The 24th Connecticut Militia Regiment fires a volley tribute at the end of the 148th annual commemorative service of the Battle and Massacre of Wyoming on Saturday.
Marcella Kester | For Sunday Dispatch
Hundreds came out to honor and remember their local history during the 148th annual commemorative service for the battle and massacre of Wyoming, held Saturday at the Wyoming Monument. The event featured speakers, music, tributes, and more, spanning a collaboration among dozens of area groups and nonprofits.
Marcella Kester | For Sunday Dispatch
Wyoming Monument Association President Marcella Star addresses the crowd during her opening remarks at Saturday’s event.
Marcella Kester | For Sunday Dispatch
Keynote speaker Christopher Pearl is presented with a plaque by Wyoming Commemorative Association President Frank Conyngham following his address about the battle and massacre of Wyoming.
Marcella Kester | For Sunday Dispatch
More than 60 wreaths and floral arrangements were presented as tributes during the ceremony by dozens of area groups and descendants for placement around the Wyoming Monument.
Marcella Kester | For Sunday Dispatch
While America is celebrating its 250th birthday, hundreds flocked to the Wyoming Monument on Saturday to honor a piece of local history.
The 146th annual commemorative service of the Battle and Massacre of Wyoming featured speakers, tributes, patriotic music, and more from multiple area groups, organizations, and descendants of those who lost their lives on the battlefield on July 3, 1778.
The keynote speaker for the event was Lycoming College’s history department chair, Dr. Christopher Pearl. Pearl defined the complexities of the then-unsettled land of the Wyoming Valley and asked audience members to view the situation from two different viewpoints: whose ground, and whose independence?
When speaking about the ground, Pearl said to imagine standing at the site back then — not with roads, buildings, and monuments, but unsettled land in a river valley that connects worlds.
“The Susquehanna River is not a boundary — it is a highway that carries people, diplomacy, trade, news, and sometimes war,” he said.
The Wyoming Valley and the Susquehanna River meant different things to different groups, he continued, and each group laid claim to the land rooted in their own history, memory, and relationships.
“When we ask ‘Whose ground?’ we are not asking a rhetorical question. We are confronting a historical reality. This land was claimed, used, and understood in multiple ways by multiple people at the same time,” Pearl continued.
The Wyoming Commemorative Association has hosted the event since the battle’s 100th anniversary in 1878, and President Frank Conyngham hopes the ceremony will continue for years to come.
He asked those in attendance to consider becoming a member, noting that the annual cost is only $15.
The event concluded with a benediction by King’s College President Dr. Thomas Looney and volley tribute by the 24th Connecticut Militia Regiment.
“We rely on income from a small endowment and community support,” he said. “So please, if you’re not a member, pay the small $15 fee, and we will continue to be here year after year.”
For Wilkes-Barre resident Cynthia Brenner, the event meant more than honoring the past.
A few years ago, she discovered she is a seventh-generation descendant of Samuel Ransom, a Captain of the 24th Regiment, Connecticut Militia, during the American Revolution, who was slain in the Battle of Wyoming.
Brenner presented a floral wreath to be placed as the monument’s base with the National Society of Daughters of 1812.
“This is family history that we never knew about, and this just makes it that much more important to know that our family was one of the original 40 settlers,” she said. “That they literally gave up their lives to fight for their freedoms, for their land, for their families.”
