On what would have been Steven Gutowski’s 26^th birthday, his mother Joan spoke of the need to remember fallen soldiers and their families at Mattapoisett’s annual Memorial Day ceremony.

Steven, an army specialist, was deployed to Afghanistan in February 2011. On September 28 of the same year, an explosion killed him and two others.

Before going overseas, Joan said her son wrote something very specific in his will. “He asked…to tell people to support the military,” Joan told the crowd gathered in front of the Mattapoisett Library on Monday. “That is why I speak to you today.”

Joan spoke of being a gold star family, meaning those who have lost loved ones in combat.

“The gold star family is one who pays the ultimate sacrifice,” she said.

Michael Lamoureux, commander of the Florence Eastman Post 280 American Legion, urged the audience to remember the fallen as well as those they left behind.

“We can never forget what these families go through,” he said.

During the ceremony, the Old Hammondtown Orchestra played several patriotic songs and Rep. William Straus (D-Mattaposiett) and Selectman Tyler Macallister also spoke.

The latter recalled his grandfather Herb Sunderman's experiences in World War II, some of which are depicted in a series of paintings he did between missions. An air force pilot, Sunderman brought his art supplies into the cockpit with him, said Macallister.

“For my grandfather, painting was a way for him to understand the conflict he was in,” said Macallister.

With junior high student Johanna Appleton's recitation of the Gettysburg Address, the audience was also encouraged to remember those who were killed during the Civil War.

Following the ceremony, members of the American Legion remembered those lost in combat with salutes at the war memorial on the grounds of the library. Those lost at sea were honored at the Town Wharf, and those lost on land were remembered at Cushing Cemetery.

A parade also followed the ceremony, traveling through Mattapoisett Village to Cushing Cemetery.