foiling, the intrigues of the american imperialists. you know, the ira men are all active agents of military intelligence. there's a lot of that. but for the most part, the ira mission is really purposely ignored by the soviet authorities, thus slowly forgotten by the soviet people. the same thing happened here, but for entirely different reasons. leave it there. okay. at this time, i'm honored to introduce our speaker for today. todd harra tod is both an author and a funeral director. in fact, his family has been involved in that profession in

delaware for four generations. todd's most recent book is last rites the evolution of the american funeral. and todd will be speaking to us today about how abraham lincoln was at the center, really, of the transformation of american funeral practices, both during his time in the white house and then also through his tragic death. now we will have a question answer session at the end of todd's talk. there will be a couple of walking microphones. i would ask, please take advantage of those, because we want our c-span audience to be able to hear both the questions and the answers. so at this time, i'll turn it over to ty. thank you, judge primos. and lincoln club of delaware is my pleasure to present to you. this evening. now, we all know what happened.

good friday, 1865. but what i'm going to talk to you about this evening is about how the grand event that was abraham lincoln's transform formed and set the stage for the traditional american funeral, the funeral that american would use for the next century and a half. but in to understand that we got to backtrack about four years from the time that lincoln was assassinated. so we're going to go back to the day that virginia held a referendum to ratify their articles of succession. and on that evening, at about 10:00, captain john smead led three handpicked companies from the washington national rifles across the long bridge that separates washington, d.c., from virginia and essentially established a bulwark for the union invasion of the south. they drove the pickets back into the countryside, and at about

midnight, the union army started invading in the south. now down to the south, near the washington navy yard, on the grounds of the lunatic asylum of the 11th new york regimen. it was there. and three of the companies from that regiment were boarding the gunboats. they were side paddle boats that were outfitted as gunboats, and they were boarding the baltimore and the mount vernon, and they floated down the potomac. and at about daybreak, they arrived at alexander andrea. and this is colonel elmer ellsworth, who commanded the 11th new york and colonel ellsworth hopped off of the baltimore and headed up king street and secured the telegraph office. now, coming out of the telegraph office, across the street was an inn called the marshall house. and above the marshall house was a 40 foot flagpole upon which

flow of succession is flag that was so large it could said to be seen from the white house on a clear day with binoculars. and the white house is about five miles away. so that's a pretty darn big flag. and ellsworth exclaimed to his entourage. he said, boys, that flag's got to come down. and they raced across king street and into the marshall house, where he said to the clerk, he said, how do i get to roof? and the clerk just stared at him. he said, never mind. and he raced up the stairs to the roof. now, the clerk went into the back room and woke the innkeeper. a man by the name of james jackson. and james jackson was an ardent secessionist and a man who had penchant for violence. jackson once nearly beat a priest to death after insulting him. and when this priest told the authorities, the sheriff rounded up a posse and went to jackson's home and where he'd barricaded himself inside with his brother. and they began to fire upon the

sheriff and his posse. and the sheriff essentially threw up his hands and he said, an assault charge is not worth my life. so jackson was a man who had a reputation for violence. and when the clerk woke him and said, union soldiers are on your roof, taking down your flag. jackson grabbed a shotgun and ran for the stairs. coming down the stairs, draped in the succession, this flag. ellsworth was wearing it like cape. and his plan was when he got down on to king street, he was going to tear up that flag and give it to his men as souvenirs. well, when jackson saw that, he didn't hesitate. he leveled his shotgun and blew a hole through ellsworth's chest. now, francis brown, he was a private he didn't hesitate. he raised his sharps rifle. and as the philadelphia inquirer would later report splattered his brains all about. okay, so we have to first happening here. the first one being ellsworth

was the first union officer. casual t of the civil war. and brownell was later awarded the congressional medal of honor. so he became the first recipient of the congressional medal of honor for actions rendered during the civil war. all happened in about 5 seconds. okay, now, word of ellsworth's death reached washington in very quickly via the secure telegraph office. and there was a man there. he was an enterprising physician from brooklyn. his name was thomas holmes. and thomas holmes had a very unique set. he knew how to embalm people and he had come down to washington thinking that this rebellion he would need to embalm people, to ship them home, because the only way to really ship people was via the adams express. the adams express would only

ship human remains if they were either sealed in an airtight metallic coffin or they were embalmed. now, airtight metallic coffins were being made. but think about it, they're ramping up wartime production in oc. the metal is being used to make ammunition and weaponry, so the two manufacturers of these airtight metallic coffins, they were having trouble getting the materials. so if you could find one of these, they were going to be very expensive. so really the only option at this point, if you want it to be shipped home and you were a soldier was to be embalmed. a skill set. the thomas holmes head. so holmes knew william seward and he got an audience at the house. they rushed over to the white house and they found president lincoln, his office. the second story. it's now the lincoln today and

president lincoln was in tears. ellsworth was a dear friend of his. he had been his law clerk in springfield. and he had also served as his bodyguard during, his inaugural train ride to washington. and dr. holmes said to him, he said, mr. lincoln, i've come to secure your permission to embalm ellsworth. so his parents might see him. and president replied to me, goes, i do not what embalming is. i cannot grant permission. and through the urging of seward he was able to secure the permission for the embalming of ellsworth. now ellsworth this time was being transported to the washington navy yard via the james gray, another gunboat. and so holmes, he left the white house and he raced back to the coffin.

