United States Marine Corps birthday

The United States Marine Corps Birthday is an American holiday celebrated every year on 10 November with a traditional ball and cake-cutting ceremony.

That was the day when the Second Continental Congress established the Continental Marines with the following decree:[1] That two battalions of Marines be raised consisting of one Colonel, two lieutenant-colonels, two majors and other officers, as usual in other regiments; that they consist of an equal number of privates as with other battalions, that particular care be taken that no persons be appointed to offices, or enlisted into said battalions, but such as are good seamen, or so acquainted with maritime affairs as to be able to serve for and during the present war with Great Britain and the Colonies; unless dismissed by Congress; that they be distinguished by the names of the First and Second Battalions of Marines.Tun Tavern, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is regarded as the birthplace of the Corps as the location of the first Marines to enlist under Commandant Samuel Nicholas,[2][3][4] though it is disputed if a recruiting drive may have occurred earlier at Nicholas's family tavern, the Conestoga Waggon [sic].

[6] Prior to 1921, Marines celebrated the recreation of the Corps on 11 July with little pomp or pageantry.

[12] The celebrations were formalized and standardized by Commandant Lemuel C. Shepherd, Jr. in 1952, outlining the cake cutting ceremony, which would enter the Marine Drill Manual in 1956.

[15] In a more somber tradition, Samuel Nicholas's grave in the Arch Street Friends Meeting graveyard in Philadelphia is marked with a wreath at dawn by a group of Marines annually on 10 November to celebrate his role in the founding of the Corps.