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Tag: 1/25/1776

  • Our First Memorial–January 25, 1776

    Cover art for January 25, 1776: the monument erected to honor Richard Montgomery outside St. Paul's Chapel at Trinity Church. via Wikimedia Commons.
    The monument erected to honor Richard Montgomery outside St. Paul’s Chapel at Trinity Church.
    The inscription reads: This Monument is erected by the order of Congress, 25th, Janry, 1776, to transmit to Posterity a grateful remembrance of the patriotism conduct enterprise & perseverance of Major General Richard Montgomery
    Who after a series of successes amidst the most discouraging Difficulties Fell in the attack on Quebec. 31st, Decbr, 1775. Aged 37 Years.

    We weren’t even a nation yet and Congress had already commissioned the Richard Montgomery Memorial. And while the memorial itself was completed rather quickly by the commissioned artist, the war interfered with its transport and it took nearly ten years to find all the pieces.

    (Dirty Secret: they never found all of them; the urn at top center was a reproduction.)

    Montgomery was generally known to be a good general even if his death was practically inevitable, given the circumstances. But that didn’t stop people from turning him into a martyr for the cause of Independence.

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    PS. Trinity Church’s website has a page dedicated to the monument, which aided my research for this episode. There’s a huge, fascinating segment dedicated to the 2011 restoration process for this memorial.