On the 29th of August 1944 the 28th Infantry Division, a unit of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, paraded under the Arc de Triomphe  and down the Champs Élysées within the newly liberated city of Paris. While Allied forces had allowed Free French troops to have the honor of entering Paris first and accepting the German surrender, the men of the 28th Infantry, bearing the distinctive “bloody bucket” keystone insignia, represented the bulk of those fighting in the ETO — men from outside of continental Europe fighting for the freedom of strangers. ​

On this day (05 August) in 1861 the US Army abolished flogging as a form of punishment for Soldiers guilty of breaches of military law or custom. Although often thought of as a primarily naval punishment, Congress had actually prohibited the Navy from flogging Sailors over ten years prior to the Army decision, spurred on in part by popular literary descriptions of the practice.