For the blood of the Irish

"Your soldier's heart almost stood still as he watched those sons of Erin fearlessly rush to their death. The brilliant assault on Marye's Heights of their Irish Brigade was beyond description. Why, my darling, we forgot they were fighting us, and cheer after cheer at their fearlessness went up all along our lines." - General George Pickett in a letter to his fiancée

It was on one of those terrifically hot, motionless country days that only happen in places like southern Pennsylvania that I came upon the striking monument.


Formed of a mass of bronze carved into a towering Celtic cross, it sits on a boulder of a granite that gives it an imposing height.

A shamrock is set in the heart of the cross; below it, three circles with the numbers "63," "69," and "88" inside to represent each of the brigade's regiments. A shield and harp are embossed closer the bottom, and at the base, a bronzed Irish wolfhound lay.

Not far from that spot, almost exactly 148 years before, the 532 surviving members of the Army of the Potomac's legendary Irish Brigade received orders to move forward to support a crumbling salient in the Union army line. To a man, they knew what that meant.

They'd numbered 2,200 when first formed two years earlier in New York City by the Irish Republican Thomas Meagher, and it was he who had led them through some of the most brutal battles in American history.

The unit had distinguished itself accordingly - always, when other men had faltered, the Irish had advanced, gallantly marching forward under rippling emerald flags as if unaware of the hail of bullets combing the air around them.

But that gallantry had come with a price.

They'd lost 1,400 men in a single day during the ghastly assault on Marye's Heights at Fredericksburg seven months earlier, and it was there that Robert E. Lee coined the phrase "Fighting 69th" as he watched that regiment break upon the stone wall manned by his southerners.

Just three months prior to that at Antietam, at a place known now as "Bloody Lane," they'd stormed a sunken road by charging into a withering fire that would kill two out of three men in two regiments.

By Gettysburg, less than a quarter of the original number remained, and every man, from brigade commander Colonel Patrick Kelly to the lowest infantryman, had taken part in every northern offensive that had been guaranteed to keep the reaper occupied.

And on that equally hot, motionless summer day in July of 1863, as the Irishmen waited to cross into immortality in one of the great battles in history, the unit chaplain, Father William Corby, mounted a large boulder to begin a ceremony that one Union officer later called "awe-inspiring."

Other soldiers watched as the entire brigade dropped to its knees and, to a menacing soundtrack of rifle fire and booming cannons, Corby gave the general absolution to the all-Catholic brigade (at that time, still a rarity.)

"Dominus noster Jesus Christus te absolvat," he began, and as the soldiers made the sign of the cross on themselves, many knew that those were their last moments on Earth. For a unit of those who'd been called "lions in any fight, be it on the battlefield or in the barroom," it must have been some comfort.

"No doubt many a prayer from men of Protestant faith who could conscientiously not bow the knee went up to God in that impressive moment," a Pennsylvania soldier later wrote of the spectacle.

And like men, when the absolution was over, they rose up off their knees and charged headlong into war's gruesome maelstrom once more - and stopped the Confederate advance cold.

As always, they paid dearly for their temerity; over half would never leave that place, which is now referred to as simply "The Wheatfield."

148 years later, all is quiet on the green fields of Gettysburg, and all that remains of the Irish Brigade is that one magnificent cross that looms in mute witness to the intrepid bravery of those "fearless sons of Erin."

But though the rest of the brigade is gone, the "Fighting 69th" has somehow endured. The regiment fondly known as "Mrs. Meagher's Own" marched forward to the strains of the Garryowen not only in the Civil War, but also at the Second Battle of the Marne and the Battle of Chateau-Thierry in World War I, at Saipan and Okinawa in World War II.

They were among the first military units to respond to the attack on the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, and were later deployed to Iraq, where they suffered a hundred casualties during "Operation Wolfhound" - so named for their mascot.

And this Saturday, in the greatest city in the world, the soldiers of the Fighting 69th will march proudly, wolfhounds in tow, down Fifth Avenue to lead off the St. Patrick's Day Parade as they have always done.

I hope that somehow, somewhere, those old souls, those "bravest of the brave," can tip their spectral hats and know that over the centuries, the Gaelic motto inscribed on the bottom of their old green flag still rings true: "Riamh Nar Dhruid O Spairn Iann" - "Those who never retreated from the clash of spears."

Email: janoski@northjersey.com

Why the flag should never be lowered to half mast for Whitney Houston

By Steve Janoski

“Crack is cheap…I make too much money to ever smoke crack.”

