Q. I am planning my wedding for the upcoming year and am in need of advice. My main question is what is the proper wording for wedding invitations? Our original wedding date was June 16, 2012, however, due to a short notice PCS and subsequent deployment, we decided to push our date back to June 8, 2013. We had not sent out invitations, only save the dates, so we followed with an announcement card explaining the change of date to our guests. Due to other circumstances, by the time my fiance returns from deployment and our wedding takes place, he will be honorably retired from service.
I am now in the process of choosing wedding invitations, and I am struggling with the wording. Both families are extremely proud of my fiance’s service and have planned a formal military wedding. Now that he will be retired when the wedding takes place, is it still appropriate to use his rank on the invitations? I have found numerous examples of how to incorporate the service rank of a groom, but nothing indicating how to do so for a retired groom, or if this is even appropriate at all. At the time of his retirement, he will be a staff sergeant in the United States Army.
Also, since he will be retired, is it still appropriate for us to have the military wedding we have planned? We had planned for him and his groomsmen to wear their formal dress uniforms and had also arranged for the traditional arch of sabers.
Any advice you can provide would be greatly appreciated.
Rank for invitations is traditionally only incorporated for senior officers (Captain and above) not enlisted. So retired senior officers would use the following example:
Lieutenant Colonel John Wayne Smith.
United States Army, Retired.
Junior officers or enlisted (since he is a Staff Sergeant this would be the case) the rank is omitted altogether, so you would use the following example:
John Wayne Smith.
United States Army, Retired.
From my understanding, it would still be accepted for him to have a Military wedding since he will be retired from service. Just make sure that they follow Military protocol with their uniforms. I will be putting together a complete section on Military weddings within the next week or two. So, make sure to keep an eye out on the website for that new section and congratulations on your marriage!
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