Augustus Ledyard Research Paper

In the middle of the Hewitt Quadrangle, commonly called Beinecke plaza, a single, 73-foot-tall, gray painted-wood flagpole stands with granite steps leading to the top of its base, where an inscribed plaque at its bottom reading “In memory of Augustus Canfield Ledyard” along with a further description of his connection to Yale and the U.S. Army. Atop this high pole, above the National Ensign blowing in the wind, a laurel wreath surrounds a spike pointing straight up towards the sky. Members of the Yale community walk through this plaza, by the flagpole, every day whether on their way to class, the Beinecke rare book library, the Commons dining hall to eat lunch, or some other important event in their daily lives, but few seem to stop to look

Army Academy graduate, former First Lieutenant in the U.S. Army, and President of both the Michigan Central Railroad and the Union Trust Company—and his wife Mary. Augustus was one of their four children, but the only one to serve in the Armed Forces like their father. Ledyard was educated at Yale College in the class of 1898, and he enlisted in the New Haven Battery at the beginning of the Spanish-American War, just before his graduation, serving as a volunteer during the last three months of his time at Yale. After graduating, he was commissioned in the U.S. Army and was later stationed in the Philippines, given to the U.S. by Spain after the end of the Spanish-American War in 1898. However, on February 4th, 1899, less than a year after Ledyard’s graduation from Yale, the indigenous Filipinos rose up in a war against the United States, led by Emilio Aguinaldo to prevent the islands from being annexed by another foreign power. Ledyard was actively involved in the war effort as a First Lieutenant in the 6th infantry, and he was shot and killed on the island of Negros, where he was stationed, on December 9th, 1899. The Philippine-American War lasted for longer than another two years, well into 1902, before President Theodore Roosevelt finally declared that it had ended, and the U.S. took stable control of the

The 9/11 remembrance ceremony occurs in Beinecke plaza, and I stood in formation near the foot of the flagpole, watching my fellow Yale NROTC midshipmen raise the Nation Ensign for morning colors on the memorial flagstaff to remember the deaths of all those civilians who died on that day, in the terrible attack on New York, as well as all of the military service members who have fallen in the line of duty in the wars since that day. Though I did not realize it at the time, while I stood at attention among the NROTC unit squads and midshipman staff, while the Company Commander saluted, we were all honoring lieutenant Leyard’s sacrifice and his memory, which the flagstaff represents, as there is likely nobody left alive now among all those who had ever met him or known of his death in battle, and therefore his memory lives on through the plaque which bears his name, rank, birthdate, and the date and location of his death, available to any and all students, professors, university staff, and even tour groups who