GREEN-WOOD
CEMETERY | INDEX OF NAMES
| INDEX
OF SUBJECTS | CHAPTERS | AUTHOR'S
NOTES
Chapter
Two
The Early Years (1838-1860)
"Jane, My Wife"
Jane Griffith (1816-1857) was not famous, but she was much loved by
her husband Charles.
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The
Tragedy Of The French Lady, Charlotte Canda
Charles
Canda (1792-1866), who fought as an officer in Napoleon’s army,
emigrated to New York City in the early nineteenth century and
opened a ladies school there.
Charlotte
Canda’s Monument, as it appeared in 1847, just after its
completion. Note the monument at far right in a separate plot
surrounded by its own fence; it is that of her nobleman-fiance,
who committed suicide in the Candas’s house a year after
her tragic death.
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Indian
Princess Do-Hum-Me
In 1843, at the age of eighteen, Do-Hum-Me (1824-1843) came east with
her father, a chief of the Sac tribe, who was representing his people
at treaty negotiations.
De Witt Clinton’s Post-Burial Travels
New York’s most revered man in the first half of the nineteenth century
was De Witt Clinton (1769-1828).
Lost At Sea
In the early 1840’s, John Willis Griffiths told everyone in New York
City who would listen that he could build a ship faster than any that
had yet sailed the high seas.
Kindred Spirits
As Jacksonian democracy took hold in the 1830’s, Americans, who formerly
had looked to Europe for their art, demanded their own domestic works.
The Pilot’s Monument
On February 14, 1846, harbor pilot Thomas Freeborn was doing his job.
Up From Alabama
Born in Virginia and educated in Georgia, Dixon Hall Lewis (1802-1848)
served as a States' rights United States Senator and Representative
from Alabama from 1829 until his death.
The Wandering (Though Deceased) Governor
William Livingston (1723-1790), after a full life, earned his right
to a final resting place.
You Can Lock Up Your Check Book, But Keeping It Locked Up Is Another
Matter
As the Civil War was about to begin, Stephen Whitney (1776-1860),
merchant, cotton speculator, and real estate investor, was one of
the wealthiest men in America.
The
Sinking Of The Arctic
Tension built in New York City early in October, 1854, when the
steamer Arctic, one of the Collins Shipping Line’s four crack
transatlantic liners, was past due from England |
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| This
print, Loss of the U.S.M. Steam Ship Arctic: Off Cape Race Wednesday
September 27th 1854, issued by Nathaniel Currier, was based on
a sketch made by a survivor. It was printed with this caption:
“While on her homeward voyage from Liverpool, she was run
into by the French iron propeller ‘Vesta’ and so badly
injured, that in about 5 hours she sank stern foremost, carrying
down with her all on board; by which dreadful calamity nearly
300 persons are supposed to have perished.” |
Anyone
For Room Service?
Chester Jennings was always looking for a new way to drum up business
at his City Hotel on Broadway just north of Trinity Church.
The Mad Poet Of Broadway
McDonald Clarke (1798-1842), a native of Bath, Maine, came to New
York City in 1819, alone and penniless. Whistler’s Father George Washington
Whistler (1800-1849) was a well-respected railroad engineer. Niblo’s
Gardens William Niblo (1789-1875) achieved great fame as the proprietor
of Niblo’s Garden, the fashionable theatre which he ran at Broadway
and Prince Street from 1823 until around the time of the Civil War.
The Sea Captain
For half a century Captain John Correja (1826-1910) brought his friends
to Green-Wood Cemetery to picnic in his lot overlooking Cedar Dell.
The Firemen’s Monument
On April 2, 1848, when a fire broke out on Duane Street, the volunteer
firemen of Southwark Engine Company No. 38 responded to the alarm.
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The
Life Of A Fireman
Just across the road from Green-Wood Cemetery's Fireman’s Monument
is the plot of hero fireman Harry Howard (1822-1896).
Harry
Howard was the model for the fire chief, standing in center
foreground with the fire horn under his right arm, in this Currier
and Ives print The Life of A Fireman: The New Era, Steam and
Muscle. It was drawn by Charles Parsons.
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"Good-bye
Boys, I Die A True American"
William Poole (1821-1855), a butcher by profession, had other skills
too.
"This Hunted, Haunted Man"
In the summer of 1854, Harvey Burdell (1811-1857), a well-off New
York City dentist and confirmed bachelor, met Emma Cunningham, a widow
with five children, at the fashionable summer resort, Saratoga Springs.
From The Potter’s Field
You didn’t have to be wealthy to be buried at Green-Wood Cemetery.
One Sprightly Woman
Of the over half a million individuals interred at Green-Wood Cemetery,
the one who lived the longest was Sara W. Kaims (1737-1854), who lived
to the age of 117 years, three months, and sixteen days.
The America’s Cup
There was never really any question what profession George Steers
(1820-1856) would choose.
George Washington’s Favorite Dentist
John Greenwood (1760-1819) had little formal education, and at an
early age apprenticed to a cabinetmaker, then served as a fife boy
during the Revolutionary War.
A Tongue-Twister
It was James Kirke Paulding (1778-1860), a prominent writer who made
a name for himself by championing American art and parlayed his nationalist
reputation into appointment as Secretary of the Navy during the Martin
Van Buren administration, who in his novel Koningsmarke (1823) coined
the tongue-twister "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers."
Business Acumen (Or Lack Thereof)
Walter Hunt (1796-1859) was quite an inventor.
He Wasn’t Just Dot And Dash
Today Samuel F.B. Morse (1791-1872) is remembered for his great invention,
the telegraph, which revolutionized human communication by allowing
messages to be transmitted faster than a messenger could travel.
City Hall
As New York City grew at the beginning of the nineteenth century,
its need for a new City Hall was apparent.
Dressing The Police Up In Uniforms
Born into a prosperous New York City merchant family, James Watson
Gerard (1794-1874) long had a sense of civic responsibility.
A Nice Story, But . . .
For years the story has been told that the impressive Chauncey family
tomb, constructed of Tuckahoe marble, was made from stones quarried
by Confederate prisoners of war while they were being held at Sing
Sing Prison.
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The
Legendary Lola Montez
Born in 1824 as Marie Delores Eliza Rosanna Gilbert in Limerick,
Ireland, she was raised in Scotland and educated in Bath and
Paris.
This
photograph by daguerreotypists Southworth and Hawes, taken in
1851, shows Lola Montez, the international celebrity, soon after
her arrival in America.
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Brooklyn’s
City (Now Borough) Hall
A contemporary described Gamaliel King (1795-1875) as a man with "a
good deal of cleverness, great industry, and a touch of genius."
Brooklyn’s Slave Auction
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887), pastor of Brooklyn’s Plymouth Church,
was a national leader in the fight against slavery.
Negro Life In The South - Old Kentucky Home
Eastman Johnson (1824-1906) was one of the great American portrait
and genre painters of the nineteenth century.
