DC Like a Local

It has come to my attention that maybe, just maybe, there are other news organizations covering items of interest in the Washington, DC travel and tourism world besides this humble effort. In that vein, I’m launching my “Weekly Washington” feature to let you know of some of those relevant items.

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It’s not there. I just can’t see it. Some of you know what I’m talking about already.

The story goes like this. Daniel Chester French carved a profile of Robert E. Lee emerging from the back of Lincoln’s head a la Lord Voldemort in the Sorcerer’s Stone. If you go around to the right side of Lincoln (his, not yours), and look on the back of the head, you see Lee’s profile in Lincoln’s locks of hair. Lee is gazing across the river at his house, now preserved as the Robert E. Lee Memorial. Further elaborations have Daniel Chester French a secret Southern sympathizer, Klan member, or other such nonsense.

The Park Service addresses this on their site:

No such carving was done intentionally, but the myth persists to this day. The fact remains that several visitors claim to find all sorts of profiles within the tufts of Lincoln's hair.

While I quibbled with them yesterday regarding the A and L in Lincoln’s hands, they’re absolutely right here (insofar as one can disprove a negative).

The idea that Daniel Chester French might harbor some Confederate fetish is just downright odd. The man was born in New Hampshire and steeped in New England Yankeedom from birth onward. Fun fact of the day his father, Henry Flagg French laid out in his 1859 book Farm Drainage detailed plans for a trench filled with gravel that redirects surface water away from retaining walls. You may know it better as a “French Drain”, which is perhaps why it was never renamed a Freedom Drain.

Daniel French was eleven when the Civil War began, and moved shortly thereafter to Concord, Massachusetts. He was a neighbor to the Alcott's (you know, of Little Women fame) and Louisa May Alcott’s youngest sister May (Amy in the book) fostered his artistic tendencies by giving him modeling clay and lending him sculpting tools. French went on to study at MIT for a year before embarking on his sculpting career in Boston, New York, and Florence. Hardly the stuff of secret Confederate sympathies.

Now, even though French designed the statue of Abraham Lincoln, he didn’t necessarily carve every bit of it. For the grunt work, French hired the famed Piccirilli Brothers of New York. Well, of Tuscany originally, but they had set up shop in 1882 in the Bronx. French’s daughter Margret French Cresson described them as “so in harmony were they, each so gifted, and so perfectly trained, that any one of them could pick up the tools and go on with the work that another had laid down.” No, it’s hard to see all six Piccirilli Brothers as likely suspects in secretly carving Lee’s face in the back of Lincoln.

And secret it would almost certainly have to be. It’s fashionable today to downplay the hatred and animosity that existed for years afterword. We hear a great deal about “brother fighting brother”, and my guests from southern states gently correct me as to the “War Between the States”. Heck, I purchased a book at Gettysburg a few months ago and the bag read “Our Country’s Common Ground”.

This would NOT have been the sentiment in Washington, DC in 1914 when French started sketching out his designs. Granted, tensions weren’t quite as high as the 1880s, or even a few years prior in 1902 when Virginia had attempted to select Gen. Lee as one of their two statues every state places in the Capitol. The public outcry, spear headed by the Union veterans organization, the Grand Army of the Republic, was overwhelming and it wouldn’t be until 1934 that Virginia quietly got it’s way.

And, on the surface, reconciliation had progressed quite a bit. The last actual veterans of the war were dying off and the nation had elected it’s first southern President since the Civil War, Woodrow Wilson. In June of 1914, the nation took the then radical step of dedicating the new Confederate Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery, surrounded by re-interred remains of southerners previously buried in the Washington, DC area.

However, while public opinion was moderating enough to allow honoring the valor and sacrifice of common soldiers, it did not go so far as to accept recognition of their leadership. As late as the 1930’s, Representative Hamilton Fish of New York proposed an equestrian statue of Lee at Arlington. He received letters condemning the idea of a rebel leader, be it “Robert E. Lee or any other traitor” (more about this topic can be read at Kathryn Allamong Jacob’s excellent book Testament to Union: Civil War Monuments in Washington, D.C.).