Yes, we all remember what Whitney Houston said in her now-infamous 2002 TV interview with Diane Sawyer.

At that time, there was suspicion about the famous singer’s drug abuse, but over the years, her battles with drug-addiction became well-chronicled, and many people (such as me) suspect that her demise two weeks ago had everything to do with it.

But in New Jersey, stuff like that doesn’t matter, especially to Governor Chris Christie, who officially decreed last Friday that, by executive order, the American flag would be lowered to half-staff in commemoration of the Newark native’s mysterious death.

Christie has come under intense criticism for this, but, according to Suburban Trends’ sister paper The Record, he’s defended his position by saying that Houston was a “cultural icon” that belongs in the same category in NJ music history as Frank Sinatra or Bruce Springsteen.

Her accomplishments, he said, are “a great source of pride for the people of the state.”

He did the same thing when Bruce Springsteen’s saxophone player Clarence Clemons died last June, but that move didn’t generate the same fire, perhaps because Clemons was never known for the erratic behavior and drug abuse that Houston became synonymous with over the past decade.

Now, it’s possible that ole’ Chris has some sort of affinity for Houston’s music — maybe one of her songs was his wedding song, or he just enjoys karaoke-ing to “I Wanna’ Dance With Somebody” at his neighborhood bar on a Saturday night.

But regardless of where his love for Whitney comes from, the fact that he doesn’t understand that lowering the flag for a musician — any musician at all — cheapens and degrades the significance of that momentous accolade, is a shame.

The American flag is no mere piece of rag — it is the emblem of a nation born out of the greatest ideas of the Age of Enlightenment and forged in the furnaces of war. Every piece of it drips in symbolism, and for many a man over the course of the past 250 years, that fluttering banner was the last thing they saw before their lives escaped them.

To lower that flag to half-mast is to say that collectively, this nation is giving a heartfelt tipping of the hat, a fond adieu, to one of its greatest citizens, to someone who idealizes what it means to be an American.

It’s an honor that is nearly unparalleled, and should be reserved for soldiers, cops, and former or current politicians who gave either their lives, or a part of them, in the service of this country and its people.

The flag is not a toy or prop to be lowered every time someone with a modicum of talent passes away, especially when that someone was a drug-addled diva that set the worst possible example for those who admired her, and appears to have squandered whatever talent she had left before departing in true celebrity fashion — alone in a hotel room amongst bottles of prescription drugs.

To treat it as such is to do the greatest of disservices to those brave men and women that have, as Lincoln said, “laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.”

And personally, I would rather see that flag stay at half-mast until every single World War II veteran is dead than ever see it lowered again for someone like Whitney Houston.

Email: janoski@northjersey.com

http://www.northjersey.com/news/140104843_Lowering_the_flag_for_Houston__We_have_a_problem___.html

What's more important - a game or your girl

By Steve Janoski

Growing up, I was probably one of the biggest sports fans I knew… and I knew a lot of them.

Everything was all about the games. You were judged in school by what football team you liked, and how they played on Sunday was a direct measure of the abuse you might or might not have to endure the following day.

We had all the jerseys and knew all the stats — we knew whether or not Emmitt Smith’s shoulder had dislocated in practice or Michael Irvin had been arrested over the weekend — and how it was all going to affect the next game.

And, after bleeding by your TV every Sunday for four months, getting to watch your team win the Super Bowl was a triumph of immense proportions that you knew was going to give you bragging rights over all of your friends (especially the Cowboys fans) until at least the following September.

We lived and died by the game, and it truly meant something to us.

As time progressed, however, it changed for me. No longer personally involved in football (or any sport) after high school, I found it hard to find that same fire on Sundays, and as I matured, I realized this might not be a bad thing.

Looking back I realized that for all those years, I had taken the whole thing too seriously. I got too upset when the Giants would take a beating or the Red Sox would blow a ninth-inning lead in typical Red Sox fashion, and the step back might have been a necessary one for my own sanity.

I still love watching the games, of course, and cursing a blue streak when a save is blown or a touchdown is scored against is still a common occurrence for me.

But that overwhelming stress is gone, and that empty feeling after a playoff loss or a season-ending skid has faded out along with the appeal of wearing another man’s name on the back of my shirt.

It’s important to remember that in the end, these games mean nothing in the overarching novels of our lives.

