quoted from James Harrison's Legends of the Fall, Kindle Edition, Location 2616.]

LPK
LiveJournal
4/21/2016