Richard Cazeault was meant to deliver his speech at the Webster Memorial Day observance. However, that did not occur due to inclement weather. 

PREFACE: This year marks the 250th Anniversary of our freedom-- and its cost.

The label on my jacket does not say “CAZEAULT” -- it says “CAZEAULTs.”  It represents all those in my family who fought for Freedom.

My journey to this podium began in 1759 when my French Sixth Great Grandfather Jean-Baptiste sailed his ship to Quebec City to resupply the city’s fight against the British so they could remain a Free Canada.  That effort failed.  He lost his ship in front of the city and lived in Canada the rest of his life.

The British took Canada and passed the high cost onto the 13 American Colonies.  This would result in “Taxation without Representation” and the 1776 American Revolution.

In 1775, Jean-Baptiste and his family helped the Continental Army invade Quebec to defeat the British.  It failed.

During the War of 1812, Jean-Baptiste and his family, again helped the US Army to invade Canada to expel the British to no avail.

Over 100 years ago, my Canadian grandfather finally found his freedom by immigrating to Oxford, MA.

A poet once said,

“Only when we face the impossible, and experience the unbearable, do we find out who we truly are.”

Those words describe who we are.

But today-- they describe who they were.

The men and women we honor today.

This year we celebrate the nation’s 250th Anniversary due to their sacrifices.

Around 1770, in response to unfair British policies and taxes, a group of Boston area colonists formed the Sons of Liberty.  The leaders included Sam Adams, John Hancock, and Paul Revere.  The movement spread down the coast to South Carolina.

On March 5th, 1770, the infamous Boston Massacre occurred.  This was caused by a confrontation with a group of British soldiers over the troops occupying Boston.  Five Bostonians were killed.

In December of 1773, in Massachusetts the Sons of Liberty decided to make a point of taxation without representation by throwing over 300 chests of British Tea, worth over
$1 million today, into Boston Harbor.

In September of 1774, the First Continental Congress was formed to unite the colonies and to address British policies.  They found out that Britain could care less.

On April 19, 1775, with the British plan to seize colonial military supplies, the local militias called Minute Men responded, and the Battles of Lexington and Concord happened.  Minute Men from Dudley and Oxford were at the battles.  The town of Webster was not yet formed.

On May 10th, the Second Continental Congress convened and named George Washington Commander in Chief of the Continental Army.  He arrived outside Boston on July 3 to form the militias, including those from Dudley and Oxford, into an Army and take back the city from the British, which was accomplished.  The American Revolution was on!

A year later, July 4, 1776, We the People claimed our freedoms, not from an unelected royalty, but through a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.

The Revolution took 8 long years, but we won our independence and freedom. 

It cost blood and treasure.  Ordinary people served as soldiers.  Some came home.  Some did not.

About fifty years ago, after returning from Vietnam,
I settled in East Killingly, a small village in Connecticut.

There, I joined the Memorial Day Committee.

Its purpose was simple:
To remember those who did not return.

I helped place flags in seventeen cemeteries—hidden and remote, some deep in the woods.

The first cemetery was a long walk in.  There was one Veteran’s grave.

A Revolutionary War soldier.

Two hundred years earlier, he helped create this nation.

As I placed the flag, I said,

“Thank you. 

You are not alone. 

You will never be forgotten.”

After the Revolution there was the conflict with the Barbary Pirates, the War of 1812, the incorporation of the Town of Webster, the Mexican American War, and the formation of Webster’s Slater’s Guards in the 1850s, and then the Civil War.

Then there were the Spanish American War, WWI, WWII, Korea, and more.

When I was a boy, my father’s youngest brother went to Korea.

That was when I learned my father had served in
World War II, as had his other brothers.

I was too young to understand war, but war was already part of my family.

As the years passed, loss came closer.

My father’s friend’s son in a far-off valley in Vietnam died in battle near Cambodian Border. 

Then a neighbor.  Then classmates.

In 1970, I stood on a hill in Vietnam waiting for choppers
to take us into Cambodia.

From that hill, I could see the valley where my father’s friend’s son had died fighting five years earlier.

Suddenly, memory became reality.

Over the next year, I learned what sacrifice meant.

We fought as a unit, but more than that, we became family.

We lived together.  Twenty‑four hours a day.  Seven days a week.  Always in the shadow of death.

When you lose someone, you do not just lose a soldier.

You lose family.  You lose part of your heart.

When they are placed on a chopper for their final ride home,
your heart goes with them.

Since 1776, more than 1 million Americans have died in service to their country.

There are 200,000 buried in U.S. cemeteries in seventeen nations.

Others were lost to oceans, jungles, and distant ground.

Many were never found.

Behind the name of each fallen is a Family, and loved ones.

This sacrifice is a debt we cannot repay,

But we can try by being better citizens in their memory.

As a veteran, it is impossible not to remember them every day.

My heart remains with them.

We are who we are because of who we have lost.

They faced the impossible.  They endured the unbearable.

They gave everything so that we could stand here free.

May their sacrifice guide us—today and always.

Thank you for honoring these loved ones.

God bless the United States of America.

Biography

A longtime resident of the Webster–Dudley region, he is a graduate of Bartlett High School and earned his engineering degree from the University of Massachusetts Lowell. A licensed professional engineer in the State of Connecticut, his career spans aerospace and naval engineering, including contributions to projects for NASA. His service in naval engineering includes work on various ships and participation in the reactivation of the historic USS Iowa. He is a member of the United States Naval Institute.

A Vietnam veteran, he served with the 4th Infantry Division and the 101st Airborne Division as an airmobile infantryman. Above all, he has regarded his role as a family man and citizen soldier as his highest calling.