Last Words

Just across the path from Joshua Chamberlain's grave stands a heartbreaking memorial to two toddlers who died in 1858. Charles Parkinson (age 4) died on May 20 and his little brother, John (age 2), died four days later. Their gravestone preserves their last words:

"Charley's tired mamma."

"Tarl gone me go too."

The top of the monument is a sculpture of two sleeping children holding hands. It has deteriorated over time, but it's still quite touching.

101 Ways, Part 95: "Unveiled"

For a brief intro to the "101 Ways to Say 'Died'" series, click here.

Part 95, in which I ignore the chronological parameters of this project.

On July 2, the 146th anniversary of the 20th Maine's heroics at Little Round Top, I visited Joshua Chamberlain's grave in Brunswick, ME. That probably sounds a little dramatic — the truth is that I was on my way to go camping with my parents farther up the coast and stopped in Brunswick for a few minutes.

Chamberlain's gravesite is covered with flags, flowers, pennies, and pebbles left by visitors, but it was his wife's gravestone that caught my eye. Fanny Chamberlain is buried next to her husband under a stone that says, "Unveiled":

While 1905 is quite a bit out of my normal range, I've never seen this particular expression before. At least, I haven't noticed it — I've been visiting this grave since I was a toddler, but this was the first time since I started this project. If forced to justify its inclusion, I would mumble something about the strong Civil War connection, which is only a few years outside of the official parameters.

"The Power of Mortals"

Today, Andrew Sullivan posted a link to H.W. Brands' review of Margaret MacMillan's book, Dangerous Games: The Uses and Abuses of History under the title, "The Reparations Fantasy." The portion he decided to highlight was the climax of Brand's lengthy meditation on the craft of the historian:

MacMillan mentions but doesn’t delve into the demands for reparations to the descendants of African-American slaves . . . Without question the millions of men, women and children forced into servitude were horribly wronged. But righting that wrong, a century and a half after emancipation, transcends the power of mortals.
Reparations would take money from people who never owned slaves and bestow it on people who never were slaves. It would require judgments of collective guilt and collective innocence, which are problematic at best; when the collectives are defined by race and the judgments extended across generations, the whole issue becomes noxious in the extreme. Racists would find cover for reviving old arguments about slavery actually benefiting slaves—after all, if the issue is money, isn’t the average African-American today better-off than the average West African? What about African-American slaveholders—which side of the ledger do their descendants land on? And the American children of Africans who were never enslaved? Would the president of the United States get a check?

I've never really waded into the debate about reparations before, but Brands' assertion that righting historical wrongs "transcends the power of mortals" stuck in my craw. It's something that people say when they don't wish to be made uncomfortable by a line of inquiry.

Brand makes two major errors in his discussion of reparations: first, he assumes that the federal (and state) government's culpability in the oppression of African Americans ended in 1865; second, he assumes that direct payments to descendants is the only possible form of acceptable reparations.

On the first point, I would point to the re-enslavement of convicts, modern prison and police brutality, educational inequality, and the massive government subsidy of white flight that is the highway system. I am no expert on 20th century history and I'm sure that others could add a lot to that list, but the basic point is this: the government of the United States and of the states individually continue to protect the status quo of racial inequality through positive actions.

This leads to the second point: direct payments to descendants is only one idea for reparations. I agree that direct payments would be a tremendous bureaucratic challenge — just finding the documents to prove descent from particular individuals would be a challenge if the government were to require birth certificates or other official records. But that doesn't mean it's the only solution.

Since the government continues to perpetuate the legacy of slavery through positive acts, it could counteract those acts in various ways. Instead of spending a trillion dollars on cash payments, the government could invest that money in schools, hospitals, and transportation that would benefit cities and rural areas with underserved African American populations. It could devise a drastic program to facilitate home/land/business ownership that would benefit black families on the same scale that the G.I. Bill benefited white families after WWII. It could do something serious about schools.

Like I said, I am new to this debate and I'm sure that these suggestions fall short in many ways. They certainly would not satisfy some of those who have thought more deeply and more sensitively about the possibilities than I have.