joseph birch's house in georgetown, where he was staying. he grabbed his embalming grip and boarded it on the bus and headed for the washington navy yard. now, when he got there, he found ellsworth laid out in the engine house. why the engine house? well, the 11th new york, they were called the fire zoo, abbs. and that's because ellsworth had raised a regiment all fireman oc new york firemen. he thought, these are men that rush fires they're used to dealing with dangerous situations. they'll make excellent soldiers and zoo. this was a type of french light infantry unit that was used in the crimean war. they were known for their aggressive tactics, so they used different tactics than your standard union infantry soldier. so that's why ellsworth being autopsied in the engine house. so we might be called the firehouse house today. it's where they kept the fire

apparatus. so after the autopsy was complete, holmes got work in bombing ellsworth using his proprietary fluid called enum and knot. and while was in bombing, ellsworth, the presidential carriage showed up at the navy yard and in it was mrs. lincoln and she wanted to see. now this was victorian times. ellsworth was undergoing a surge angle procedure. it would, you know, not be right for a woman to see him like this. so she was turned away about an hour later, the presidential carriage returns to the washington navy yard and. this time, the president is accompanying mrs. lincoln. he goes and he sees ellsworth. and when he comes back out, he says to the honor guard, i'd like your permission for to bring colonel ellsworth the white house, where we can have a funeral ceremony before he goes back to his parents mechanicsville, new york.

so they bring ellsworth to the white house, where he's laid out in the east room. and about three politicians and high ranking military officials gather there a funeral ceremony. and mary todd lincoln comments, he looks natural. he looks like his only sleeping. now, think about this until this moment in time. a wound like this, a shotgun wound to the chest would have made ellsworth. he would have been rendered unviable to decomposition. probably within a day. and here he is in the white house, looking natural, like he's only sleeping. it was as if holmes had worked magic. he had stood death on his head. almost. okay by war's end. thomas holmes had been bombed. 4028 soldiers.

but it was this death of ellsworth that essentially gave this cadre of the green light to embalm during the civil war. after the ellsworth slain, many men, mostly physicians, flocked to washington to then ply their trade of embalming and make their fortune. holmes was the first, so in order understand the lincoln funeral a little bit, we're going to need to step back another decade and a half. two 1845. this year on the left, jean nicholas goodenough. he wrote essentially the first embalming textbook in the mid 1830s. and here on the right we have jean pierre souk and in 1845, the canal essentially the undisputed embalmer in europe at this time. and souk said, i've got a better

way to do things. so they took part in kind of this grisly little carpet, titian for embalming supremacy you will where before a medical board these two and one other a man by the name of mr. dupré. they each embalmed a body. okay canal used he used aluminum salts aluminum acetate, aluminum and sucre used chloride and dupree sulfuric gases. all right, you're saying, todd, what does this have to do with lincoln? well, this should be clear here in just a minute. so they buried these bodies for 14 months. and after 14 months, they dug them up to see what they look like. suitcase was the only one that didn't show any signs of decomposition. okay. now, at this time, suitcase and an agent by the name of dr. palazzi to america to conduct embalming demonstrations,

essentially to license his methodology, and also his formula of zinc chloride in america. and it was by a dentist, new york city, by the name of dr. charles brown. okay. so let's fast forward back into the civil war here. embalming is becoming commonplace. all right. now, commonplace, though, for those that could afford it. all. it's estimated that only 6% of soldiers were. of all soldiers killed were embalmed and sent home. this is dr. richard burr. embalming at camp letterman. gettysburg. okay here we have the embalming shed of william burnell thomas holmes's brother in law. this is taken at fredericksburg. and then over here, this is doctors chamberlain and lefferts, embalming tent camp letterman at gettysburg. these two gentlemen in the coffin, they are alive. okay.

