The Death of Ulysses S. Grant

 

Ulysses S.Grant, Civil War hero and 18th U.S. President, died on July 23, 1885, at age 63 from throat cancer at Mount McGregor in New York. Ruined by swindler Ferdinand Ward's Ponzi scheme, the bankrupt Grant raced against agony to finish his memoirs, aided by Mark Twain's generous 70% royalty deal.

Unable to speak or eat without agony, he penned 366,000 words in under a year, declaring on July 16, "nothing more... I am not likely to be more ready to go." He passed peacefully surrounded by family.  He whispered "Let us have peace"—his tomb's inscription. Posthumous sales of his memoirs secured his wife’s future and cemented Grant's literary triumph.

CIVIL WAR CIVILIAN LIFE: MANASSAS, VIRGINIA

War and Reconstruction in Mississippi 1861-1875: A Portrait

George Washington’s Church During the Civil War

Christ Church

While many churches were turned into hospitals and stables during the occupation of Alexandria, Virginia, Christ Church’s reputation as George Washington’s place of worship preserved it as a church. 

Union Army Lt. Charles Haydon found Alexandria, “A quaint, old looking place….There is not a half hour in the day that I do not have his (George Washington’s) presence associated with the surrounding scenery.”  Lt Haydon mused, “It would do us all good to spend an hour at the grave of Washington in tears over the fate of our country.” Union army chaplains conducted services in the church, where a Union army congregation grew up.  Most of the original parishioners worshipped with other Southern sympathizers elsewhere.  

Union soldiers vandalized the grave of Eleanor Wren at Christ Church, changing her age at death from “32” to “132”.  According to contemporary reports, “The streets were crowded with intoxicated soldiery; murder was of almost hourly occurrence, and disturbances, robbery, and rioting were constant.  The sidewalks and docks were covered with drunken men, women, and children, and quiet citizens were afraid to venture (out)”.

By the summer of 1863 the Alexandria Gazette reported, old residents of Alexandria had mostly departed.  When the war ended, Christ Church was returned to its parishioners with its interior intact.

Alexandria, 1861-1865

Civil War Graves of Northern Virginia

Who was Wilmer McLean (1861-1865) ?

Wilmer McLean

Wilmer McLean was born in 1814, was orphaned before he was nine, was raised by relatives in Alexandria, Virginia and became a prosperous food merchant in Alexandria.  In 1853 he married Virginia Hooe Mason a wealthy widow, with extensive real estate holdings and other property. She owned Yorkshire plantation in Prince William County, Virginia, estimated to have some 1200 acres; a tract of 330 acres in Fairfax County, and two other tracts containing 500 acres in Prince William County. She also owned fourteen slaves. There were two daughters by the first marriage, Maria (born 1844) and Osceola (born 1845). Both girls lived with the Wilmer McLeans at Manassas and were described by Confederate officers as McLean’s “two pretty daughters.” Two other children were born of the McLean marriage, Wilmer McLean, Jr. (born 1854) and Lucretia Virginia (born 1857).

Following the First Battle of Manassas, Mrs. McLean and the children left the area. Wilmer McLean, however, worked diligently as a civilian with the Confederate Quartermaster Department. He worked to expedite the flow of food supplies to the troops in camp near Manassas. There was a time when the troops were down to one day’s rations. McLean’s experience as a wholesale merchant was invaluable in solving the purchasing of supplies in the fertile country around Manassas.

McLean’s most valuable contribution to the Confederacy was agreeing to let the army take over the buildings of the family plantation, “Yorkshire”, for use as a military hospital. The barn was a hospital and the dwellings and outbuildings were used as living quarters of surgeons and hospital attendants from July 17, 1861 until February 28, 1862. McLean gave his full cooperation to the establishment of this hospital. By 1862, however, he was completely disenchanted by the misconduct of soldiers and hospital personnel at Yorkshire. Large quantities of wine and whiskey were consumed by the hospital attendants. Sanitation was woefully lacking, flies covered the faces of patients. The dwellings were grossly mistreated while occupied by surgeons and attendants.

Further evidence of his disillusionment was his growing price demands on the Quartermaster. McLean apparently purchased candles and other scarce items in Richmond, had them shipped to Manassas, and then sold them to the Confederate Quartermaster for the highest price he could get.

Wilmer McLean had left the area in March 1862 as the Army retreated. From his experience as a merchant he knew that a long war would cause the price of commodities to rise higher and higher. He began to speculate in sugar and made a tidy income during the war. McLean moved his family to the quiet village of Appomattox Court House to escape the fury of war. But fate once again took a hand. The war which had virtually begun in McLean’s kitchen in Manassas, when a Union artillery shell exploded in the cookhouse at Yorkshire, ended in his front parlor in Appomattox Court House where General Lee surrendered his army to General Grant.

The McLeans left their rented house in Appomattox and returned to the Manassas area, virtually penniless. McLean still owned many hundreds of acres of land in Prince William County, but the land was virtually worthless for resale and McLean was heavily in debt.

Eventually the ever practical McLean turned his attention to politics, joined the Yankee Republican party, supported Grant in the election of 1872 and was rewarded by an appointment to a U.S. Treasury job.  Wilmer McLean died on June 5, 1882 and is buried in St. Paul’s Cemetery in Alexandria.  

Civil War Graves of Northern Virginia

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The Confederate Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery

     Several hundred Confederate dead were buried at the new national cemetery at Arlington by the end of the war in April 1865. Some were prisoners of war who died in custody, some were executed spies, and some were battlefield dead. The federal government did not permit the decoration of Confederate graves. Families of Confederates buried at Arlington were refused permission to lay flowers on their loved ones' graves.

     In 1868, families of dead Confederates were barred from the cemetery on Decoration Day (now Memorial Day). Union veterans prowled the cemetery ensuring that Confederate graves were not honored in any way.  Cemetery authorities refused to allow monuments to the Confederate dead or allow Confederate veterans to be buried at Arlington.

     Because of the Spanish-American War and the need to end still simmering sectional differences, the federal government's policy toward Confederate graves at Arlington National Cemetery changed. On December 14, 1898, President McKinley announced that the federal government would begin tending Confederate graves since these dead represented “a tribute to American valor”.  Several hundred Confederate soldiers buried throughout Arlington National Cemetery were disinterred and reburied in a “Confederate section” around the spot designated for the Confederate Memorial.  

    On June 4, 1914 President Woodrow Wilson dedicated the Confederate Memorial at Arlington. The Confederate Memorial was dedicated to peace and reconciliation and to the hope of a united future.  U.S. Presidents have traditionally sent a wreath to be placed at the Confederate Memorial on Memorial Day.

Civil War Graves of Northern Virginia