Surratt Commission and Anna Surratt

[L Verge]

Do we know what city that photo was taken in? Every city where the coffin was taken off the train seemed to outdo the others for splendor.

[RJNorton]

Laurie, I think New York.

http://americanphotoarchive.photoshelter...FNizvAduUI

[LincolnToddFan]

(09-20-2014 03:12 PM)Warren Wrote:  

(09-20-2014 12:04 PM)LincolnToddFan Wrote:  Hi Warren-and welcome!

I wish I could see that photo of the coffin....

Here you go:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/201164052503?ssP...1435.l2649

Be sure and scroll down that page for the photos.

If we're not allowed to post ebay links, let me know and I'll delete.

Gosh...that IS a clear photo! I always wondered about the shamrocks on the coffin until I read recently that one of the men who built it was Irish.

Thanks much, Warren!

[L Verge]

The chief undertaker in New York who was in charge of the Lincoln funeral preparations there was a man named Peter Relyea. I did not know this until about twenty years ago when a couple who lived near Surratt House asked me to take a look at a deteriorating water color pasted to a piece of cardboard. It showed a good duplication of the NY hearse with horses pulling into position and was signed by a Peter Relyea.

I asked for Harold Holzer's help, and he identified who Relyea was and guessed that what these folks had found in their neighbors' shed was a rough draft of what later became an advertising piece for Relyea's undertaking business. I have no idea what happened to that piece, but it was one of my Antique Roadshow moments.

[Rsmyth]

Here is a great site on the NYC funeral - http://www.mrlincolnandnewyork.org/insid...rd=Funeral

[L Verge]

Love that site! "The funeral carriage was the work of official New York undertaker Peter Relyea. According to Dorothy Meserve Kunhardt and Philip B. Kuhnhardt, Jr., "He had been issued a permit to transport Abraham Lincoln — dead of 'pistol shot wound' — through New York on his way to Springfield, Illinois. For three days, right out on the streets at the junction of East Broadway and Grand Street, Relyea had been building the elaborate New York funeral car before marveling crowds. He had been living with it, sleeping there with it, and up to the last available second adding one more flag or plume or silver star. Now a little before one o'clock in the afternoon Relyea led his glorious catafalque into the park enclosure in front of City Hall, and walking in front of the sixteen gray horses, he turned the hearse car entirely around so that it would face west and be ready to set forth for the procession up Broadway. The Relyea work of art just about paralyzed all beholders with its magnificence. Its platform was huge — fourteen feet long and almost seven feet wide. Up on the roof of the canopy was a gold and white temple of Liberty with a half-masted small flag fluttering from its dome, a fitting crown to the twelve big craped national flags that rose in clumps of three from each column."

The eleventh photo down on the right-hand side (right below the train route map) is almost identical to the watercolor that I was shown years ago.

[Warren]

God, I wanted that photo! I had an automatic bid in, and didn't have the opportunity to do any last minute bids; I have the distinct feeling I would have been crushed anyway at the last minute.

Do you see the honor guard soldier below the line of the main soldiers? It appears he is holding his rifle upside down, and I think I remember that from the Kennedy funeral?

Jesus, to have been at that funeral procession!

BTW, was TR really looking out the window during the funeral procession, or is that a myth?

[Gene C]

(09-22-2014 06:18 PM)Warren Wrote:  BTW, was TR really looking out the window during the funeral procession, or is that a myth?

It's true!
http://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/R...ID=o284880

and read post 2-11 below
http://rogerjnorton.com/LincolnDiscussio...d-351.html

[LincolnToddFan]

(09-22-2014 06:18 PM)Warren Wrote:  God, I wanted that photo! I had an automatic bid in, and didn't have the opportunity to do any last minute bids; I have the distinct feeling I would have been crushed anyway at the last minute.

Do you see the honor guard soldier below the line of the main soldiers? It appears he is holding his rifle upside down, and I think I remember that from the Kennedy funeral?

Jesus, to have been at that funeral procession!

BTW, was TR really looking out the window during the funeral procession, or is that a myth?

Jacqueline Kennedy deliberately based JFK's State Funeral on Abraham Lincoln's as closely as possible. On the night of Nov22nd on Air Force One headed back to Washington from Dallas with her husband's remains, she had her staff radio'd from the aircraft and told them to gather all the available protocol on the Lincoln funeral. It was already very late in the capital and the Library of Congress was closed, but the WH staff did as they were directed to, researching through the night at the Congressional archives by flashlight.(Four Days in November, originally aired 1988, CBS, narrated by Dan Rather)

The majestic, moving State Funeral that resulted in 1963 was drawn on the one that had taken place nearly 100 years previous.

Young Teddy Roosevelt and his little brother definitely did see part of the NYC procession from their grandfather's window. Perhaps that is when TR's lifelong fascination with Lincoln began.

[STS Lincolnite]

My dad was in the Navy when JFK was killed. He was amongst the group of sailors that lined the street during the funeral and could see JFK junior's salute from where he stood. My grandmother used to have an issue of Life Magazine that had a two page photo of that part of the funeral procession - don't know whatever happened to it.

[Warren]

Looking at the photo again, another of the honor guards (closest to the camera) to the right of the first is holding his rifle upside down, so I guess that was protocol.

[STS Lincolnite]

(09-23-2014 10:39 AM)Warren Wrote:  Looking at the photo again, another of the honor guards (closest to the camera) to the right of the first is holding his rifle upside down, so I guess that was protocol.

The modern practice of displaying a battlefield cross also has an inverted rifle. See picture below. According the The Soldier's Field Guide "The inverted rifle with bayonet signals a time for prayer, a break in the action to pay tribute to our comrade." There are similar descriptions for the meaning of the helmet and boots.

It is believed that practice got its start during the civil war to mark soldier's burial sites. I suppose it is possible that the holding of inverted rifles at a funeral meant much the same as above in the battlefield cross.

[Warren]

(09-23-2014 11:11 AM)STS Lincolnite Wrote:  

(09-23-2014 10:39 AM)Warren Wrote:  Looking at the photo again, another of the honor guards (closest to the camera) to the right of the first is holding his rifle upside down, so I guess that was protocol.

The modern practice of displaying a battlefield cross also has an inverted rifle. See picture below. According the The Soldier's Field Guide "The inverted rifle with bayonet signals a time for prayer, a break in the action to pay tribute to our comrade." There are similar descriptions for the meaning of the helmet and boots.

It is believed that practice got its start during the civil war to mark soldier's burial sites. I suppose it is possible that the holding of inverted rifles at a funeral meant much the same as above in the battlefield cross.

That makes more sense than what I was thinking (gun pointing down - a time for peace, not war).