Veteran’s Day, the holiday we observe each year on the 11th day of November, was originally celebrated beginning in 1918 as Armistice Day, as that was the date that marked the signing of the treaty that officially ended World War I. Through the middle years of the twentieth century the scope of that observance evolved and expanded to become, from 1954 onward, a day each year when the United States officially honors all citizens who have served in the Armed Forces of the United States. As we meditate on the solemn ideals of duty to country and sacrifice, we who are involved in the remembrance of Hood County history sometimes find our thoughts drawn to the stories of our county’s origins, and the fact that the very names of our county and its county seat call to mind a time when our citizens’ and indeed our Nation’s allegiances were torn asunder in the horror and tragedy of a Nation at war with itself.
It is worth remembering that a war – whether wrought by international conflict or a National divorce, much like a human conflict between a husband and wife or members of a family; is rarely a simple matter. Even when reconciliation does, in the end, occur, the scars and pain left behind often linger, long after, and the mourning of lives and relationships irrefutably changed endures forever. And so we pause here, to remember that truth through the eyes of a single Hood County family. Many people assume, because of the names of our county and town that the folks in these parts must have been all in for the Confederacy, states rights and black slavery. The irony is – that nothing could have been further from the truth. The truth, as usual, is complicated, and nuanced, and oftentimes tragic and unbearably hard. And that truth is measured by all – in the sacrifices and cost borne through the decades by those we remember and honor today and the families and communities they loved and who loved them.
This place we call home was not even an officially named town or county when its young men were first called up by the government of their state of Texas to serve in its defense in that great national conflict we call the Civil War. Many, if not all, of the families on both sides of that awful five-year tragedy had family members who served. An astonishing number of families had some male relatives in service to the Confederacy, while other family members served in the forces of the Union. One example of that horrific situation was the Nutt family.
When David and Sarah Nutt migrated to Texas with their five youngest children in 1855, their five older children, who were all adults or older teens, elected to stay behind in Missouri. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, Henry Nutt, their eldest son, who was still living in Missouri, fought for the Union. Twin brothers John and William Nutt who also stayed in Missouri, fought for the Confederacy and were both killed in the war. The middle Nutt brother, Abel, who came to Texas, also fought for the Confederacy, but survived. Their parents, who were opposed to slavery, but understood the complexities of the situation, simply prayed for the safety of all their sons, and grieved the ones who were lost. Such has the lot of many during the tragic times of human conflict throughout history.
A generation and a half later, the eldest son of David Lee Nutt the youngest brother of original Nutts in Granbury, David Henry Nutt, served in the Navy in World War I. Descendants of that same family served in World War II, Korea and Vietnam. And so, as is the story throughout human history, when the homeland is threatened, brave men and women step forward, to defend the homes and Nation they hold dear.
Today, we pause to remember and give thanks for all who have served, for their willingness to sacrifice themselves in defense of the families and homes they held dear. In every generation, our young men, and later our young women too, stepped up to serve our Nation, in times of war and in times of peace. Today, for their willingness to serve and to sacrifice themselves if need be, to defend their families and homes and Nation, we say with one voice, “Thank you, for your service.”