they had the exciting prospect of having their picture made. so those are models. so let's now move to february of 1862, when a calamity rocks the white house, willie lincoln dies of typhoid fever. and this is on mrs. lincoln's mind. he looks natural. he looks like he's only sleeping. okay. so they send vernon bomber. now they don't send for thomas holmes. i have never read anything on why. what i suspect is holmes was out in the field in bombing. these embalmers would follow the armies. so she calls on the firm of brown and alexander the same dr. brown that bought suitcase or license doctor. suitcase, embalming the zinc chloride and a 23 year old man by the name of henry cattell

embalmed a young willie lincoln. all. and he was laid out in the green room of the white house. and. and then he was temporarily interred at. oak hill cemetery in the family vault of william carroll, who was a supreme court clerk at the time. now, president lincoln would that tomb very often and is said to have ordered his coffin unsealed on at least two occasions so he could view the body. now, we know willie was buried in a metallic coffin similar to this one. this is a fisk medal. this is an 1850s version. so by the mid 1860s, there were two companies that were making these. one was crane and breed out of cincinnati. the other one was the w.m. richmond company out of queens,

new york. now i strongly suspect that willie was placed in the w.m. raymond version. why? because senator daniel would was an owner of that company. daniel would was good friends. president lincoln so it just fits. teresa in that if your good buddy owns a coffin company, then you're probably going to be using that coffin. okay. now let's move forward three years after the the death of willie and we all know what happened. good friday 65. okay. so the following day, when lincoln died, he was transferred from the peterson house to the white house under the direction of this man, frank sands. frank was the government

undertaker, so he had the contract to conduct all funerals. government officials. all right. and lincoln was transferred from the peterson house to the white house in a very plain wooden coffin. it was supplied by harvey and ma and i think this is just because of proximity. harvey m.r. they backed they essentially shared the same alley is ford's theater. so i think that's why they were used supply the coffin and lincoln of course was transferred to the prince of wales room and the white house. all right. now, there was nine doctors in attendance for his cranial autopsy. so it was just a cranial autopsy. just his head. they didn't do the why. that would be a full autopsy. one of those being robert king stone, the lincoln family physician, the other being the surgeon general, joseph k

barnes. now, this was so hurried, they didn't even have a proper, proper projection kit. one of the surgeons offered up his personal amputation kit for the autopsy. now, after the autopsy, see the frank sands sent for the embalmer? they used brown and alexander once again. and is documented that when the messenger arrived at brown and alexander, dr. brown, who was very very prolific and well-known embalmer, he was at the office when the call came in for some reason henry could tell. now age 26 with no medical experience, was sent to the white house alone to embalm the president, the united states. i think about what you were doing at 26 and being burdened with that memento stars being

sent to embalm the president of the united states. okay, henry. he used dr. suitcase formula saying chloride. he injected five quarts of it through president lincoln's femoral artery. after which he was dressed and, shaved and left to lie in repose until his coffin could be made. how his coffin was by frank sands. it was made by an undertaker in baltimore named john weaver. this coffin was a solid walnut. it was lined with lead and white satin covered in black broad cloth. all right. it was fitted up, meaning it was decorated with kind of those silver nail heads, the discussions you see this handles, the fringe at harvey and ma, the undertaker. i previously mentioned. so it was built in essentially

two different places. now, here is, a replica of it at, the national funeral history museum down in houston, texas. and as you can see, this is what we call lift panel, meaning this entire panel lifts off most of. you are pretty familiar with seeing the hinged panel. the lid sits on a hinge. on caskets today and this was done partial early by design so they could double the number of people walking by his coffin. so instead of having people walking by on one end. they're going by on both sides so they could double the people that were going to viewing president lincoln. now, this was, as i said, custom built to a length of six foot, six inches to a prop to accommodate the president's six foot four inch frame. it is interesting that that is the standard length of caskets

these days, because that's the length that can accommodate 99.8% of all americans without having to get a larger casket. this coffin. it costs the government 1500 dollars. so would be about $24,500. in today's money. now, on tuesday. the 18th, folks were admitted to the white house to view the president and then on the following day, wednesday, the 19th, there was a private ceremony held at the white house where 600 ticket holders were admitted. after that ceremony, the president's coffin was taken to the where it was to in state in the rotunda. now, president lincoln was the person to lie in state, in the rotunda, in the capital, and the first president.

