MEMORIAL DAY IS ALMOST UPON US. It’s that time of year, when as a nation we remember our veterans who are deceased and the sacrifices they made for freedom’s cause. It’s quite fitting, then, that we remember the story of the “Four Chaplains.”

On February 3, 1943, the troop ship Dorchester went down in the icy Atlantic off the tip of Greenland with heavy loss of life. It was not the worst disaster of a long war, but we have good reason to remember it.

There were four men aboard, chaplains dedicated to the services of God and their fellowmen. George L. Fox and Clark V. Poling were Protestant ministers. Alexander D. Goode was a Jewish rabbi, and John P. Washington was a Catholic priest.

When the torpedoes struck around one o’clock in the morning many of the inexperienced GI’s were caught sleeping without their lifejackets, although that was contrary to orders. In the fright and confusion some were still without them even after all the surplus stocks had been distributed.

Each of the four chaplains wore a life jacket when he began working among the men to comfort the wounded, to calm the shocked, to help distribute lifejackets, and to guide men toward the lifeboats.

Places in the boats were declined by the chaplains. When last seen in the light of flares just before the ship went down, not one of the chaplains still wore a lifejacket. Theirs had been forced on unwilling soldiers taught to obey the orders of their superiors. Those four dedicated men, symbolic of religious freedom in America, stood together arm-in-arm praying for those young men of America for whom now only prayers were left. This brave, selfless act should serve as a reminder to all of us of how important it is to “remember, reflect, and give thanks for our liberty.”