My point is that white Americans can't throw up our hands and say, "oh, we couldn't possibly right the wrongs of the past, so let's just talk about something else." That is lazy and it lets us off the hook way too easily. Modern Americans can't erase the evil of slavery, but there's a lot that can be done about social inequality if we insist on committing our considerable creative and financial power to the task.

It's not that we can't make reparations — we choose not to.

Mourning Doves

On the 4th of July, I took advantage of a brief respite from the rain to visit Eastern Cemetery in Portland, ME. The visit turned out to be even more fleeting than I expected because the cemetery reeked. The overpowering stench of rot had me gagging as soon as I stepped out of the car. I don't know if it was wafting in from the harbor or what, but it was awful. Worse than rotting fish. I breathed through my mouth for about 10 minutes, but I couldn't take it any longer, so I didn't get very many pictures.

I did stumble across an adorable pair of mourning doves. I promise that I wasn't chasing them — they just kept flying where I wanted to go.

Grave Desecration in Chicago

Four people have been charged with felonies after excavating and reselling graves in Chicago's historic Burr Oak Cemetery. According to CNN, these cemetery employees dug up about 300 graves in the oldest section of the cemetery and dumped the remains in the far corners so that they could resell the plots. The CNN article doesn't say whether tombstones were removed or destroyed.

This is obviously a terrible situation for the families and the whole community. It's also a good lesson for those of us who spend time in historic cemeteries — if you see something strange, don't be afraid to report it to the local historical society or police.

UPDATE:
More details are emerging about this ghoulish crime, including the shocking revelation that a fund set up to erect a monument to Emmett Till was drained. Some news organizations are reporting that Till's coffin was also found in a shed, but it is unclear whether that has anything to do with the scam — Till's body was legally exhumed for an autopsy in 2005 and reburied in a different coffin.

UPDATE II:
It appears that Emmett Till's gravewas not disturbed — the coffin found in a shed was supposed to be part of the memorial.

Prissilar Goff

In the tradition of Annar Lawrence, Marther Stone, and Alletherr Grosvenor, I give you

Prissilar Goff.

photo via the Farber Collection

What Hath God Wrought

I am one of those people who is ruining American history. When curmudgeons lament the much-exaggerated death of "traditional" history or complain that young scholars only care about sexy minutia, they have me in mind. I'll read any journal article with a title that promises prostitution or infanticide.

That said, I am thoroughly enjoying Daniel Walker Howe's What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848. I didn't expect to feel any affection for a tome on the antebellum period, but the writing is lively and Prof. Howe shares my love of John Quincy Adams (the book is dedicated to Adams). After slogging through Sean Wilentz' fawning Jackson lovefest, I'm tickled to find that Howe's Jackson is a violent, anti-intellectual, petulant demagogue. If I have to read about bank charters and the transportation revolution, I prefer to be entertained, and Howe delivers.

He also does a good job of alternating between politics-heavy chapters and chapters that focus on social, cultural, and technological developments. If I feel myself flagging during a section on monetary policy, I can be comforted by the thought that something closer to my interests is not far off.

If you're looking for a survey of this period, I recommend this one over all the other doorstops and textbooks out there.

Middle Names

Sometimes, they make an already ungainly name even more of a mouthful.

Norbert Felicien Wigneron

1764

Newport, RI

Don't worry, Norbert. My own middle name is Galante-DeAngelis, so I feel you.

via Farber Collection

Name o' the Day

Captivity Smead

b. August 22, 1746
d. May 7, 1747

Captivity Smead was born to John and Mary Smead two days after the Smeads and their two young sons, Elihu and Simeon, were taken captive at Fort Massachusetts. She died in Canada.

Carved in Stone

One thing about carving something in stone — it's really tough to erase mistakes.

The Wood family of Little Compton, RI suffered a tragedy in 1712: all four of their teenage children died between March 8 and March 16. There are several other gravestones in the immediate area dated January-March 1712, which indicates a major epidemic. I haven't been able to find out exactly what the epidemic was — it was unusual in its virulence among teenagers and young adults.

