Evening Star Newspaper, March 17, 1929, Page 90

Congressional Cemetery Long Used for Offi THE UNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, 0, MARCH 17, 1929—PART 7. cial U.S. Memorials Elbridge Gerry, Vice President and Signer of Declaration, Distinguished in Many Spheres, Probably Most Notable of Public Men Buried There—Among Others of Note Whose Graves May Be Found Is Tobias Lear., Priva’.ce Secretary and Friend of Washington. SECTION OF CONGRESSIONAIL CE GOVERNMENT TO THE MEMOR - BE REPATRED SOON THROUGH BY JOHN CLAGETT PROCTOR. } T took Congress quite a while to wake up to its responsibility to care for its holdings in the Con- | gressional Cemetery, which for so| many years it has left to the| committee managing the cemetery | without making any eppropriation to cover the necessary expense. Of course, the committee just had to cut the grass and, in a way, at least, keep up the burial lots owned by the Government in order to keep the grounds from look- ing disgraceful and reflecting too harsh- ly against the other parts of the prop- erty, but, naturally, it saw no special reason why it should keep up the Na- tion’s cenotaphs any more than it would the monuments of other site or lot own- ers in this noted necropolis. As to the wisdom of Congress in ever starting the custom of placing cenotaphs in this cemetery to the memory of de- ceased members of Congress there has always been a difference of opinion. But they are there; and, in many cases, the particular member of Congress who died years ago is there, too, and it is now just as much a duty to keep up the respectable surroundings of their graves as it was in the first place to erect here the monuments to thelr memory. No country with justice to itself can forget its honored dead, and no doubt 2ll the people will be glad to know that the efforts of Representative Abernethy to have the Government care for and reserve “certain lands and monuments the Congressional Cemetery” was not without avail, and it is hoped that fu- ture congresses will provide, if neces- sary, for keeping up the good work. ‘The Civil War changed conditions in many ways, and it was during this pe- riod that congressional appropriations for caring for Government-owned lots In Congressional Cemetery were stopped. However, every now and then an effort was made to renew national interest, but the movers in this good cause, be- coming discouraged, were finally forced to give up the idea, and in this way the matter has rested until now. & e n CORRESPONDENT of an out-of- town newspaper, writing to his home town some 44 years ago, made some interesting statements which are well worth repeating today. He said: “One of the largest cemeteries in this district is known as the Congressional Cemetery. The strange paft of it is that it has no connection with Con- gress, and has not since 1864, when Lemuel L. Bowden, a Senator from Virginia, was buried there. This ceme- tery was established in 1807, Maj. Gen. Uriah Tracy of Connecticut being the fst to be interred there. The ceme. ashington Woman Flies Over Europe With First A RECRUITING THE AIR CRUISE PASSENGERS ABOARD THE S. S. COLUMBUS. | had been buried elsewhere. American Westminster Abbey,’ as it was | ETERY SHOWING Y OF DEC A CONGRESSION AL tery was originally 10 acres in extent, but since then ground has been added from time to time until it now in- cludes 30 acres. The original idea w: to erect cenotaphs—empty tombs—in | | honor of deceased Congressmen who But ‘the called for years, was forgotten during the war and no appropriations were made to keep it up. From 1807 until about 1850 the appropriations bills reg- ularly contained appropriations to build ‘freestone cenotaphs at the Congres- slonal Cemetery.’ They cost about $150 each. There are now in the cemetery over 200 of them, one for each Senator or Representative who dled during the interval. Under some of them, how- ever, repose the remains of those they are intended to be a memorial of. George Clinton of New York, who was Vice President of the United States from 1805 to 1812, was buried there. So was Elbridge Gerry, who also filled the office of Vice President. They were both buried there at their own request. Toblas Lear, the friend and private secretary of George Washington, was buried there, as was also Gen. Jacob Brown, who was commander-in-chief of the Army and died in 1828, and Wil- liam Wirt of Virginia, who was Attor- ney General of the United States from 1817 to 1820. All the prominent In- dians who died in this city for over a half century have been buried ghere. Gen. Rawlins, who was Grant's first Secretary of War, was buried there, The last cenotaph