With reverence and appreciation, people filled City Hall’s Council Chambers on Monday to remember the fallen – their names, faces, stories, and pivotal role in protecting our nation and its ideals.

The rainy weekend prompted Milton’s annual Memorial Day ceremony to move inside City Hall, but it didn’t stop citizens from coming out to pay tribute to late members of the U.S. military. The approximately 200 attendees included Councilmembers Phil Cranmer, Brian Dolan, Jan Jacobus, and Juliette Johnson, along with Fulton County Commissioner Bob Ellis. 

Mayor Peyton Jamison spoke about Memorial Day being an opportunity to “remember those who left home and never returned,” as well as the loved ones these heroes left behind. Recalling his own family’s recent visit to Normandy in France – site of the June 6, 1944, D-Day invasion that set the stage for the Nazis’ defeat in World War II – Jamison stressed the importance of teaching “the next generation about the past.” 

“Let us remember those who gave everything,” the Mayor said. “Let us honor the families who still carry the weight of that loss. And let us recommit ourselves to being a community that remembers – not only with our words, but how we live.” 

After his remarks, a color guard consisting of Milton First Responders solemnly presented and placed flags behind the Council Chambers’ dais. As they stood at attention, Grace Jacob delivered a powerful performance of the national anthem. 

Jamison took to the podium again to read the City’s official Memorial Day proclamation. He was followed by Nick Satriano, a retired U.S. Army Colonel and key figure with the Milton Veterans Memorial Markers group, which recently placed 949 markers around the city honoring late troops over the generations with Milton connections.

RETIRED COMBAT NURSE: MEMORIAL DAY ‘DEEPLY PERSONAL’

A former Army combat nurse, 1^st Lt. Ginny Dornheggen (Ret.), delivered a moving keynote address. She began by reflecting on what Memorial Day had meant to her growing up in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, site of the deadliest and most climatic battles of the Civil War. 

Some of the graves that she and other Gettysburg schoolchildren would lay flowers by every Memorial Day had no names. Regardless, Dornheggen stressed that every headstone “represents a life interrupted, a family forever changed, [and] a future that might have been.” 

Her perspective evolved after joining the Army Student Nurse program during her final year of nursing school.  Dornheggen recalled tending to, singing with, praying for, and feeling the pain of wounded troops while serving in Vietnam. 

“It is deeply personal,” she said, mentioning how her first visit to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington stirred her emotions further. “… I was remembering the young soldiers that I cared for, faced that tried not to forget, and their stories.”

Every name on that wall – much like every grave at Gettysburg and every marker in Milton – stands for “a person who was loved and missed.” Dornheggen closed her speech by urging attendees to do what they can to ensure “Memorial Day will never become just another Monday on a calendar.” 

“Let us speak the names of the fallen,” she said. “Let us never forget that the liberty we enjoy was secured by Americans who believed something greater than themselves was worth defending.” 

“We remember. We honor. We are so grateful.”