Georgians ignored the threat of rain and turned out on Monday to honor those who have died in military service at Memorial Day ceremonies around the state.
Jack Ferguson, a U.S. Navy veteran of World War II, dressed in Revolutionary War-era regalia at a re-enactment ceremony in Roswell.
"We need to recognize our veterans and the sacrifices they gave more than three days a year," he said.
At Fort Benning, hundreds gathered under cloudy skies at the main post cemetery. The ceremony included the placing of a wreath at the grave on an unknown soldier and a message from Fort Benning's commander Maj. Gen. Michael Barbero.
Barbero read from a letter written by the parents of Army Spc. Ross McGinniss, a machine gunner serving in Iraq. McGinnis died in 2006 after throwing himself on a grenade to protect four other soldiers.
"It didn't matter to Ross that he could have escaped the situation without a scratch. Nobody would have questioned such a reflex reaction. What mattered to him were the four men placed in his care on a moment's notice," Barbero quoted the letter as saying. McGinnis posthumously received a Medal of Honor.
Hundreds of people climbed the hill inside the Marietta National Cemetery for the 63rd annual Memorial Day program there.
"Memorial Day is not about war, it's about honoring those that died for our country," Brion Moore, director of the Georgia National Cemetery in Canton, told the crowd in Marietta.
Maj. Gen. Jerome Johnson, deputy chief of staff of the U.S. Army Forces Command at Fort McPherson, urged those gathered to remember and respect those in uniform.
"It is appropriate in a democracy to argue politics, but don't bring the soldiers, your sons and daughters, into the middle of it," he said.
At a ceremony in Smyrna, the speakers included Marine Sgt. Troy Campbell, who said he changed what he was going to say on Monday after he thought about the differences between Veterans Day and Memorial Day.
He said more than remembering those who have died fighting, Americans need to remember and support the families of those fallen soldiers.
"We all need to take a pledge to remember and look out for those families," Campbell said.
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