now, there have been 35 people to date have laid in state in the capitol rotunda. now, on the morning of the 21st, lincoln's coffin was taken from the capitol building and taken to the train station. now, lincoln's the idea was to have this essentially this national funeral, where people could partake. so the secretary of war, edwin stanton, thought, we'll do a train journey back to springfield, where mrs. lincoln wanted president buried. and so the train is going to go 1662 miles, go. 404 cities, towns, hamlets. stopping 11 times to offload it on this journey ending may back in springfield for the president's burial. now his son was going to

accompany him, but willie was never part of funeral ceremonies at any of the cities. willie's coffin stayed on the presidential hearse car the entire time. just note lincoln's portrait, the cattle guard, different local motives were used throughout the train journey. but the same presidential hearst car was used the entire time. this car was initially designed so the president could tour the country during reconstruction. all right. it was hastily outfitted when. the president was assassinated. so it was draped in the appropriate buntings and black crepe of the time. but it was said to be nice, kind of the pullman car of its day. it had a a sitting room, a parlor a bedroom, and wheels that could accommodate different

gauge tracks. interesting. lee, enough, the president was rumored to have supposed to be inspecting the car on the saturday he died. so stop one was baltimore and this is his son robert. and robert rode from to baltimore about a two hour ride. and this is the only lincoln family member to ride what was called the lincoln special? that's what they called lincoln's funeral train. so he rode a grand total of 2 hours, and that was the only time a lincoln family member rode the train. robert did later meet the entourage, the funeral entourage in springfield and in baltimore where lincoln's coffin was taken, the exchange building where was viewed for an hour and a half.

okay. so this was the shortest viewing time out of any of the stops and it's estimated that about 10,000 people viewed him during this time. so from there, he was taken to harrisburg where he was the funeral party was met with just an absolute deluge of rain. he was taken to the capitol. there were 25,000 people viewed him. and then from there the following day, they stopped at lancaster. his coffin was not. but lincoln's predecessor james buchanan, the 15th president, was in for the reception. lancaster stop three in philadelphia. now, it was reported that the train as it was coming in to philadelphia, almost stalled because. there were so many flowers heaped onto the tracks. now i find that very unusual and interesting. think about how much a train

weighs and how many flowers would take to stall a train. but this is one of the pieces of the lincoln funeral that kind of changed, you know, american burial practices or american funeral practices prior to the lincoln flower offerings made. they flower offerings have been made since antiquity. but mostly it was kind a simple bouquet picked somebody's garden and brought to the ceremony. all right. and the thought was of surrounding the ugliness of death, something kind of as vibe and and nice looking as a floral offering. but it also had the practical of covering up or masking the odors of decomposition, which once embalming into vogue, was really not needed anymore. but after the lincoln funeral,

we start to see these grand floral offerings. people were essentially mimicking what they saw during lincoln's services, as in all the cities he went to. this top one here, this is his catafalque in, you can see how it is just heaped with loads of flowers. and then this one's here from a in michigan. city, indiana. these pillars here were decorated with al hunt flowers picked from hundreds of local gardens. so we see flower displays as being part of kind of this this national mourning fraternity and social organizer. if the lincoln special stopped in your village and the coffin not offloaded, it was very common for them to take floral tributes onto the train. and we see emergence now of what

are called set. okay. so flowers arranged to look like something else. crosses, wreaths were common things that were taken on to the train as a tribute to the slain president. now, after lincoln's funeral, we see these get more ornate, the gates of john hour, the broken harp string. these all become very popular victorian floral offerings. but but really, they're they're kind of genesis. their origin is with the lincoln funeral. now stop. three in philadelphia. the ceremonies are officiated by an undertaker, by the name of early this hearse. he created for the the event. it cost the city $4,000. b roughly. $73,000. in today's money. and lincoln's remains were taken to independence hall, the assembly room where the

declaration of independence was signed and his coffin was laid out to his head with symbolically pointing the liberty bell. all right. so from 5 a.m. on april 23rd to 2 a.m., on the 24th, so a period of what's at 21 hours, approximately. 150,000 people stood in line to view the president. from there, the lincoln special went up to jersey where lincoln's the lincoln hearse car was put on to a ferry for crossing to new york. now at the ferry terminal, the clock was stopped at 722. i couldn't find a picture of a clock stopped at 722. this was a very common victorian superstition in that they were afraid that the dead would not be able to pass on to where they were going. the dead should know no time so they could pass into the next

world. so it pretty much every stop all the clocks in the building were stopped at the minute of his death. and also, all the mirrors were draped. so this was another very common victorian superstition one that if the dead spirits saw themselves reflected in a mirror, they would realize they were dead. and again, they couldn't pass on. so all the mirrors would have been draped in all the locations that the lincoln obsequious were held. now, when the ferry arrived at the desroches street station, it was met by peter rella. he was a sexton undertaker in new york. he dug the graves at the willet street, methodist episcopal church, and as such, he was often called upon by new yorkers to also handle the funeral arrangements because he knew how to do things to effectively bury somebody.