So, yeah, I just don’t see Daniel Chester French deciding to add a profile of Robert E. Lee in the back of Lincoln’s head. Which is fine, because I don’t see anything back there anyway.

photo uploded to flickr by Mr. T in DC

Ahh, springtime in Washington. Between sweltering summers and cold, wet, and icy winters (if not normally mistaken for Buffalo's), spring and fall are DC's most pleasant times of year.

Unfortunately, I'm not alone in thinking this. Every year, millions of folks come down to the Mall, the Zoo, Arlington Cemetery, and other high traffic areas to take in the cherry blossoms and just enjoy the beautiful spring weather. So many, in fact, that I'm enjoying the relative peace and quiet of New York City right now. Times Square is almost pastoral compared to the British soccer riot that the Mall entrance to the Metro is during Cherry Blossom season.

So what to do if you come to DC, have seen the Cherry Blossoms, and don't want to mix it up with the crowds again? Let's take Arlington National Cemetery as an example. I can't say enough good things about that place. Whether you take theTourmobile, walk the main loop, or explore some of the other themes we've suggested, you can't helped but me moved by the weight of sacrifice and grandeur that permeates the place. That is, until you've been jostled with several thousand of your new friends trying to get a glimpse of the Changing of the Guard.

So save Arlington for the fall, when you can give it the attention it so richly deserves, and come visit another DC final resting place, Historic Congressional Cemetery. Tucked away in the back end of Capitol Hill (also known as the awesome part of the Hill), Congressional predates Arlington by over half a century. Never formally run by Congress, it served as ade facto National Cemetery until Arlington stole their thunder.

And that's fine. Part of the charm of Congressional is that it is, in many ways, very much still alive. Arlington's stately grandeur is appropriately enshrined, guarded for that matter 24 hours a day by armed infantrymen. At Congressional, the dead let their hair down a bit. Besides continuing as an active cemetery, Congressional fulfills what was once a commonplace role for urban graveyards; that of a public park. Maintenance is partly funded by fees from users who bring dogs there, local kids romp about, and neighbors just out for a stroll stop and chat among the tombstones. Before the advent of large urban parks (think Central Park in New York), cemeteries often provided the only green space available in dense urban areas. Congressional resuscitates and preserves that tradition, as well as providing a fitting home for generations past.

All fine and good, but why should you come? Well, the history of Historic Congressional Cemetery extends well beyond the local Capitol Hill community. Congressional got its start as the parish burial yard of Christ Church on G St. SE, between 6th and 7th. In Peter L'Enfant's original plan of Washington, graveyards were to be away from the urban center; a break in tradition from European and early American concepts where people were buried in church yard (think Trinity Church in New York), in dense in-fill lots (think Granary Burying Ground in Boston), or in the church itself (Westminster Abbey being the most famous example).

Among it's many other challenges in starting a new nation, the new Congress quickly found that they had to deal with members croaking far from home. They turned to Christ Church, who allowed Congressmen to be interred at the burial ground, and Congress provided cenotaphs, or monuments, for each of their own. While many of these remains were eventually returned home, 19 Senators and 71 Representatives are still buried here. And although it is no longer the fashion for Congressmen to die in DC (and those that do normally return home), the Cemetery occasionally is the still final resting place of Congressmen. Representative TomLantos, the only Holocaust survivor to serve in Congress, has recently been laid to rest here.

Besides members of Congress, Congressional is also home to John Phillip Sousa, the "March King"; J. Edgar Hoover, longtime director of the FBI; Matthew Brady, famed photographer of the Civil War; Eldridge Gerry, only Vice President to be buried in the District and the source of the term "gerrymandering", and many others. And while I could tell you much more, I don't want to ruin the surprise. Free tours are available every Saturday during the Spring, Summer, and Fall (check website to find start/end dates) at 11 am. If you can't make it then, the Cemetery offers self guided cell phone tours (pdf) or stop by the gate house to pick up a pamphlet on one of the many specialty tours. Subjects include the War of 1812, significant women buried here, Native Americans, and several others.

