Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-12-08
History Seen in White House Funerals

His attending physician was Dr. Thomas
Miller who then lived on the north side of f:
street between Thirteenth and Fourteenth
streets, and the consulting physicians Drs.
Frederick May, H w. Warrington and Ashton
Alexander.
We are told that soon after his death was
announced, almost every private dwelling
placed crepe upon the knocker and hall-handle
of its door, and many of the very humblest
abodes hung out some spontaneous signal of
the general sorrow"
On the day of the funeral which took place
from the East Room of the White House all
stores and places of business in Washington
were closed. The religious services were con-
Quoted by the Rev. w. Hawley pastor of ST.
Johns Episcopal Church. at H and Sixteenth
streets, and the body was temporarily placed
in the receiving vault Of Congressional Gene
terry. The funeral car was of large dimen-
sions," an account states, and ION the coffin lay
the sword of justice and the sword of state
surmounted by the scroll of the Constitution.
bound together by funeral wreath formed OF
the yew and the cypress. The car was drawn
by six white horses, having at the head of each
a coloTed groom, dressed in white with white
turban and SASH and supported by pallbearers
In black"
THOUGH the White House had been occupied
for al years without recorded funeral hay-
ing taken place from there, yet it was to DC
but three years after the death of President
Harrison that gloom should again envelop this
historic structure, when the bodies of Abel p
Upshur, Secretary of State in the cabinet Of
President John Tyler; Thomas w. Gilmer Sec
rotary of the Navy; Virgil Maxcy, in the diplo-
matte service; ex-senator Gardiner of New
York. and Commodore Beverly Kennon. were
borne there after the disaster on board the
frigate Princeton off Broad Creek about seven
miles below Washington.
The prominence and positions of those killed
naturally makes this event all the mere notable
and historic. Commodore Kennon had as his
second wife Britannia wellington daughter of
Martha Parke (Custis) Peter, the granddaughter
of Mrs. Washington. Britannia Peter had mar
ried Capt. Kennon at Tudor Place on Decem-
Der 8, 1872 and was therefore left widow
after a brief married life of but two years
Largely because of the impcssibility of keep
ing from making errors even among the best
OF writer's upon historic subjects, the writer
has always deemed it safest to go back to the
beginning of things and find out just what
the press said on subjects like these at the
time, and even then sometimes he finds it quite
advisable to sort of check up.
The Intelligencer in its issue of February 30,
1874, the day following the explosion, gives a
good account OF this unfortunate affair and
here it is, punctuation marks and ALL
Yesterday a day appointed by the
courtesy and hospitality af Capt Stockton
commander of the Princeton, for receiving as
visitors to his fine ship dying off Alexandria,
a great number of guests, with their families
literally and numerously invited to spend the
day on board The day was most favorable
and the company was large and brilliant, of
both sexes; not less probable in number than
four hundred, among whom were the President
OF the United States the heads of the several
departments, and their families At a proper
hour after the arrival of the expected guests.
the vessel got under way and proceeded down
the river to some distance below Fort WASH
1ngton. During the passage down, one of the
large guns on board carrying a ball of 225 .
pounds) was fired more than once exhibiting
the great power and capacity of that form:-
dable weapon of war
THE ladies had partaken of a sumutuous