and peter was a carpenter by trade. so on the morning of april first, a committee of aldermen approached him and said, peter presidential funeral be held here on the 24th, and we need you to build a hearse, a of the grandest magnitude can think of. so that's three days, 72 hours. so, peter was up to the task. he accepted and in 72 hours, he built perhaps of the grandest hearses that were used in the lincoln funeral. he employed 60 men and women, they worked around the clock for three days straight. the hearse was 14 feet long, eight feet wide and 15 feet tall. it was pulled by 16 gray to paris and horses, each led by a groom. and for that, the city of new york paid $9,000 or roughly, i

think $165,000 in today's money. this was a common theme. all these cities would make a custom hearse to carry lincoln's remains. something they were trying to outdo each other. something grander than the previous one. and typically, the coffin would sit about five or six feet off the ground. so it was processing through the city streets. everyone could see it. now, the procession its way through the city until it got to city hall where a chorus of, 800 people singing greeted it, while lincoln's coffin was taken upstairs and laid outside of the governor's room in. city hall. now, prior to the doors being thrown open for the public to come in and view the president, this man here, this is general eddie townsend.

all right. he was essentially acting as edwin stanton's proxy during this. stanton did not come on the lincoln special, and he a photograph or by the name of jeremiah gurney to come in and photograph the president. now this is the only known photograph that exists of the president because that's when mrs. lincoln agreed to edwin stanton for the funeral train. there was a couple conditions, one no show be made of her son willie to the president, not be photographed. well, this hit the evening new york. stanton found out about it and he was furious. so he ordered all the prints and all the negatives of this photograph to be destroyed. this was located in 1952 by a 14 year old boy who was combing through the nicolay papers at

the bollinger collection at the university of iowa. all right. this photograph came from louis stanton. so that's son gave it to john nicolay, who bundled it up in these papers. and they were eventually given to the university of iowa. so think about that. the man that ordered this destroyed couldn't bear to part with this cherished memento. so this is this is the only existing photograph that exists of president. now in new york, the new york herald estimated hundred and 50,000 people view the president, general john dix, who was essentially grand marshal of things while in new york city, estimated 100,000 people viewed the president. likely that number lies somewhere in between. next stop in albany, dr. brown, who was accompanying the along with frank sands, they had to

issue this statement because the new york press had been so, shall we say, unkind about lincoln's appearance. all right. and they issued this statement to the press. but as we see lincoln moving further west, we see the press coverage of his appearance becoming more favorable until when he finally arrives in chicago. the chicago tribune reports no corpse in the world is better prepared, according to appearance. at the same time, the president his funeral is being held in albany. john wilkes booth is killed now. i thought this a little interesting when i was down at the national funeral history museum. they had this book here from the secret. and i don't know if you can read this little card here, but it says this book essentially contains the carefully guarded truth that booth was not and executed as was believed by the

public. now, i'm not one for conspiracy theories, but edwin stanton did order a photographer by the name alexander gardner to photograph john wilkes booth's remains dead. and to my knowledge, that photograph has never surfaced. so just little food for thought. we're going to jump ahead to stop seven in cleveland. this stop is notable because cleveland had the foresight to construct an outdoor forum for lincoln's viewing all the other stops. the funerals were held in. a capitol building or some sort of hall where the public had to be funneled up steps down hallways and through this way, in that. and cleveland had the great idea. hey let's have the funeral outside. we can get more people to view him so they created this chinese style and the days leading up to the president's arrival in

cleveland, the newspapers, even printed. ladies, please do not put hoops in your skirt. so they could fit more people in line. all right. they were expecting 120,000 people to view the president during the stop in cleveland. unfortunately, again, heavy something that seemed to plague the lincoln funeral train kind of put a damper on the crowd. but 60,000 hardy, ohio fans still braved the elements to view the president. we're going to jump ahead. stop ten in chicago here. i just want to point out, you know, it's kind of hard to, you know, overstate the amount of money that these cities spent on decorating for the arrival of their slain leader. this here is an archway that the city of chicago constructed over michigan avenue. it's 24 feet wide, 27 feet high. i mean, these cities just spent

so much money to welcome lincoln back to their city last time. you know, just kind of very it's very all inspiring and humbling to see how much the nation loved him. this year is collins h. jordan. he was the local undertaker that was tapped to conduct the obstacle while lincoln was in chicago. it propelled him into kind of he became the white shoe undertaker for chicago after this, he did later conduct, the funeral for carter harrison, the mayor of chicago that was murdered during the world's fair. in 1887. and this is the grant hearse he constructed. i think this hearse is a little interesting because on top of it is a is a taxidermied bald eagle. yes. you can't see it in the

photograph here. so i put the drawing in it. now in chicago. the funeral procession was led by fightin joe hooker. it comprised of 40,000 people in the procession. so it wound its way from the michigan avenue station to the cook county courthouse, where lincoln was laid out in the courthouse. and viewed for 26 hours. and 150,000 people viewed him in chicago. now, after that, he was taken back to the train station. it was nighttime. it was torchlight. okay. which is i think is very romanesque, like because the romans would always have their funerals at night. so it wouldn't interfere with commerce. and in fact, the word funeral is from the latin word funerals, which means torch. now, the stop after chicago was

