April 19, 1865 funeral procession

[L Verge]

(12-08-2014 02:05 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  

(12-08-2014 01:32 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Now, any taker's on what the name of the locomotive was that pulled out of D.C. with the Lincoln funeral car? Hint: Think of an American city.

According to "The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln The Funeral Train Excerpts from newspapers and other sources" (From the files of the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection) there is some debate on this:

WASHINGTON TO BALTIMORE
The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad over whose lines the
funeral train first moved has claimed that its famous
engine "Number 23" later called the "William Mason,"
headed the funeral train from Washington to Baltimore.
This engine is the same one which brought Lincoln into
Washington from Baltimore in 1861 and also was used
for part of the Gettysburg trip in 1863. A contemporary
news item states, however, that engine "Number 238"
drew the train and that it was a new locomotive made
at the Mount Clare works. Thomas Beckett was the engi-
neer. "Number 239," the pilot locomotive, was draped in
mourning and William Galloway was the engineer.

http://archive.org/stream/assassinationo...c_djvu.txt

My memory is that the Old Nashville was the one used on the Cleveland to Columbus portion of the route.

OK, another mystery to solve. Both Jill and I evidently read the same source that the locomotive was named Old Nashville. Back to the search...

There is also a story attached to the engineer(s), but for the life of me, I cannot remember it. I want to say that we carried it in a Surratt Courier about ten years ago.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Scott and Kees mentioned 42 different engines - that meant 3,5 different each day. Why??? Reasons for changing engines I could think of are entering a different company's "territory" (but were there so many different companies?), and/or different gauge (which would also require to change the cars). Were there so many different engines also used for the inaugural journey? Thanks for any hint!

[RJNorton]

Eva, I am thinking each individual railroad company along the funeral train route desired to use its own locomotive. In his book on the funeral train Scott Trostel (a member here) has included a couple of pages (pp. 208-209) with the names of all identified locomotives used during the long journey to Springfield. For example the locomotive that pulled the train from Michigan City to Chicago was the Ranger.

Scott's book is full of fascinating details and stories of the funeral train.

[loetar44]

(12-08-2014 07:40 PM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Scott and Kees mentioned 42 different engines - that meant 3,5 different each day. Why??? Reasons for changing engines I could think of are entering a different company's "territory" (but were there so many different companies?), and/or different gauge (which would also require to change the cars). Were there so many different engines also used for the inaugural journey? Thanks for any hint!

Eva, 42 engines makes sense, considering that the train moved from one railroad company's jurisdiction to the next through 8 states and a lot of counties. I’m sure it’s recorded somewhere; the trick is finding it! There were ca. 20 engines that pulled the funeral train and ca. 20 engines used as pilot. And there were engines that pulled extra train(s) of mourners to Springfield. I will give it a try to compose a list, only because I’m curious. Don’t know I will succeed.... I’ve a lot other things to do today, so give me some time .... Maybe someone else already has such a list. Please help!

[Eva Elisabeth]

Thanks Roger and Kees. Well, since I grew up with just one monopolist railway "company" nationwide (the German state, now a corporation with only few competitors), 42 companies seemed indeed an enormous number to me.

Also I understood that all the 42 engines just pulled the funeral train. Kees, re: "There were ca. 20 engines that pulled the funeral train and ca. 20 engines used as pilot," - what does this, i. e. "used as pilot" mean?

[loetar44]

(12-09-2014 09:27 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Thanks Roger and Kees. Well, since I grew up with just one monopolist railway "company" nationwide (the German state, now a corporation with only few competitors), 42 companies seemed indeed an enormous number to me.

Also I understood that all the 42 engines just pulled the funeral train. Kees, re: "There were ca. 20 engines that pulled the funeral train and ca. 20 engines used as pilot," - what does this, i. e. "used as pilot" mean?

Eva, the pilot engine is the locomotive that is ca. 10 minutes ahead of the funeral train to control the track, if it is free of any obstacles, crowds etc.

Back later ....

[Eva Elisabeth]

Thanks, Kees.

[STS Lincolnite]

(12-09-2014 02:42 PM)loetar44 Wrote:  

(12-09-2014 09:27 AM)Eva Elisabeth Wrote:  Thanks Roger and Kees. Well, since I grew up with just one monopolist railway "company" nationwide (the German state, now a corporation with only few competitors), 42 companies seemed indeed an enormous number to me.

Also I understood that all the 42 engines just pulled the funeral train. Kees, re: "There were ca. 20 engines that pulled the funeral train and ca. 20 engines used as pilot," - what does this, i. e. "used as pilot" mean?

Eva, the pilot engine is the locomotive that is ca. 10 minutes ahead of the funeral train to control the track, if it is free of any obstacles, crowds etc.

Back later ....

I will expand a little on Kees response.

This from Scott Trostel's book The Lincoln Funeral Train mentioned by Roger in a previous post. From p. 22:
"The Pilot Engine and usually one coach operated over the tracks first, as a security buffer, followed by Funeral Train. The space between the trains was to average approximately 10 minutes."

Also in the same book (as Roger mentioned - on p. 208-209) is a great table that lists all of the locomotives (pilot and funeral train) names that are known - he has been able to identify a good number of them. In addition it lists the segment of rail they operated on as well as the names of the crew members (engineer and fireman) who ran the locomotives if known. Quite a few are known.

