Produced by ellinora and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
Obvious errors in spelling and punctuation corrected.
Inconsistent accenting of words made consistent.
Italic text is represented by underscores surrounding the _text_.
Small capitals in the original have been converted to ALL CAPS in the text.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Second Lieutenant Dinsmore Ely 1894-1918 ]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
“_It is an investment, not a loss, when a man dies for his country_”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the battlefields of France there are thousands of American graves; graves of our best and bravest; sacred places to which we shall make pilgrimage in the years to come and over which we shall stand with tears on our faces and with pride in our hearts. Our heads will be bared because the ground is consecrated; the last resting place of heroes who gave their young and beautiful lives for their country’s cause.
Dinsmore Ely was one who gave. His was the Great, the Supreme Sacrifice. Never was Crusader of old inspired by higher and holier motives. In his letters home, which we have the privilege of giving to the public, there is revealed a knightly soul: the soul of a Bayard “without fear and without reproach.”
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Into the Presbyterian Church he was born, and at her altar dedicated to the service of his God.
Taken back, when four years of age, to the old home in the Pennsylvania hills, he was present at the Centennial Celebration of the church where his ancestors have worshiped for five generations.
Called on to say his little speech—I can see him yet—he marched bravely down the long aisle of the crowded auditorium, climbed up the pulpit steps, too high for his short legs and, facing the great audience, the childish treble rang out true and clear, as he volunteered for his first service under the banner of the Cross: