124. FORT SCHUYLER
6 Pennyfield Avenue, Throgs Neck, The Bronx. Hours: M–Sat 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. General information: www.sunymaritime.edu/Maritime%20Museum or (718) 409-7218.
Fort Schuyler was built to defend the northern water approach to New York City via Long Island Sound. Although begun in 1833, the fort was not quite finished when it was dedicated in 1856. Fort Schuyler faces Fort Totten on the Queens side of the river, completing a perfect cross-fire defense. During the Civil War, these forts were used as prisons to detain Confederate soldiers. Nearly 500 prisoners were held here, including deserters from the Union army and other miscreants. Unlike other, more notorious prisons, Fort Schuyler was considered to be clean and well run; in fact, no one died of disease here during the war, a remarkable statistic. Fresh recruits with Duryea’s Zouaves and the Irish Brigade who were heading off to battle were equipped and trained at this fort as well.
Fort Schuyler as seen from Fort Totten.
Also attached to Fort Schuyler was a hospital complex capable of accommodating 2,500 patients. The 132 mostly male nurses treated both Union casualties and Confederate prisoners. Following the battle at Gettysburg, nearly a thousand wounded men were sent to this hospital for treatment. In 1934, the fort was decommissioned. It is now part of the State University of New York Maritime College, a component of the SUNY system. A section of the building serves as a museum whose displays document the history of the fort.
125. HALL OF FAME FOR GREAT AMERICANS
Bronx Community College, 2183 University Avenue and West 181st Street, The Bronx. Hours: Daily 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. General information: www.bcc.cuny.edu/halloffame or (718) 289-5161.
A forgotten institution of bygone New York still exists at the Bronx Community College, now part ofthe CUNY system. Here you will find the original Hall ofFame for Great Americans, which was established in 1900 as the focal point of the New York University campus then at this location. It is a semicircular colonnade that curves for over 200 yards and was originally meant to encompass the Gould Memorial Library. The memorial was designed by the architectural firm of McKim, Mead and White to house busts of notable Americans who by thought and deed had served mankind. A bronze panel designed by Tiffany Studios is affixed to the base of each bust giving detailed information about the honoree. The 97 figures around the imposing colonnade include such Civil War-era luminaries as Lincoln, Grant, Lee, Farragut, Sherman, Stonewall Jackson, Walt Whitman, William Cullen Bryant, Henry Ward Beecher, Edwin Booth, and Harriet Beecher Stowe. Jefferson Davis was nominated twice but not elected.
126. THE BRONX COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY
3309 Bainbridge Avenue, The Bronx. Hours: T–Th 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. General information: www.bronxhistoricalsociety.org or (718) 881-8900.
The Bronx County Historical Society and Library often display items that relate to the history of this borough. Within their collection are examples of Civil War diaries, a Union cavalry saber with scabbard, Union soldiers’ discharge documents, photographs, and scrapbooks that focus on the role of the Bronx during the war. Near their headquarters is a monument entitled the “Bronx River Soldier.” Sculpted in granite by John Grignola (1861–1912), the piece was intended to adorn a grave in the nearby Woodlawn Cemetery but was never used. Later it was placed on a granite pier in the Bronx River. In 1964, the sculpture fell into the river but was salvaged and installed here.
127. WOODLAWN CEMETERY and VAN CORTLANDT PARK
Webster Avenue and East 233rd Street, The Bronx. Hours: Daily 8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. General information: www.thewoodlawncemetery.org or (718) 920-0500.
Woodlawn is one of largest cemeteries in New York City: it has received more than 300,000 burials. It was opened in 1863, midway through the Civil War, and is the final resting place of many veterans from both North and South. As one of the nation’s most renowned cemeteries, Woodlawn contains the graves of a legion of dignitaries. Admiral David G. Farragut, whose beautiful public memorial is located in Madison Square, was interred in Woodlawn in 1870. His headstone features traditional nautical symbols: a broken mast with rope, belaying pins, a sextant, and hilts of swords. Near Farragut is another U.S. naval officer, Commodore Henry Eagle. It was Eagle who fired the first offensive shot from a vessel during the Civil War at Newell’s Point, Virginia.
General Franz Sigel’s grave.
Admiral David Farragut’s grave.
Among the soldiers buried in Woodlawn are Gen. Franz Sigel, whose equestrian statue on the Upper West Side guards Riverside Drive; Col. Benjamin Bristow, who captured the Confederate raider Gen. John Hunt Morgan; and Gen. Richard Busteed, who served in the Yorktown campaign. The Confederacy is also well represented in the cemetery. Here is found the grave of Gen. Lloyd Tilghman, who fought against Grant on the Tennessee River. Although Tilghman was originally buried in the South following his death in 1863 at the battle of Champion Hill, his family brought his remains north to the family plot in 1901. The Southern Gen. Archibald Gracie III is also buried here, although his headstone is badly weathered and difficult to identify. He was a member of the family that built Gracie Mansion, now the official home of New York’s mayors. Confederate Brig. Gen. Zachariah C. Deas served as aide-de-camp to Gen. Joseph E. Johnston at the first battle of Bull Run, fought bravely for the South at Shiloh and Chickamauga, and was wounded in battle several times. After his death he was buried in Woodlawn.
General Tilghman’s grave.
Civil War noncombatants figure in Woodlawn’s roster, too. Mary “Mamie” Lincoln Isham, the president’s granddaughter, and Cornelius H. Delamater, whose iron works produced the hardware for the USS Monitor, are buried here, as is Frank Leslie, the publisher of Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Weekly. That newspaper’s illustrations from the battlefield helped inform the public about the grim realities of war. Illustrator Thomas Nast, who began his career making political cartoons about the Civil War and Reconstruction, lies nearby. Due to the popularity of his patriotic illustrations, Lincoln called Nast “our best recruiting sergeant,” but today he is remembered mainly for his classic illustrations of Santa Claus that became popular after the war.
Across Jerome Avenue from the cemetery is Van Cortlandt Park, one of the largest parks in The Bronx. In 1902, the National Guard Association of New York State unveiled a statue of Gen. Josiah Porter (1830–1894) sculpted by William Clark Noble. Porter was one of the first Harvard graduates to enlist in the Union army and commanded the 22nd Regiment of the New York National Guard. The statue, which stands near the Van Cortlandt House Museum, represents Porter in full dress uniform with hat in hand.