Postcard Thursday: Happy Birthday, General Grant

Yesterday marked the 194th birthday of Ulysses S. Grant, the general who won the Civil War and later served two terms as president of the United States. Happy birthday, Mister President!

Grant's Tomb, on Riverside Drive, is the largest presidential burial place in the country. But is he buried there? As we write in Inside the Apple:

If you are older than a certain age, you’ve likely heard the riddle: “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb?” It was a consolation question on Groucho Marx’s quiz show, You Bet Your Life. Like other consolation questions—“What color is an orange?” “What year did the War of 1812 start?”—it was designed to have such an obvious answer that no one could get it wrong. Most people answered, “Grant, of course!” and won $25, though a few poor souls thought it was a trick question. 

But while Groucho would accept that answer, it isn’t correct. Technically, no one is buried in Grant’s Tomb: both the former President, Ulysses S. Grant, and his wife, Julia Dent Grant, are entombed there, above ground, in marvelously monumental stone sarcophagi. So those You Bet Your Life contestants who thought it was a trick question were correct. It was a trick question—no one is buried in the building. 

Grant died in 1885, having lived the last four years of his life in New York. His tomb sits at 122nd Street and Riverside Drive, at one of the highest points in Riverside Park, and is the largest mausoleum in North America. It is also a remarkable testament to the high esteem in which Grant was held after his death (despite two terms as president marked by scandal and perceived mediocrity) as well as to New York’s growing obsession in the 1890s with becoming the premiere American city. First, New York beat out other places Grant had lived—including Galena, Illinois, and St. Louis, Missouri—for the right to bury the president. Then, the Grant Memorial Association held two contests to determine who would design the structure, the second contest being held because none of the entries the first time around was deemed grand enough. The tomb, by John Duncan, is modeled on the mausoleum at Halicanarssus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. In 1897, the tomb was officially opened and it fast became the leading tourist attraction in the city. Indeed, more people visited Grant’s Tomb in the early years of the Twentieth Century than went to the Statue of Liberty.

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Read more about NYC history in

 

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City

Postcard Thursday: Surrender at Appomattox Courthouse

Grant's Tomb and ferry landing, seen from the Hudson.

One hundred fifty years ago today, on April 9, 1865, Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant, ending the bloody Civil War.

The day before, Lee had written to Grant:

To be frank, I do not think the emergency has arisen to call for the surrender of this army, but, as the restoration of peace should be the sole object of all, I desired to know whether your proposals would lead to that end....

Around 5:00 a.m. on April 9th, Grant dashed off a reply:

I have not authority to treat on the subject of peace. The meeting proposed for 10 A.M. to-day could lead to no good. I will state, however, that I am equally desirous for peace with yourself, and the whole North entertains the same feeling. The terms upon which peace can be had are well understood. By the South laying down their arms, they would hasten that most desirable event, save thousands of human lives, and hundreds of millions of property not yet destroyed. Seriously hoping that all our difficulties may be settled without the loss of another life....

The two men met at the home of Wilmer McLean in the town of Appomattox Courthouse (not in an actual courthouse as is too often erroneously mentioned). After hammering out the terms of the surrender, Lee departed around four o'clock in the afternoon. General Horace Potter recalled the scene:

At a little before 4 o'clock General Lee shook hands with General Grant, bowed to the other officers, and with Colonel Marshall left the room. One after another we followed, and passed out to the porch. Lee signaled to his orderly to bring up his horse, and while the animal was being bridled the general stood on the lowest step and gazed sadly in the direction of the valley beyond where his army lay - now an army of prisoners. He smote his hands together a number of times in an absent sort of way; seemed not to see the group of Union officers in the yard who rose respectfully at his approach, and appeared unconscious of everything about him. All appreciated the sadness that overwhelmed him, and he had the personal sympathy of every one who beheld him at this supreme moment of trial. The approach of his horse seemed to recall him from his reverie, and he at once mounted. General Grant now stepped down from the porch, and, moving toward him, saluted him by raising his hat. He was followed in this act of courtesy by all our officers present; Lee raised his hat respectfully, and rode off to break the sad news to the brave fellows whom he had so long commanded.

 (These and other firsthand accounts of the day can be found at eyewitnesstohistory.com.)

After the war and his two terms as president, General Grant moved to New York City. He lived on the Upper East Side (in a house that's now gone) and is entombed in the largest presidential mausoleum on Riverside Drive. As you can see from the above black-and-white postcard, the tomb was once quite the destination and--as we've pointed out before--more people used to visit it than the Statue of Liberty.

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In commemoration of the end of the Civil War, James is leading a walking tour on Saturday, April 25, at 1:00 p.m. that looks for remnants of the era still left in Manhattan and traces the footsteps of Abraham Lincoln, both when he came to the city as a candidate for president in 1860 and when he returned as a martyr on April 25, 1865.

You can read about the tour and find out how to sign up at http://blog.insidetheapple.net/2015/04/walking-tour-saturday-april-25.html.

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Explore more NYC history in

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

If you haven't had a chance to pick up a copy of Footprints yet,

you can order it from your favorite online retailers (Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc.) or

from independent bookstores across the country.

And, of course, Inside the Apple is available at fine bookstores everywhere.