The office is open 9-5:30 Monday through Friday, and 10-1 on Saturday. However, unless there is a funeral, the grounds are open until dusk every day. To get here, take the Orange/Blue line to Potomac Avenue and walk up Potomac to 17th St SE. The Cemetery is the large plot of land filled with grave markers and dead people.

While we've covered the history of slavery and its aftermath at Arlington, as well as a few of the many African Americans in the military, we're still missing substantial segments of the story. I'm talking, of course, of those people who, while they may have served in the military, are best known for accomplishments out of uniform.

Arlington is full of the graves of those who fit this profile, black and white. Some are here after receiving a dispensation from Congress or the President. Some fit the requirements for Congressmen, Cabinet Secretaries, and Supreme Court Justices. Some are even the spouses of those who are eligible through conventional means. And some are those who served honorably for a few years before persuing other avenues. We're going to look at just a few of those African Americans who fit this profile, and who, not coincidentally, happen to be on or near my standard walking tour of the Cemetery.

We'll start with Medgar Evers, the well known Civil Rights hero. Medgar Evers was shot and killed on June 12, 1963, just a few hours after President Kennedy gave a particularly important speech in support of civil rights. The nationwide publicity surrounding his death helped put a lie to the idea that the push for full equality in the South was instigated by "Northern agitators". Evers was born and raised in Mississippi, leaving the state only during World War II, when he served in the Army in the European Theater.

From Medger Evers' grave, head up Custis Walk towards President Kennedy's tomb, and you'll come across an area known as "Justice's corner", the final resting place of seven Supreme Court Justices (eight if you count Chief Justice Rehnquist, just down the hill). Notable among them is the grave of Associate Justice Thurgood Marshall. Well known for being the first African American Justice on the Court, I prefer to focus on his earlier years. After being denied access to the University of Maryland School of Law due to his race, Thurgood Marshall crossed state lines into DC to graduate first in his class at Howard University School of Law in 1933. In short order he managed to get Maryland's discriminatory practices overturned in Murray v. Pearson. With this success and with a Supreme Court win under his belt already, he became the Chief Counsel for  the NAACP in 1940 at the age of 32. He would go on to extend his record in front of the Court to 32 appearances, with 29 wins. The most notable of course, was the landmark Brown v. Board of Education, which as every eighth grader should know, struck down public school segregation.

From here, if you continue down Eisenhower Ave, you'll come to a collection of benches just below the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. As you pause for a minute, you'll see the grave of Joe Louis. Racking up an even better record than Thurgood Marshall, the Brown Bomber lost only one fight in his first 69 fights, to the German Max Schmeling in a twelfth round knock out in 1936. Seen by many as a proxy for the build up to World War II, the rematch in Yankee Stadium in 1938 lasted only two minutes, with Joe Louis the victor and Max Schmeling spending ten days in a New York hospital recovering. Regarding as one of, if not the first, African Americans to be widely accepted by white America, Joe Louis is also credited for helping to clean up the sport of boxing from gambling interests and even went on to help break the color barrier in the golf world. Upon his death, President Reagan waved some technical barriers to his interment in Arlington (Joe Louis had served in the Army in WWII) and he is buried in Section 7A, right next to actor and Marine Lee Marvin.

Medgar Evers, Thurgood Marshall, and Joe Louis are just a few of the well known African Americans resting in Arlington and while the subject is hardly exhausted, I am. Maybe next year we'll revisit the topic and examine the graves of other folks who you may have never heard of but helped shape the country we live in. For now, I hope you come visit Arlington National Cemetery as something else besides the final resting place of President Kennedy and the Tomb of the Unknowns.

Once Arlington had shed it's slave-day past, and the last freed slaves had left Freedman's Village, the area fell into the rhythms of a military cemetery. Although serving in a largely segregated military, African Americans would be among some of the earliest soldiers and sailors to be be buried in the new cemetery. Reflecting its early use as a cemetery of convenience, many African American solders from the Civil War are often interspersed with white soldiers, although attempts were made to segregate them. A black soldier's grave can be identified as it will have U.S.C.T after the name, for U.S. Colored Troops. These graves are generally in Sections 27 (the same location as the graves of residents of Freedman's Village, discussed yesterday) and 23 (near the Confederate Memorial ironically).