back in springfield, and this is where lincoln was going to be buried. now, this is the surviving photograph of the springfield hearse in it was destroyed in 1887 in a fire that also claimed lives of three people and 18 horses. now, springfield had spent all their money decorating for lincoln's arrival and, ran out of money. so the mayor of saint louis generously offered to donate the hearse to. springfield and springfield accepted. so this hearse was owned by a man by the name of jesse arnett. he owned a delivery service in saint louis. this was actually built close by in philadelphia, was made by famed coachbuilder billy. and it cost about $6,000 at the time. now that hearse was reverse

engineered for the 150th anniversary of lincoln's death, an outfit called stop funeral home in springfield, illinois. using that photograph i just showed you rebuilt this hearse using period correct techniques, and they have a downloadable brochure on their website. that's why i put the url up there. so if anyone's interested in finding out how they did it, i it's really, really interesting. and what they came up with is just beautiful. but this is essentially what remains were conveyed in springfield. and this is also interesting because this is one of the few stops where his remains were conveyed in a hearse that was built to be a hearse, not something that was custom built for the occasion. like so many these other cities that had a of money to throw at this were able to do. now after lincoln was viewed one

last time in his hometown, he was buried here in oak ridge cemetery. now, those of you that have. seen the lincoln tomb, you're saying, well, what's this? well, this is the receiving vault at oak ridge. so it was very common for cemeteries at this time to have a vault to receive coffins during the cold months when they couldn't dig. the frost was too thick, too hard for them to dig, so they would store folks in these receiving vaults until the spring thaw. so the lincoln monument, the lincoln tomb, not even having been really started or thought at the time when he was taken to oak ridge, he was placed in this receiving vault until his final tomb could be built. and the reverend david simpson is the bishop of the methodist episcopal church, said during

committal. he said such a scene as his return to you was never witness. among the events of history. there have been great processions of mourners. there was one for the patriarch, jacob which came from egypt and the egyptians wondered at the evidence of forever reverence and filial affection far more have gazed on the face of the departed man than i have ever looked upon the face of any other departed man, more races have looked upon this procession for the 1600 miles or more by night by day, by sunlight on twilight and day. so i thought that was very, very fitting because counting it up at each stop,. 880,000 americans cast eyes on president lincoln. that's not even counting the millions of americans that were

present in those city streets as his coffin went by or that line tracks when the lincoln sped by. now, there were vast swatches of wilderness as the train went by would usually be pitch dark. but people on the train would say it was almost like it was dawn because so many people would build these bond out near the tracks to catch a glimpse of lincoln's train, his funeral train, as it went by. so they could be part something, you know, stand together in solidary and mourn as americans. now, mr. lincoln would not rest in peace. he would be moved 13 more times from his initial entombment in that receiving vault until he was finally buried. one last time on september 26, 1901.

his coffin would be open six more times to view him and there was even a failed grave robbing 1876 when the grave robbers managed to get the lid of the marble sarcophagus off and expose his coffin. so that's why in 1901, he was buried in a steel cage ten feet deep, covered completely with concrete, to prevent any future grave robbing and. he's buried under the floor of the memorial hall here. now, rumors started to circulate at this time 1901 that holmes had done the embalming. no one knows where these rumors came from. they were circulated by the newspapers. holmes have been dead for a year at this point, so they didn't come from him. but that is patently false. henry cattell, age 26, embalmed. mr. lincoln. so very quickly to wrap up. let's look at the effects of the lincoln tragedy and they shaped

the american funeral for the next century and a half. so are the elements of the american the early american funeral and were based on the 1644 direct directory for public worship of god, which said no funeral services should be said and no should be held. so the colonial american funeral, the remains were washed at home, dressed by the family, awake, would be held to ensure that the person, in fact, dead. there was no embalming then and really the only way people know if somebody was dead was by the signs of decomposition. the remains were coffins. a piece of string would be taken down to your local cabinetmaker, carpenter, who would make a custom coffin for burial. there would be a procession. bells would be told. and for the first half century, nothing said. the family would then gather for a repast. and that was the american.