for a New York Rep- resentative was that of Silas M. Bur- 1’0\1:1::2.r wth?hdl;gh ”l’tn ufi’al;‘. He was a member of the y-fifth and Thirty- sixth ’s. Some of these ceno- taphs are-plready going to pieces in consequence of being constructed of a poor quality of sandstone, “One of the gravediggers speaking on the subject said to your correspondent: ‘The great majority of these stones will last for many, many years yet, but about 50 of them will waste entirely away inside of the next 10 years. They were mostly erected by contract, and as the contractors were not watched they made them of imperfect and often of condemned stone that could not be used for building purppses. Now and then some of the descendants of some of these Congressmen come here to see these stones, and they say they will have them replaced with a better stone, but the last we hear of it. The stone emory of John Quincy Adams over there is as good as it was the day it came here, just because some of the friends of Mr. Adams were particular in seeing that it was cut out of a good ROW OF CENOTAPHS ERECTED BY THE ASED MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. THESE STONES WILL APPROPRIATION. Of the many, cemeteries which for- merly existed within the lines of ‘Washington as originally laid out, Con- | gressional Cemetery is the only one to- |day in which intérments are made; sll others having been removed. On_ April | 4, 1807, a few persons, including Henry Ingle. George Blagden, Griffith Coombe, S. N. Smallwood, Dr. Frederick May, Peter Miller, John T. Frost and Capt. Thomas Tingey, purchased square No. 1115, between E and G, Eighteenth and Nineteenth _streets southeast, for & cemetery. There seems to have been no desire upon the part of the pur- chasers to run the cemetery for a per- sonal profit, for it was agreed by them that when the property became clear of debt it should be transferred to the vestry of Washington Parish. Accord- ingly it continued under its original management until March 30, 1812, when—the conditions of the agree- ment having been met—title to the land was_transferred through Henry Engle to the parish as agreed upon. The first Congressman to be interred in this cemetery was Senator Uriah Tracy of Connecticut, whose body is recorded as having been transferred from Rock Creek Cemetery on July 19, 1807, just a little over three months after its purchase by Henry Engle and those assoclated with him in this worthy undertaking. . Senator Tracy 'was born in Franklin, Conn., February 2, 1755. He was gradu- ated from Yale College in 1778, following which he studied law, later being ad: mitted to the bar. He became a mem- ber of the State House of Represent- atives, in which he served as speaker in 1793. Subsequently he was elected as a Federalist to the Third and Fourth Congresses, and served from March 4, 1793, to December 6, 1796, when he re- signed, and entered the United States Senate as the successor to Jonathan Trumbull, and where he served for a while as president pro tempore of that body. The Biographical Congressional Directory gives the place and date of his death as “‘Was| n, D. C., July 19, 1807,” but it is evident that if his body was exhumed from Rock Creek ry, his death must have taken place at an earlier date, since it would be umteasonable to suppose that they would bury such a distinguished man as he and remove his remains to some other cemetery the same day. Besides being a United States Sen- ator, Urlah Tracy had the distinction of having served in the American Revo- lution. In his article on “Patriots of the Revolutionary Period Who Are In- terred in the District,” Selden Marvin Ely tells us that the Senator’s name is listed “in a company that marched from sundry places for the relief of Boston, etc, in the Lexington Alarm, April, N your next trip to Europe| let “Afrways for My Wdys” trains are notoriously slow. | Even the Europeans—particuiarly those BY AMY HUGHES EATON. | your slogan. Don't waste your time on trains, for European who have traveled in America—are frank to admit their inferiority. On the other hand, it is my personal | afraid of doing & thing has always| Colonial Airways, Inc.; Samuel opinion that the Europeans are justly | proud of their commercial air Iln!s.