Following the war, African Americans continued to serve and Civil War veterans continued to die, both to be buried at Arlington. Major Alexander Augusta, one of only a hundred black officers (out of 180,000 who served), is buried in Section 1 (site 124-A), near the Ft. Myer chapel where many funerals are held (and where I was married). Last year, one of 20 Buffalo Soldiers to receive the Medal of Honor was interred in Section 1 (site 630-B) after it was discovered his grave in Arizona had, I kid you not, been paved over. Cpl. Issiah Mays, a former slave, was awarded the Medal for crawling more than two miles to get help after his convey had been ambushed in 1889. He had been shot in both legs. Two other African American Medal of Honor recipients from this time period are buried her as well, Pvt. Dennis Bell (Sec 31/site 349) and Master Sergeant George Wanton (Sec 4/site 2749). They were two of four soldiers from the 10th Calvary Regiment to go ashore under hostile fire to save allied Cuban insurgents during the Spanish-American War. Additionally, 22 of the 163 sailors buried at Arlington from the explosion on the USS Maine are black. They are all buried in Section 24, near the mast of the Maine.

Ironically, by the time the United States had entered World War I, racial progress in many ways had slipped from where it had been in the late nineteenth century. While African Americans were routinely assigned to combat units in the Civil War, Indian Wars, and Spanish American Wars; by World War I they were largely restricted to labor and supply units. When they did serve in combat, their contributions were often overlooked. Only one Medal of Honor was awarded to an African American, and that was not until posthumously in 1991.

One African American from that time to be buried at Arlington is Colonel Charles Young (Sec 3/site 1730-B). The first African American to hold that rank, Col. Young was the third black man to graduate West Point, the first African American to be the superintendent of a National Park (Sequoia), and a squadron commander in Gen. Pershing's raid into Mexico to chase Pancho Villa. At the outbreak of World War I, Col. Taylor was suddenly discovered to have high blood pressure, and medically discharged, presumably to avoid having to make him a general in the wartime expansion. After riding his horse from Ohio to DC to prove his physical fitness, Col. Taylor was reinstated but died in Nigeria while serving as an advisor to Liberia in 1922. Col. Taylor's funeral service was in the Memorial Amphitheater, one of only a handful of services to be held there.

Following the relegation to secondary roles in World War I, African American leaders insisted that black soldiers be assigned meaningful roles in World War II. Perhaps best known of these, but by no means the only, was the Tuskegee Airmen. The Army Air Force created an all-black fighter group, the 332 Fighter Group, eventually commanded by Gen. Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.  General Davis was the fourth African American to graduate from West Point in 1936 (the first since Col. Taylor), and was shunned by his fellow cadets the entire four years there. When he graduated, he would be one of only two African-American line officers in the U.S. Army; the other being his father, then Col. Benjamin Davis, Sr. Col. Davis, Sr. would go onto be be the first black General in the U.S. Army, capping off his forty two years of military service as a Brigadier General. Gen. Davis, Jr. would be promoted to full General after his retirement under President Clinton.

However the title of first African American full General would go to Air Force Gen. Daniel "Chappie" James. Gen. James would go on to serve in an integrated military after his start as a Tuskegee Airmen, flying combat missions in Korea and Vietnam. He was awarded his forth star in 1975. Gen. James, Gen. Davis, Jr., and BGen. Davis, Sr., are all buried in close proximity to each other in Section 2, just past the statue of Sir John Dill on Roosevelt Drive. Gen. James is to your right, and the Davis's are across the road to your left. Gen. Davis, Jr. has a large black tombstone on the top of the hill, and BGen. Davis, Sr. has a government issue headstone between the top and the road. Further up the drive, just below the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, in Section 7a (site 18), is Gen. Roscoe Robinson, the first black Army four star General.

This is hardly meant to be an exhaustive list of African Americans who have served in the military and are buried in Arlington, but it includes some whose stories intrigue me. Join us tomorrow when we wrap up our visit to Arlington by looking at some folks buried here who are best known for what they did out of uniform.