{"id":13762,"date":"2016-04-11T15:29:26","date_gmt":"2016-04-11T19:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=13762"},"modified":"2016-04-11T15:29:26","modified_gmt":"2016-04-11T19:29:26","slug":"honorary-first-defenders-wreath-laying-west-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=13762","title":{"rendered":"Honorary First Defenders Wreath Laying West Park"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 20pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Wreath Laying Ceremony<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 16pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">West Park, 15<\/span><sup><span style=\"color: #000000;\">th<\/span><\/sup><span style=\"color: #000000;\"> and Linden Streets, Allentown<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 16pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Held at Ignatz Gresser\u2019s Statue<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 16pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Monday, April 18, 2016 at 11:00 AM<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 16pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Honorary First Defenders Commander, LTC Donald W. Davis<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 16pt;\"><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Allentown Mayor\u2019s Proclamation presented by Nate Kline<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p><b><i><span style=\"font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\"><strong>The Honorary First Defenders, Allentown Chapter will hold its annual Wreath Laying Ceremony at 11 AM on April 18<sup>th.<\/sup><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Presentation\/Posting of Colors \u2013 96<sup>th<\/sup> PA Infantry, Dieruff High School Air Force JRROTC<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Pledge of Allegiance<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Prayer<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">History of the First Defenders<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Reading of the Resolution of the 37<sup>th<\/sup> Congress<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Roll Call of the Allen Infantry<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Reading of the Proclamation, Major Nate Kline<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Laying of the wreath<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Taps<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">Retire the Colors<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\"><strong><em>Brief History:<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\">The ceremony honors the original Allen Infantry of the local militia who traveled on April 17, 1861 from Allentown to Harrisburg where they joined four other PA units.\u00a0 They left by train for Washington and while marching from one train station to another in Baltimore, they were stoned by Southern sympathizers.\u00a0 Thus the first blood was spilled from this bloody war.\u00a0 Among those injured was Ignatz Gresser who was later awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for heroism in the Battle of Antietam; the only Allentownian ever so honored.\u00a0 The men from Pennsylvania were the first to arrive in Washington on April 18<sup>th<\/sup> in 1861 in defense of our Capitol. \u00a0By their presence they not only deterred the South from any plans they may have had to capture our Capitol; they also may have changed the course of the war itself.\u00a0 Through their actions they came to be numbered among \u201cThe First Defenders\u201d who the Allentown HFD so proudly commemorates through this ceremony.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14pt;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.honoraryfirstdefenders.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>www.honoraryfirstdefenders.com<\/strong><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\nInformation Provided By:<br \/>\nViola C. Hertzog, Assistant Director<br \/>\nLehigh County Veterans Affairs<br \/>\n17 South Seventh Street<br \/>\nAllentown, PA 18101<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.lehighcounty.org\" target=\"_blank\">www.lehighcounty.org<\/a><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class='adkingprobanner sidebar banner3023'><a href='http:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/' target=\"_blank\" data-id='3023' data-ga='{\"campaign\":\"\",\"banner\":\"\",\"implemented\":\"universal\",\"imp_action\":\"Impression\",\"click_action\":\"Click\"}'><img src='https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/inpostblank.jpg' alt='' \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div class='adkingprobanner sidebar banner7036'><a href='http:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com' target=\"_blank\" data-id='7036' data-ga='{\"campaign\":\"\",\"banner\":\"\",\"implemented\":\"universal\",\"imp_action\":\"Impression\",\"click_action\":\"Click\"}'><img src='https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/inpostblank.jpg' alt='' \/><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?post_type=adverts_posts&p=7036\" class=\"read-more\">Click here to read more... <\/a>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13763,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[69,482],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-the-valley","category-press-release-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/hfd.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13762"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13762\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}