Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 February 1899 — IN MEMORY OF WASHINGTON [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

IN MEMORY OF WASHINGTON

GEORGE WASHINGTON'S DEATH.

Centenary to He Observed by What Was Called a “Mock Funeral.” On that December day, nearly a century Ago, when the body of Gen. George AVnshington was laid away in the vault at Mount Vernon, “mock funerals" were held in many towns and cities east of the Alleghanies. Our great-grandparents were in their infancy in those far-away days, and many of them saw these “mock funerals,” which were conducted, of course, with all solemnity. From these sights of childhood springs the conviction in the minds of Centenarians here and there that they were witnesses of the real funeral. Such is the trustfulness of old age in memories of times long agone! Ninety-nine years of national life hare

passed since then, and America has given far more attention to anniversary celebrations of that happier event —the birth of its first President —than to the yearly recurrence of the day of the funeral. This year, however, the centennial of that day will take place, and the observance at Mount Vernon will be on Dec. 14, the anniversary of the day of the death, instead of on the ISth, which was the date of the funeral. It is intended, nevertheless, that the observance shall take the form of a duplication of the funeral services, going over the same ground as in 1779. So elaborate are the contemplated ceremonies that already plans are being put into shape for the great event. As Gen. Washington was a Mason, the services over his body were conducted, in part at least, by the Masons, and so tho anniversary services will be under the direction of the Grand Lodge sf Virginia, Free and Accepted Mnsons. The Grand Lodge will meet in Alexan-

dria, and, escorted by Lodge No. 4 of Fredericksburg, in which Washington received his first degret»; Washington Lodge No. 22 of Alexandria, of which he was the first master, and Federal Lodge of Washington and representatives of every Grand Lodge in America will go to Mount Vernon and there repeat the services of Dec. 18, J 799. It is expected that President McKinley, himself a Mason, will make an address, and after the ceremonies a banquet will be given in Washington. The march to the tomb will pass, of course, the old tomb in which Washington’s body was buried, and in which It rested for more than thirty years, though the objective point of the procession will be the new tomb, where the coffin now 16. In his will Washington stated that “the family vault at Mount Vernon reqhii .ig repairs, and being improperly situated, I desire that a new one, of brick, and upon a larger Beale, may be built at the foot of what ia called the Vineyard Inclosure, on the ground which is marked out, in which my remains and those of my deceased relatives (now in the old Tanlt), and such others of my family as may choose to be

entombed there, may bo deposited.” Notwithstanding his request, it was not until 1831 that the new tomb was built and Washington’s body placed therein. And then the old vault was allowed to fall into a state of decay. In recent years it has been rebuilt from a drawing in the Congressional Library, and it is now surrounded by an iron fence, and is kept up with the same care as the new tomb. In 1837, when the marble sarcophagi in which the coflSns of Washington and his wife rest were placed in the new tomb, the key of that tomb was thrown into the Potomac river. > At the request of Martha Washington a door was made to the old tomb at the time of the general’s burial, instead of closing it with brick, as had been the custom at previous burials. The widow was sure that she would soon follow her husband. She lived only eighteen months after the death of Washington, keeping entirely, it is said, to her room on the third floor of the mansion, and upon her death, in 1801, her body was laid beside that of her husband in the old tomb. Washington was buried in a mahogany coffin, lined with lead, which was put in a case covered with black cloth.

TOMB HOLDING WASHINGTON'S BODY SINCE 1831.