Two of the Wood children, Deborah (age 18) and Margeret (age 16), are buried under the same headstone. It is a lovely example of an early John Stevens I double stone with strong letters, dotted capital Is, and muffin-shaped deaths heads.

If you look closely, you can see that Stevens originally misidentified Deborah as "Elizabeth" — you can see the initial E, the I, and a faint ghost of the Z. Stevens reused the H at the end and sort of gave up on trying to erase the T.

If there was a widespread epidemic, Stevens may have been inundated with orders. Perhaps he mixed them up.

"Died By a Bite of a Mad Dog"

In Memory of

Mr Aaron Goodrich

Junr. son of Mr Aa

ron & Mrs Dorcas

Goodrich who

died by a Bite of

a mad Dog August

28 1789 in the

19 year of his age

Aaron Goodrich

Hatfield, MA

Hill Cemetery

middle of graveyard, nearer to preservation sign

Camping!

I'm taking off for a few days (camping! in this weather!).

I've set up some autoposts, but Blogger's scheduled post feature has been a little sketchy lately, so I'm not sure whether that will work.

Enjoy your weekend and hope for some sun.

Name o' the Day

Today's Name o' the Day award goes to a young entrant from Shaftesbury, Vermont:

Wealthy Buck.

Wealthy Buck died in 1777 at age 3 and a half. Her gravestone is visible through the Farber Collection.

That's 88.51392 Kilometers Per Hour

Now that Al Franken is a senator, we can expect his magnetic media presence to drive the filibuster-proof Democratic majority so far to the left that we'll be inundated with foreigny, emasculating policies like the introduction of the metric system! And speed limits!

It's true!!!11!1! 

We may end up having Easter in November, but the papists will have to pry the Julian calendar from our cold, dead, Protestant hands!

Canada Wait

Canada Wait is the great(x8)-grandmother of Sarah Palin. She was born in captivity in Canada.

Canada's mother, Martha, and her three sisters, Mary (6), Martha (4), and Sarah (2), were captured during a raid on Hadley, MA on September 19, 1677. In all, 21 captives were taken from Hadley and marched to Canada. Martha Wait survived the journey and gave birth to Canada on January 22, 1678. Another captive, Hannah Jennings, gave birth to a little boy on March 14, 1678 and named him Captivity.

The captives were redeemed in the spring of 1678, thanks to the efforts of the babies' fathers, Benjamin Wait and Stephen Jennings, and a Mohawk guide whose name is not preserved in the English records.

Both Canada and Captivity went on to live long, full lives. Canada married Joseph Smith, whose father had been killed in a raid in 1676. They had ten children: Mary, Joseph, Martha, Benjamin, John, Sarah, Esther, Hannah, Eleanor, Joseph, and Samuel. Sarah Palin is a descendant of Canada's first daughter, Mary (b. 1697).

Canada Wait

Hatfield, MA

Hill Cemetery, Rte. 9

1749

101 Ways, Part 94: Unhappily Parish'd in the Flames

For a brief intro to the "101 Ways to Say 'Died'" series, click here.

On the 12th Day of May

1768, the House of Mr.

William Arms was Con-

sumed by Fire And his

Wife Mrs. Rebecca Arms

unhappily parish'd in the

Flames in the 70th Year

of her Age.

She was one who Feared God
& Lov'd the Redeemer, was a sin-
gular Example of Piety, who by
a devout walk was a Bright Or-
nament to the Christian Religion,
And her Death Great Gain.

Rebecca Arms, 1768

Old Deerfield Cemetery

Deerfield, MA

Mary Harvey and Her Child

In Memory of

Mary, the Wife of

Simeon Harvey

Who Departed this

Life

Decemb,r 10th

1785 in 39th year of

Her age. on her left

Arm Lieth the Infant

Wich was still

Born

Mary Harvey was already the mother of nine children in 1785. She died in childbirth with her tenth.

Her gravestone was carved by Solomon Ashley.

Mary Harvey

Deerfield, MA

1785

Name o' the Day

From Old Deerfield Cemetery in Deerfield, MA:

Fanny Forward.

That would be a great name for a gregarious, flirtatious (and doomed) young lady in a 19th-century cautionary tale.