We live a short enough time as it is, and to put so much emphasis on something that we can’t control in the least is dangerous. I recently read an awe-inspiring statistic that 15 percent of men would miss the birth of their first child if their team was in the Super Bowl and they had the chance to go.

There’s nothing wrong with being a fan, of course, and even I am not jaded enough to miss the inherent beauty of certain remarkable happenings in sports such as the 2007 Super Bowl or the 2004 Red Sox-Yankees series.

But then having become more involved with boxing over the last five years and becoming more of an “active” participant in my sport of choice has also made the notion of sitting on a couch drinking beer while referring to the team I’m watching as “we” seem even more ludicrous.

I am reminded of the scene in Good Will Hunting when Robin Williams is trying to explain to Matt Damon why he gave up the chance to see Game 6 of the 1975 World Series (one of the great games in Red Sox history) for the chance to talk to a beautiful woman at a bar who would later become his wife.

“I just slid my ticket across the table and I said, ‘Sorry guys, I gotta’ see about a girl,’ Williams said.

He had his priorities straight.

Email: janoski@northjersey.com

http://www.northjersey.com/sports/139227504_What_s_more_important_-a_game_or_your_girl_.html

The death knell of the simple existence

By Steve Janoski


A man, however well educated, who has once sampled extreme simplicity of existence will seldom return to the artificial life of civilization. The burden of it is not realized until it has been laid aside.

-     English explorer Percy Fawcett

When I first wrote the initial draft of this column, it was by candlelight, on paper, in the earliest part of the night.

This wasn’t by choice, of course — it was during one of those rolling blackouts that struck every few days in the early fall when the wind would blow too hard and PSE&G’s infrastructure would shatter again.

These frustrating instances quickly exposed once again that society’s reliance on electricity is immeasurable at this point; it does indeed seem that we’ve forgotten how dark the night truly is when there’s no burning bulb to show us the way.

But as someone who divides his time between the gym and reading (neither of which require much light), I can honestly say that in small increments, power outages don’t bother me.

Yes, I was without an iPod or TV, but I am no great watcher of television in the first place; the cable could be out for six weeks and there isn’t a show I can say I’d actually miss.

I’d be lying if I said that I don’t spend an inordinate amount of time online, though, and my job would be drastically different.

Of course, I’m not sure how different, because I have only a vague awareness of how newspapers used to be printed in the days when phrases like “setting type” and “upper case” had real, tangible meanings.

But then really, isn’t that the problem?

Most of us don’t look at setting type as a necessary skill, but at one time, it was as prized as any other in the industry.

And the same thing has happened to other basic skills, like carving a piece of wood, using a forge, or even remembering a phone number — they have fallen by the wayside in the computer age.

Before electricity, candles were the “sine qua non” of life at night; now, they are for mere aesthetics.  People who have not yet traded in pocketknives for cell phones are looked on with amusement, as are those who cram a road map into their glove box instead of a GPS.

Call me a luddite (most do), but this worries me.

I cannot help but wonder if, in our zeal to make our survival easier, we are turning into one very fat, very lazy race that’s working so hard at improving the intelligence of our computers that we’re sacrificing our own.

Even the simplest of skills — navigation, fire-building, purifying water — are the culmination of thousands upon thousands of years of human experimentation, and their dismissal as quaint reminders of a time long past is a grave mistake.

The advancements made by computers are certainly a remarkable achievement, one that will bring great benefit to the human race…but with that comes a great danger.

We no longer “turn off.” We no longer “unwind.” Smart phones, Facebook, email, text messaging, they haunt us, swirling around us just inches away from our collective fingertips and inundating our minds with a constant swarm of useless information  that we’ll forget in the next instant.

The sun has set on the days of our self-educated forebears reading the classic works of literature by firelight in the cabins that they built themselves. No longer do we think that a man’s business is his own, or that anything can be solved by the labor of our hands or the power in our fists…the sun has set on “rugged individualism.”

When I was very young, my grandparents were close with a Mennonite family in Pennsylvania.  I don’t recall much about them, except that their children often ran barefoot through the hand-plowed fields and their wall clock had Roman numerals instead of Arabic ones.

But there was one man in that family, I remember, who made his own furniture — utterly beautiful works of art that would rival the best to be found in any store, and last decades longer.

There was no doubt, looking at every finished piece, every hand-carved loveseat or chair, that he’d let a piece of his soul soak into it.

At the end of my writing the draft of this column, I noticed that I had black ink on my right palm.

It’s been so long since I’ve had ink on my hands.

Email: janoski@northjersey.com