now, in 1683, we see the first funeral ceremony for a man by the name of elam. he was a pastor in roxbury, massachusetts, who sits on the funeral sermons would be preached, though, at sunday. services, not the day of the burial. so would be preached after and not necessarily sunday after. it might be a sunday or two. and then we start see prayer services being held, graveside so the first recorded instance of that is 1770. wait, so he was one of the colonial magistrates? you might be familiar. he took part in the salem witch trials. okay. so we start to see the american funeral changing. and i'm not saying the lincoln funeral in really invented this template, but it was to use a chemical term, the active energy the kind of spur a lot of these changes are definitely embalming came into vogue. think of all the people. 880,000 people. that saw president lincoln and

they their thought that was if it's good enough for the president, it's good enough for me. so we see embalming as a practice explode in america after the civil war. a flower tributes in the interest of time touched on that. so i'm going to kind of breeze by that. the visibility, the hearse. so think all these grand hearses i talked about that each city tried to outdo prior to the civil. hearses were something they were almost frivolous. all right. these were people trying to scratch out an existence in this new world. and having a specialized vehicle to convey the dead was not needed because most people were burying folks their yard or in the town common somewhere. they could walk. so after the civil war, with the advent of the rural cemetery, so we start seeing these cemeteries are out of the city centers like oak ridge cemetery where lincoln

was buried was one of these rural cemeteries outside of the city limits, a very bucolic setting appealed to the victorian sense of people gone to their sleep. so lincoln being, buried in a rural cemetery as they were called, was an endorsement for this type of cemetery. all of a sudden americans wanted type of burial. they didn't want to be buried in these crowded moldering churchyards. you know, jammed into city centers. they wanted this rural setting for burial emphasis on the casket, coffin. so we start seeing couple of things. one being the mass production of caskets and then the advent of the casket. so no longer are local carpenters of knocking something together. custom and then certainly lincoln's grand coffin that was paraded before millions of people. all of the sudden you know,

there's this emphasis in the funeral rite of, the coffin, and then later the casket. postmortem photography has kind of like this golden age from the mid-19th century until the turn of 20th century, when modern medicine and the personal camera kind of make postmortem photography go the way of the horse and buggy. but certainly lincoln being photographed, that photo being published in the paper and everyone knowing it, you know, kind of created this buzz about postmortem photography. and then the elements of wow. so this is mary todd lincoln. she put on mourning dress after her was assassinated and never took it off until the day she died. next, 17 years. so we see the victorians adopt this form of overt mourning. and it wasn't just her, it was the other families of the

650,000 soldiers that were killed during civil war. this was a time of national crisis. these men, they marched off to war. most of them were never seen again. and so this was a time of national mourning and the victorian people, they adopted this type of overt mourning, this display of over mourning and they held on to that until there was another national crisis. i won't even go into it. and americans cast mourning garb off just as quickly. but mary todd lincoln was definitely leading the charge. and again, americans are looking to her saying, well, she's doing it. if it's good enough for the first lady, it's good enough for me. so that's what i have you this evening on the grand funeral of president lincoln. thank very much for coming out, alison. right on time.

any questions? how about if i start out by testing the mic and i do have a question for you. thank you for this presentation. it was wonderful and and very inspiring. i have to share a before my question because feel strongly about it about 20 years, maybe 30 years ago, they made a recreation of one of the slave ships called the amistad and. they picked up a single man, man in sri lanka who took the trip and represented all the slaves that had been taken. that trip he went through the caribbean, came up and it joined our free asian ship, which is the command at christi and a river. it stayed there for a week. the weather was beautiful all week. and during that time, i got to talk to this gentleman, he's just so full of love. i mean, he was just an amazing, amazing man. and the last thing they were going to do before the ship left

was to give prayers, rabbis, pastors, fathers in this small tent. during that one section, it rained and range. not quite loud enough. almost loud enough. and i as a sound man, i was devastated because it kind of wrecked the moment. and i came out and went to apologize to him and he was crying and he's was like, why are you crying? it's night. i'm sorry. he goes, no you don't understand. in my country it rains. it means god is pleased with your work. hmm. so i would suggest that maybe the funeral wasn't plagued by rain. it was blessed by rain. so my question is, i was curious about the flag and the flag code. so i'm a boy, so i follow the flag code. and it was written like 70 years later. but in it it references lincoln when they talk about the pledge

of allegiance and the words under god are the and in the last of sentences of the gettysburg address and they talk about the flag being taken a half mast for 30 days for president and ten days for a vice president. and also that the flag should lie with the stars, the left shoulder on a coffin. but all i saw in the pictures were just flags, the train. i was curious how else was the flag change during that funeral? you know, i honestly. i don't know. and i didn't come across any or photos of the flag on lincoln's coffin. it was a prominent on the hearses. you see a lot of they would have these pillars because. a lot of them were canopied and you would see the flags wound around a lot of the pillars of the hearses that were used and draped. as you know, there was be

bunting on the hearse, but i never did see anything about. a flag on the coffin or read anything about, you know, flags ordered to a half or anything like that. i just wanted to know what were stops eight and nine that use kept so in the interest of time it went cleveland column indianapolis chicago chicago. mm. so question for you i've been to several museums in europe where i've frequently seen masks. so for a lot of historical figures after they've been dead they've basically had their entire cast into a mask, which was then preserved. has that been a tradition in the u.s.? it has been in several presidents have had death masks made, to my knowledge, president