---

Forgot to include in my last post that Scott Trostel will be speaking at the 2015 Surratt Conference.

[loetar44]

Thanks Roger and Scott.

I am not in the possession of Trostel’s book. Because a well investigated list of all trains used already exists in his book, it makes little sense to compile a new one. However I came quite far (found different railroad companies, names of locomotives and pilot locomotives, names of engineers, firemen, conductors, the – often changing – order of the 8 to 10 cars), but what I compiled is certainly incomplete and not researched in an exhaustive way. More a “beginning”. If someone is interested in what I found, please let me know and I am glad to post my list. What I learned was that all locomotives were 4-4-0 locomotives. I wondered what that designation meant and found that it is a classification notation for steam locomotives, meaning that the loc has 4 leading wheels, 4 powered / driving wheels and 0 trailing wheels.

[RJNorton]

Lincoln's Springfield Funeral hearse - Announcement from the ALPLM:

"James Cornelius, curator of the Lincoln collection at the museum, said a special exhibit of items associated with Lincoln’s assassination and funeral will be displayed in the Treasures Gallery from around the end of March to early May.

Included is the original silver-plated medallion from the hearse that carried Lincoln’s body to Oak Ridge Cemetery on May 4, 1865.

The medallion was removed from the hearse, which burned in a livery fire in St. Louis in 1887. It is the only remaining artifact from the hearse and was in private hands for more than a century. Engraved on the medallion are the words “In Memoriam,” the initials “AL” and the words “Springfield, May 4, 1865.”

Historian Ian Hunt of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation discovered in early 2014 that it still existed, and it will be displayed at the museum as part of that exhibit.

“No one knew it was out there,” Cornelius said. “The owners didn’t really realize they had it.”

http://www.sj-r.com/article/20141209/NEWS/141209522

[L Verge]

I saw something posted recently on one of the Lincoln Funeral Train sites that two, brass lanterns from the original funeral car have been loaned/donated to the project. I didn't write things down and promptly forgot where I saw it. Has anyone else seen that?

[STS Lincolnite]

(12-10-2014 01:09 PM)L Verge Wrote:  I saw something posted recently on one of the Lincoln Funeral Train sites that two, brass lanterns from the original funeral car have been loaned/donated to the project. I didn't write things down and promptly forgot where I saw it. Has anyone else seen that?

I have and you are correct. I recently got that information and a photo of them in an e-mail from my contact with the project (Laurie, she is the one I put you in contact with). Once I get home, I will post that photo.

[loetar44]

(12-08-2014 02:05 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  

(12-08-2014 01:32 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Now, any taker's on what the name of the locomotive was that pulled out of D.C. with the Lincoln funeral car? Hint: Think of an American city.

According to "The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln The Funeral Train Excerpts from newspapers and other sources" (From the files of the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection) there is some debate on this:

WASHINGTON TO BALTIMORE
The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad over whose lines the
funeral train first moved has claimed that its famous
engine "Number 23" later called the "William Mason,"
headed the funeral train from Washington to Baltimore.
This engine is the same one which brought Lincoln into
Washington from Baltimore in 1861 and also was used
for part of the Gettysburg trip in 1863. A contemporary
news item states, however, that engine "Number 238"
drew the train and that it was a new locomotive made
at the Mount Clare works. Thomas Beckett was the engi-
neer. "Number 239," the pilot locomotive, was draped in
mourning and William Galloway was the engineer.

http://archive.org/stream/assassinationo...c_djvu.txt

My memory is that the Old Nashville was the one used on the Cleveland to Columbus portion of the route.

Please note:

http://www.bullsheet.com/news/lincolnepisode.html

in which Allen Brougham says that he was the bugle boy in a NBC documentary in February 1956. Included in the documentary - shown nationwide - was B&O's No. 25, the William Mason, pulling a train of three cars in a sequence reenacting the 1865 funeral train as it arrived in Baltimore from Washington for one of many stops en route to Springfield, Illinois. Maybe this documentary declares the confusion about which engine was used in 1865. Locomotive William Mason was borrowed for the event from the B&O Railroad Museum.

   

[STS Lincolnite]

Almost forgot to post this, when I said I would.

Here is a photo that shows the original lanterns that are on loan for use with the Lincoln Funeral Train recreation this spring. I will take a guess and say that the orange gatorade cooler also in storage is not original to the funeral train!

[SpruceCreekHawk]

To begin to answer the question about how long the mourning was to last, in the Daily National Republican of April 17, 1865, Secretary Stanton ordered the military to wear the badge of mourning on the left arm and swords (and on regimental flags) for six months; all headquarters nationwide were to be draped in mourning for a month. Gideon Welles ordered comparable mourning for the Navy for six months as reported on the 17th. In the paper of the 18th, the Secretary of Interior, Usher, ordered employees to wear crepe armbands for six months. However, Jay Winik writes that the flag flew at full staff on the White House for the first time since Lincoln's assassination on May 22 and that emblems of mourning were removed in preparation for the Grand Review. A newspaper engraving of the funeral parade shows the trees without leaves, so I'm inclined to think the photograph is from the Grand Review.