‘ Perhaps it was for this very reason that the enterprising North German; Lloyd Steamship Co. and the Deutsche | Luft Hansa decided to introduce their ¢ airways to Americans interested in| aviation. They organized the first air, cruise in history, which was to be sim- | eling Chamber of Com-} Members of the air cruise} were to visit important capitals and | inspect the greater air flelds, such as| Croyden, Le Bourget and Templeh Furthermore, they were to be intro-| duced to the best and latest European | models of airplanes at the Interna- tional Aviation Exposition in Berlin. Like most Americans, I had always been interested in and enthusiastic ‘about -aviation—but for the .other fellow. I had never been quite brave enough to trust my life in an airplane. The highest altitude I could boast, was a roof garden or the Wash- ington Monument. Imagine, then, my awe at being in- vited to go on the alr cruise! Inva: bly every one to whom I mentioned the subject quite frankly said: “But of course you won't go.” Being a little made me want to do it more. A few words of encouragement were all that I needed. A great deal of that was furnished by my friend, Miss Miidred Johnson, often referred to as the “Apostle of Alr Mail.” She served with Byrd, Lindbergh, Goebel and others, as a member of the committee of Amer can aviators indorsing the air crulse. She had flown all the American well as the European air routes. Her articles recounting her experiences were 50 interesti and her enthusiasm so that found mysalf, at last, air cruise passenger on he steamship Columbus on the first ap of our journey. But something happened to the air cruise. Either its promoters did not realize the valus of American publicity and adverising in educating us to its t pt | | pioneering possibiiities, or we Ameri- | | cans proved how unairminded we are. | At any rate, Eurcpeans never seem to | appreciate how we Americans rely on our newspapers to do our nho{)plng for us and sound out the bargains, even in travel. Instead of the 300 passen- | gers expected, there were only four of | us, Miss Mildred Johnson, Philadelphia; | Gen. Leslie Kincaid, director D’Bfl"‘e T, | vice president of the National Capital | Airways, Inc., of New York and Wash- | ington, and myself. Undaunted, we decided to make the lair cruise a success despite its in- | auspicious beginning. When we landed at Bremerhaven and counted the “heads,” we discovered that every seat in our big 12-passenger, tri- ’momr»d Junkers was taken. Our ‘“ex- tras” included three young men from | Jersey [lrflm New Yorz and Col. Barcley of |Chicago, who, despite his years, was| {known as the youngest man on the | |boat; besides the North German repre- sentative, While our baggaze was being weighed and found ‘“not waniing” [we were taken around the riifield ciimbed City, one from California, two' .. into our old birxd. We stufli cotton lan TOMB OF ELBRIDGE GERRY, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES AND A SIGNER OF PENDENCE. THE DECLARATION OF INDE- 1775, and were formed into an inde- pendent company at Roxbury.” Though the first Congressman to be buried in Congressional Cemetery, Sen- ator Tracy, was not the first member of Congress to die in Washington, for, on March 1, 1802—five years before the death of the Senator—Narsworthy Hunter, a Delegate from the then terri- tory of Mississippi, passed away in one of the six buildings, still standing at 2107 to 2117 Pennsylvania avenue northwest. It was from his home in this block that the funeral took place, his body being escorted to the grave in the yard of the Presbyterian Church in Georgetown by members of the two houses of Congress, the heads of the several Government departments and others, * ok ox o 'OLLOWING this was the death, on March 17, 1804, of Danleld Hiester, a Representative from Maryland, and who had served previously in a like capucity from the State of Pennsyl- vania. There seems to be some doubt as to his name. Bryan's Hisf gnes it as “Heister,” and so does the - gressional Directory of February 15, just passed, while the Congressional Bio- graphical Directory gives it as “Hiester.” Whatever may be the correct spelling of his name, he had a very interesting funeral. He died at Lovell's Hotel, on the north side of Pennsylvania avenue near Fifteenth street, and on the day of the interment, Congress adjourned to this hotel, where biscuits and wine were served. This expense, together with other incidental expenses, was paid from the contingent fund of the House, which I believe is still customary in such cases —-ex':ctptB as mmgne wlnan V';lxlhelmus Bogart Bryan us: v s occa- sion the members of the two houses walked in procession ‘from Lovell's Hotel round the President's Square,’ and from that point the body was taken on through Georgeotwn to Hagerstown, where the deceased had lived.” A year Iater, Mr. Bryan states—quot- ing Cutler's Life—"on a similar occa- sion, the members of the two houses instead of walking rode in carriages from the Capitol to the late residence and thence to the grave. At the house, wine, spirits