Postcard Thursday: Grant's Tomb

This great shot of Grant's Tomb is from sometime in the early twentieth century, and if you've toured with us, you may have seen this on our walk of Morningside Heights. (This scene has to be after 1907 due to the type of postcard, but we aren't car buffs -- can someone identify any makes or models?) As you can see in this picture, Riverside Park and Grant's Tomb were popular destinations for Sunday drives.

From its opening in 1897, Grant's Tomb became a magnet for tourists and New Yorkers alike who were coming not just to honor the memory of the great Civil War hero, but also to gawk at the country's largest presidential tomb. As we write in Inside the Apple:

Grant died in 1885, having lived the last four years of his life in New York. His tomb sits at 122nd Street and Riverside Drive, at one of the highest points in Riverside Park....[It is] a remarkable testament to the high esteem in which Grant was held after his death (despite two terms as president marked by scandal and perceived mediocrity) as well as to New York’s growing obsession in the 1890s with becoming the premiere American city. First, New York beat out other places Grant had lived—including Galena, Illinois, and St. Louis, Missouri—for the right to bury the president. Then, the Grant Memorial Association held two contests to determine who would design the structure, the second contest being held because none of the entries the first time around was deemed grand enough. The tomb, by John Duncan, is modeled on the mausoleum at Halicanarssus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. In 1897, the tomb was officially opened and it fast became the leading tourist attraction in the city. Indeed, more people visited Grant’s Tomb in the early years of the Twentieth Century than went to the Statue of Liberty.

In the meantime, if you want to find out the answer to the old riddle, "Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?" you'll simply have to go check it out in person. The tomb is run by the National Park Service and is open for visitation.

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Read more about Grant's Tomb and Riverside Park in

Inside the Apple

and don't forget our next book

Footprints in New York comes out April 15, 2014, but you can pre-order today.

William Jenkins Worth and Worth Street

The fall of Mexico City, 1847

Today, May 7, marks the anniversary of the death of General William Jenkins Worth, hero of the Battle of Chapultepec in the Mexican-American War and namesake of Fort Worth, Texas. But while Worth died of cholera in Texas in 1849, his remains ended up in New York, a city in which he never lived while he was alive.

That Worth was well-regarded in his life is unquestioned. A protégé of Winfield (“Old Fuss and Feathers”) Scott, Worth fought in the War of 1812, the Seminole War in Florida, and the Mexican-American War. At the Battle of Chapultepec, Worth’s division took Mexico City’s San Cosme Gate, thus gaining access to the city in what would prove to be a decisive battle in the war. When Mexico City fell to the Americans, it was Worth himself who raised the American flag from the top of the National Palace.

(Though the Mexican-American War is often overlooked these days, it was a major turning point in American history, netting the United States the territories of Arizona, New Mexico, and California. And the Battle of Chapultepec—also known as the “Halls of Montezuma”—is still commemorated in the opening line of the Marine Corps hymn.)

When Worth died in 1849, he was a famous man—but why he didn’t end up buried in Texas or in Hudson, New York (his childhood home) remains a bit of a mystery. Certainly, New York embraced him as a man deserving of all the pomp and circumstance it could muster. He was brought to the city and buried in a temporary tomb in Green-Wood cemetery while a proper monument could be erected at Madison Square. Once the monument was finished, Worth was reburied on November 25, 1857, in an elaborate ceremony after lying in state at City Hall. (November 25 was in those days an important holiday—Evacuation Day—which marked the end of the American Revolution.)

Like an Egyptian pharaoh, Worth had numerous objects entombed with him, and they provide a fascinating insight into the customs of the time. Worth was a Mason and so many Masonic items were included, ranging from The Masonic Manual to a list of the lodges under the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge in New York. Other items were particularly New York-centric and provide a time capsule of 1857; they include Valentine’s Manual, the constitution and by-laws of the Metropolitan Social Club, a catalogue of the New York Ophthalmic Hospital, and many documents pertaining to the building of Worth’s tomb. Added for good measure were newspaper stories covering George Washington’s funeral in 1799 and two pennies—perhaps on the general’s eyes—dating from 1787 and 1812.

The Worth Monument, which stands at the junction of Fifth Avenue and Broadway near the Flatiron Building, is one of only two stand-alone military gravesites of its kind in the city. (The other, grander structure is Grant’s Tomb in Riverside Park.)

But the tomb isn’t Worth’s only commemoration in New York. Running through Chinatown and Tribeca is Worth Street, which was named for him in the early 1850s. For many years that thoroughfare had been called Anthony Street and it was known as one of the worst streets in New York. Low-cost brothels clustered in the blocks of Anthony near the intersection of Orange and Cross Street. In 1829, the five-cornered intersection where Anthony, Orange, and Cross met had been dubbed “the Five Points,” and soon that name came to refer to the entire slum that radiated out from that hub.

By the 1850s, with a surge of poor Irish and German immigrants moving into Five Points, the city decided to improve the neighborhood’s fortunes through a little creative street renaming. If Anthony Street was terrible, they would literally wipe it off the map. In its place was Worth Street, named for the great hero of the war, and therefore free of any taint. (Around the same time, Orange Street was renamed Baxter in honor of Colonel Charles Baxter who had commanded the New York Regiment at Chapultepec and was killed. When Cross Street later became Park Street—now called Mosco Street—all three original street names that made up the infamous Five Points intersection were gone.)

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Much more about the Five Points, including a walking tour that takes you along General Worth’s street to all that remains of the original intersection, can be found in our new book, Inside the Apple. Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or order from Amazon or other online merchants.

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