The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-02-15
MAINE'S ANCHOR AS MONUMENT
 TO HER DEAD
Dedicated Today at Arling- ton National Cemetery
 at Washington
Admiral Sigsbee Makes the Chief -Address-Anniver- sary of Sinking of Battle ship in Havana Harbor F'ittinglv Observed.
Especial from United Press.)

 Washington, Feb. 15.-In the pres ence of a distinguished gathering a
 Arlington National cemetery this aft
 ernoon, the anchor of the battleshiI Maine which sank in Havana harbol
 eleven years ago today, was dedicated
 as a part of the monument to the sailor dead and the granite stone itself
 which marks the spot where one hun dred and sixty-five of the men are
 sleeping, was covered with flora. 1 Wreaths.
 One of the offerings was a nagnifi' cent wreath from President Roosevelt
 and other pieces were sent by the
 camps and posts of the various pa- triotic societies Of the capital.
 The exercises at Arlington were but one of g. number of ceremonies com memorating the anniversary. The pa triotic societies participating made the pilgrimage to the cemetery on foot from the Virginia end of Aqueduct Bridge; @ band from Fort Myer play ed the National dirges; a bugler sound ed Taps, and Admiral Sigsbee, who commanded the Maine on the night of the disaster, delivered an address. The Admiral said:
 When the battleship Maine was de- stroyed at Havana, eleven years ago members of her crew came to sudden death. Later eight members of her crew died in hospitals from wounds re- ceived in that awful catastrophe. Of the crew but sixteen men of the Maine wholly escaped injury. Her officers numbered 26 and her crew BPS.
 Twenty-Five of her dead are buried 113v~ motely at different places. Sixty seven are buried only God knows where. Here in 8. cemetery dedicated to our country's heroic dead, lie 165 who were buried formerly in Colon cemetery i'll the city of Havana.
 "In December, 1899, the battleship Texas, under my command, was or dered to Havana and there with the assistance of Chaplain John P. Chid- wick she took on board all of the Mains dead from Colon cemetery and brought them to the United States. They were laid to rest in Arlington in the presence of President Mckinley, the Secretary of the Navy and other high officials of the government and distin guished army and navy offic- ials.
 "On that dark, overcast, quiet night, Taps took on a new meaning to the surviving men. We were bound that night with exceptional solemnity. The call of the bugle seemed to echo back from the hills with opeinous forebod- ings.
 Traps, the nightly signal for silence and sleep, was therefore the last dis tinctive sound heard by these men in life for in one-half hour they were dead-for the greater part dead in their sleep. And the bugler, himself, was dead. He had sounded a requiem for himself and his shipmates.
 we are assembled here today to honor our dead. The manner of their dying calls for our deepest sympathy and most profound sorrow.
 Beyond all doubt our whole people ent gathering and the gatherings and ceremonies elsewhere today show that these dead are not forgotten. To me, as to no other man, has come a. knowl- edge of the sorrows and distress and spread broadcast by that catastrophe of the Maine
 Comrades and friends-as the com of the Maine when she was lost and so far as I may assume to be representative of this occasion-I join my hands to yours in patriotic fellow ship and in grateful appreciation of these commemorative services at Ar lington.'
 Rev. Father McGuigan celebrated mass in honor of the anniver- sary of the Maine at St. Peters church in the morning, and in the evening services are to be held at the First Presbyterian church.