and biscuit were provided as part of the cost of the funeral all of whi funds.” | In connection with the burial of Rep- | resentative Hiester, another patent error | presents itself. Cutler, as quoted above, l(nves his final resting place as Hagers- town, while the Congressional Record gives it as Congressional Cemetery. It looks as if the Angel Gabriel might have quite a time locating some folks when the great day comes. Congress apparently did not pay very ich was paid from the public Christ.Church at an early date assign- interment of deceased members of Con- gress. It was not long before they were called upon for more ground, and 300 more sites were donated for the same purpose. Later Congress purchased other sites and began erecting the ceno- taphs we see today. Congress also made appropriations for improvements to the grounds designat- Ing the burial grounds as “Congressional Cemetery,” by which name it is known today. Previous to this it was called “Washington Cemetery,” which had taken the place of the earlier name of “The Washington Parish Burial Ground.” * kK K RIST CHURCH was very glad to accept the burial ground presented by its vestryman, Henry Ingle, and others, since a lot purchased by it about this time had proved to be too low v:;ml g-mp, and was accordingly aban- oned. James Croggon, 8o well known for his reliable research work, in speaking of | Star, says: “The Congressional Cemetery up to 1825 was, to all intents and purposes, in the county, for there was no settle- ment east of the Navy Yard, commons intervening between the plot set apart for burials and the town, although at long. intervals there was some garden- | ing and not a few squares of corn, oats, | potatoes, etc. The square west, now included in the grounds, and some oth- | ers south were 80 used, and it is related lm‘nt fthe“m-mer thereof, with some of s family, rej on the ground he once culti: wmhe spot on which a Tells of Trip Over Alps and Pyrenees in Luxurious Pagsenger Planes to Visit the Principal Capitals of Europe and the Greater Air Fields—Describes Dancing and Dining in Plane. K| AR’ INCAID AND THE AUTHOR OF TICL d ourse] e motors vib; in our ears and strap curely to our seats. T and we felt a slight Johnson smiled reassuringly d out the window. To my asionishment, I saw that our wheels had already lof the ground and we were lifting up on ly soft cushion of alr, he first time, I became consclous of the interior of the plane. I had heard of 12 -passenger airships, of course, but I had no conception of one's jarrangement and equipment. The | leather upholstered.chairs were arranged comforta tably les along the much for its burial lots in Congressional | Cemetery, for we find the vestry of | ing 100 sites in this cemetery for the | this cemetery some years ago in The | TOMB OF TOBIAS LEAR, SECRETARY TO GEORGE WASH dance took place at the marriage of his ;’!aughter being now.the family burial ot. “But little improvement had been made to the avenues and streets, but the | travel to the graveyard, the naval maga- zine and the naval hospital at Tenth street had worn a passable road. Over this the funeral processions passed, for, owing to the few public conveyances obtainable, more people walked than rode, and when there was a military, naval or fraternal escort bands of marching tunes. It is needless to say that when the honors called for a sa- lute by cannon there was ample room on the commons north.” In 1824 square 1102, to the north- west of ihe cemetery, was.bought of Col. Eigar, the commissioner of public buildings. the same amount of ground as the Congressional, and was located between Seventeenth and Eighteenth and D and | E streets. The price paid for this en- tire square was $150, which, at that, might have been quite a large sum 105 years ago. It is probable that this block is the one which was later called the Naval Cemetery and which was used for burial purposes until after the Civil War, sub- sequent to which the bodies buried here were removed to the Congressional Cemetery. In his description of this cemetery, Mr. Croggon further tells us that: streets southeast, to which had been added the square south in 1849, was in like condition to the others, all the lots being taken and most of the sites occupied. The square south of Georgia avenue between Seventeenth and Eight- eenth streets was added in 1855. Dur- ing that decade an addition eastward was taken on the authority of Congress, 8 _section 200 by 478 feet of reservation 13 being conveyed to the parish in 1858, as well as square 1105, between Beventeenth and Eighteenth streets and G and H streets. The following year square 1106, south of