Worcester residents, veterans, and city leaders gathered on May 25 at Hope Cemetery for the annual Memorial Day ceremony to honor those who died serving in the Armed Forces. Despite persistent rain, attendees stood together as speakers reflected on sacrifices made from the Revolutionary War through recent conflicts in the Middle East.
Rich Landry, a U.S. Army veteran of the 82nd Airborne Division who has attended the event for five years with his wife Courtney Landry, said, “I just feel that it is so important to be here.” He added, “This is the rainiest one I can recall.”
The Memorial Day Observance Remembrance Ceremony at Webster Street cemetery was one of three city events marking the holiday. The day also included wreath-laying ceremonies at Massachusetts Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Green Hill Park and at the Korean War Memorial on Foster Street.
City Manager Eric D. Batista addressed attendees with prepared remarks: “It is important that we honor that sacrifice because not only did they lay down their lives for their country, but their families sacrificed having them as a part of their lives, left with empty seats at a table that can never be filled.” Batista spoke about John D. “Jacky” Kelleher, a private in the U.S. Army who died in 1950 during the Korean War. Kelleher’s nephew Nick Argento and sister Kathleen Kelleher were present for Monday’s ceremony.
Batista continued: “Nick imagined what his uncle, the most likeable boy in his graduating class at St. Peter’s High School, might have been…an educator, a doctor, a husband or a father. We can never replace Jacky or any other service members from Worcester who died in the line of duty, but we can carry their memories in our hearts.” A monument was erected and dedicated to Kelleher last August near June Street and Hartshorn Avenue.
Tracy Vaillancourt spoke as a Gold Star mother whose son Brian Moquin died while deployed in Afghanistan in 2006; this year marks twenty years since his death. “It will always seem like yesterday to me,” said Vaillancourt through tears. “Brian was my only child. I miss him more than words can say. But I couldn’t be more proud of him,” she concluded.
Members of Sons Of The Union Veterans of the Civil War attended dressed in period uniforms and discussed ancestors’ roles preserving national unity during that conflict. George Maple recalled family connections to Union soldiers but chose instead to remember John Willie Grout—the first person from Worcester killed during that war—whose repeated acts of bravery ended with his death at Ball’s Bluff.