lincoln was not one of them. but death's death masks never really took off in america as they did in europe. and my theory is, because americans adopted embalming a way that the europeans did not so from kind of the mid-'ninety century on, you didn't need the death mask because we could hold the remains, you know, a period of weeks for folks to come view it, you know, like they did in lincoln funeral. i mean, think about it. the people in springfield, they were viewing the president two and a half weeks after he died. and seen his real likeness, didn't need a death mask. and they were created really in europe for the the funeral ceremonies because they would be held. so and i say so far, i mean, a period of weeks after somebody died until, they could collect

the members of the royal family that oftentimes what they were displaying was an effigy. it wasn't the actual decedent because nature was its course and they could not. so they would have an effigy and a death mask. that was fascinating talk well done thank you. you mentioned that lincoln you mentioned that lincoln, the second person to lie in state in the capital. you remember who the first was, was clay. okay. yeah. hi. i just to first say thank you to samuel's. i've never been to the american culture like it today. it's amazing. and i really feel honored, so. thank you sam.

i up in between two cultures. one does not allow the body to be kept more than days. and one that will keep the body for sometimes even 2 to 3 months for funeral so today's kind of like really unique to get to understand the american culture from a funeral perspective. but i also want oh, he took care of one of my questions i wanted to say in my two when it rains, that's a blessing. i mean, god is just saying he's just shining your green light to the heaven. that's it the last one is a question to you as. you dedicate your knowledge, your time to this work, which is really so dear to so many families. how do you see the future funeral? we've seen the reasons cremation

urns and now ashes. crystal, how do you see the future going forward with funeral system services? the one thing that has been constant in my research into, the history of the american funeral is, there's nothing constant if you look at snapshots, whether it be 50 years or 100 years, starting with first jamestown settlement, and you go back and look at these snapshots of the american funeral is constantly changing. so the one thing i can tell you is the funeral 50 years, 100 years from now won't look like the funeral today. now, what it's going to look like, i can't necessarily tell. is cremation growing in popular. yes. are there new forms of disposition that are emerging engage gaining popularity like alkaline hydro delicious and natural organic reduction. yes. will those be the preferred forms of disposition in 50 years? i don't know.

so we see this kind of this change in the funeral technology is certainly playing a bigger and bigger role in funerals. definitely kind of spurred on by the pandemic when we had to use technology. so i see that as something that's here to stay, what its role is going to look like in the future. i know vr certain is something that's been kicked around and that's virtual reality. funerals for, everyone, holograms is another thing i hear kicked around a lot. so maybe that'll be part of the funeral experience. and then there's also a lot of talk about virtual memorialization in the metaverse. so instead of going to a rural cemetery and buying headstone like people have done for several hundred years, maybe you buy land in the metaverse using an end f and you have a memorial. i don't know.

so we'll out together. well, thank you. save a few questions. where is mary todd lincoln buried? willy. she's she's buried with all the lincolns are buried together. yes. and why did they why did they open? his coffin, i think you said six times. six times to ensure that it was him he was moved, too. there were so many threats of his his coffin being essentially snatched and held for ransom that. a lot of times whenever they moved him. they'd peek in there to make sure that it was him. and suitcase zinc chloride worked. so well that when the coffin was opened for the final time in 1901, the condition of i want to say there was 17 or 18 people that viewed him that final time, along with his son, robert. he was in a remarkable state of

preservation to those that viewed him in 1901. what's his number on the brace for that? because you said he was 21. and i don't know how much experience he had, but how did that all work out? well, i think he i think his embalming during the civil war traumatized him. he left embalming immediately. the civil war, he was a lithograph for for a short amount of time. and then he joined the metropolitan police, where retired from. he never about embalming lincoln until the rumors of that thomas had embalmed him surfaced in 1901. so he finally broke his silence. 37 years later, in 1901, to talk about embalming president lincoln. and that was the first time he spoke about it publicly. we're going to have one more question and then i think we'll need to cut off. thank you for your excellent remarks. the shortness of the visitation in baltimore, was there a

security concern related to. i have not read anything, but i strongly i strongly believe that it had to do with the southern sympathies in baltimore and perhaps the security issues around there that they wanted to keep things as short as possible. but i've never anything definitive as to why it was only an hour and a half. so this is certainly a fascinating presentation. think everyone would agree? i know there probably are other questions, but we do need to cut off the because of the time that we had said before and some may have places to go but we certainly thank you todd. this has been a fascinating presentation. thank you very.

good morning. my name is kevin gaines and it's a pleasure to welcome you to the miller center for a conversation about the post-presidency of barack