the latter, ex- tending to the circle and Water street, was taken, as was also square 1117 ex- tended to Water street, and square 1123, between G and H streets and Nine- teenth and Twentleth, directly south :112 that part taken from the reserva- n. O * K ok ok F the 60,000 burlals made in this cemetery, probably the most nota- Yice President of the United States, a signer of the Declaration of Independ- ence and distinguished in many other ways, He was born in Marblehead, Mass., July 17, 1744, and died suddenly on his way to the Capitol, Washington, D. C., November 23, 1814. In 1810 and 1811 music played ‘Mary’s Dream’ and other | ‘This block contained about | “Congressional Cemetery, on E street between Eighteenth and Nineteenth ble of all is that of Elbridge Gerry, | GTON, | he was elected Governor of Massachu- | setts and it was his party which, in 1812, divided Essex County into a dragon-shaped district for political rea- sons, & course which resulted in coin- ing a new word for the dictionary— “gerrymander,” He was active in his efforts for American independence, and after serving as a member of the Colo- nial House of Representatives from 1772 to 1775, became a Delegate to the Continental Congress, where he served from 1776 to 1780 and from 1783 to 1785. He was also a delegate to the Constitutional Convention of the United States, held in New York in 1789, but refused to sign the instrument upon the grounds that he felt it gave the President too much power. He was a member of the first and second Con- gresses, serving from March 4, 1789, to March 3, 1793. In 1797 he was one of the envoys sent to France on a secret mission to establish relations with that country. His election to the vice presidency, on in 1812, and he served as such until his death on November 23, 1814. His grave is covered with a handsome monument which was erected by an act of Con- gress passed in 1823. An iron rafling fence incloses the burial plot. Another man of considerable historic prominence interred here is Tobias Lear, Washington's private secretary, and the tutor of his two adopted chil- dren, George Washington Parke Custis and Nellie Parke Custis, afterward Mrs. Lawrence Lewis. He was born in Ports- mouth, N. H, on September 19, 1762, and graduated from Harvard in 1783. In 1786 he became Washington's pri- vate secretary, and later married, for his second wife, the widow of one of Washington's favorite nephews. At Mount Vernon he lived on an equal footing with other members of the household, as the following letter, writ- ten by Gen. Washington, will testify: “MOUNT VERNON, “6 February, 1786. “My Dear Sir: Mr Lear, or any other who may come into my family im the blended characters of preceptor to the children and clerk or private secretary to me, will sit at my table, will live as I live, will mix with the company who resort to the house and will be treated in every respect with civility and proper attention. He will have his washing done in the family, and may have his linen and stockings mended by the maids of it. The duties which will be required of him are generally such as appertain to the offices above mentioned. The first will be very trifling, till the children are a little more advanced, and the other will be equally so. as my cor- respondences decline (which I am en- deavoring to effect) and after my ac- counts and other old matters are brought up. To descend more minutely the ticket with James Madison, occurred | IN CONGRESSIONAL CEMETERY. into his duties I am unable, because oc- casional matters may call for particular services, but nothing derogatory will be asked or expected. “After this explanatiom of my wants I request that Mr. Lear will mention the annual sum he will expect for these services, and I will give him a decided answer by the return of the stages, which now carry the mail and travel quickly. A good hand, as well as proper diction, would be a recommendation on account of fair entries, and for the benefit of the children who will have to copy after it.” * ok x ok F OR his services as secretary to the first President he received the sum of $200 a year. In the city's infancy he tried to help it along by writing a pamphlet entitled “Observations on the River Potomac,” etc., in which he no doubt received thz encourage Washington. It w ly in 1793, and is probably the earliest monograph relatin: Columbia and the Potomac River. ‘Washington thought a great deal of Tobias Lear and in his wul left him a life interest in a 3G0-acre farm, and though he had resigned six years before the general passed away, yet he had the distinction of being present at Wash- ington’s bedside during his last illness