Dear Friends,
We are so thankful for our many guests who have helped us to promote the study and discourse of history by traveling with us to the places where history was made.
We would like to extend our Thanksgiving blessings to you, your family and friends in this time of thanks and throughout the upcoming holiday season.
With gratitude,
From all of us at Stephen Ambrose Historical Tours
Photo: WWI ended just weeks before Thanksgiving 1918. Returning servicemen enjoy Thanksgiving cheer in New York City. Photo source: U.S. National Archives
Thanksgiving During World War II
During World War II, C- or K-rations were replaced with turkey and cranberry for the holiday. It was either shipped in by the military or collected from local farmers.
In this photo, WWII soldiers crowd around a field range on Thanksgiving, watching Sgt. Louis S. Wallace of Meadville, Mississippi, prepare two of the many thousands of turkeys that arrived from the America.
Photo source: U.S. Army Quartermaster Museum
Thanksgiving During the Civil War
With the Battle of Gettysburg in mind, both the Union victory and the immense loss of life, on October 3, 1863, President Lincoln issued a proclamation that is viewed as the beginning of the national holiday of Thanksgiving Day:
“I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, …to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving… And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him …, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.”
Image: Thanksgiving in Camp was sketched by artist Alfred R. Waud on Thursday, November 28, 1861.
