Gruesome discovery made underneath a "Lincoln oak" tree

[Linda Anderson]

Lafayette Square was also once a burial ground.

"Old Jake, whose hair and beard are as white as his skin is black, says the old Seward house which Mr. Blaine lives in was once the site of a graveyard, and once the bodies were removed sixty or seventy years ago, one grave was overlooked by the workmen and that this buried skeleton has queered the house which was built over its resting place."
Daily Illinois State Register Feb. 16, 1890. (Thanks to Betty for finding this article.)

Washington Evening Star
April 19, 1913
OLD WASHINGTON
Lafayette Square

by James Croggon

"Was Once a Graveyard.

Christian Hines, in his reminiscences, refers to graves being in the southwest corner of the square about 1800, and an old resident states that in his boyhood, about 1840, there were evidences of a graveyard found in the northeast part - skulls, bones etc., and common report was that it had been the burial place for slaves and in the preceeding century, and part of a pear orchard encroached the northern border. There had been erected a fence of three narrow planks prior to 1834 when $1,000 was appropriated to repair it and plant trees. At each corner of the square a stile prevented the intrusion of horses and cattle, and the paths made were well worn, the center especially, by the department people. Down to 1850 it was a playground for the boys, and not infrequently were snakes found there. When Gen. Taylor occupied the white house, 1849-18?? his war horse, Old Whitey, often browsed there as well as the cows of a cabinet officer."