and was intrusted with the arrange- ments for the funeral, which took place at Mount Vernon on December 18, 1799. His detailed account of the first President’s last hours are quite full and are regarded as accurate. After resigning as Washington's sec- retary, together with others, he en- 824 in business in this city, which, however, resulted in failure. He was later sent as consul to Santo Domingo and subsequently.as consul general at Algeria, and at the time of his death, which was brought on by his own han was accountant of the War Department. The inscription on the marble slab which covers his grave, and now almost indiscernible, reads: “Here lies the remains of Tol ar. He was early distinguished as the Private Secretary and famillar friend of the Tiustrious Washington and after Having served his country with Dignity, Zeal and Fidelity in many stations d m honorablf die Accountant of the War Department i 11 October 1816 Aged 54. His desolate Widow and mourning Som have erected this monument to mark the place of his abode in the City of Silence.” | | | | ir Cruise LOOKING DOWN UPON THE OLD WORLD FROM AN AIRPLANE T of the fusela space between. Furthermore, instead of a “no smoking” sign, we were in- vited to smoke if we chose. Settling down to our two-hour ride from Bremerhaven to Berlin, we were each handed a little pillow for our heads and a menu card for lunch. Our white-groomed steward, who had stepped out of his buffet barroom—a compart- ment between us and the cockpit certainly on the job. Afterward, w agreed that a luncheon beginning with caviare and ending with champagne was fitting enough to our mode of travel, Suggestions were made that we visit the cockpit. We filed in, one at the time, and played at steering one of the controls relinquished by an indulgent pllot. We placed our hands on the wheel and our feet on the pedals to “feel” how the other pilot maneuvered us through the clouds. The radio op- erator gave us his chart and pointed to the interesting places over which we flew. He showed us the great radio sta- tlon at Hamburg, one of the largest in the world, and we counted the 14 tall towers. Then he gave us a little music iy on eltfier side of neat littleiand I had my first dance in a heavier- s fleld @ess-windowed walls than-air craft, There was plenty of ‘world that there is Iit ge, with plenty of aisle : room in the spacious aisle and we th'!‘ | certainly steady enough, until one of the passengers tipped the pilot off and he furnished an additional thrill by doing |8 sudden side dip that made us glad | enough to fall into our seats again. As much as I learned to appreciate | Berlin later, I was loath to have this little cruise over. However, I later learned that in aviation, no matter how pleasant the thing at present, there is Iiusually quite as great a thrill just around the corner. To view Berlin from the skies is in itself a rare treat. I have now seen it from the air many times, but always the impression is a new one. On this particular day Berlin looked much like a huge carnival. These same copper domes, green with oxidation of es and almost iridescent in the with the bright red roofs of the smaller buildings. The streets, intertwining throughout the city, looked like ribbon confetti and even appeared in such a vivid setting to be varicolored. And Templehof Field! So many peans of praise ve already been sung to this great air-field by tle else that can | { | ag bright sunlight, made a lovely contrast | be said. My own impressions are that | Templehof is a little city within itself 15 minutes from the heart of Berlin. | Although it was formerly the parade | ground of the Kaiser's troops, it is now devoid of any military aspect whatso- ever. It caters only to the comfort and pleasure of its passengers and visitors. It never seems congested, and yet it is possibly the liveliest, busiest aeronautical center in the world. People have their wine on the terraces, their tea or cof- fee in the restaurants, or they stand within certain limits to watch the planes land and take off. After a 10-day round of festivities, my next treat was a visit to Priedrichs- | hafen, via Zurich, to see the Zeppelin works and the Dornier plant. But be- cause my trip ever was so interesting, Icannot forego a bit of descrintion here. Many rafubows have been seem from {the skies, of course. But one just doesn't forget the first time he sees one. We had left Halle-Leipzig and were “""T, over country lnfkrchlnlin’ly flat and hilly. The sun was taking its first peep out after a heavy rain. All this Seemed to accentuate the span of the gorgeous colored arc suspended in the (Continued on Seventh Page.)_ %