The New York Times, October 15, 1905. PAGE NUMBER 10
Accepted by New Rochelle with a Preacher’s Benediction.
TOWN REFUSES TO DECORATE
But Turns Out for the Exercises — Part of the Patriot’s Brain to Rest Under the Shaft.
Special to The New York Times.
NEW ROCHELLE, N. Y., Oct. 14. — The monument to Thomas Paine, which has been so long without a home, was formally installed in North Street to-day and the City of New Rochelle took it into its keeping.
It was a great occasion here. There was a parade, including two companies of the Twenty-third United States Infantry, representatives of the First Battalion Connecticut National Guard, Continental Guards, and Grand Army posts and 500 school children. There was a salute of thirteen guns — one for every one of the original colonies — by the First Battery, N. G. N. Y., in Paine’s memory. And finally, at this Tom Paine memorial gathering, a minister pronounced the benediction.
The benediction was pronounced by the Rev. De Witt L. Pulton, rector of St. James’s Protestant Episcopal Church, New York, who is Chaplain of the General Missionary Society of the Salvation Army. He made no direct reference to Paine, but thanked God for peaceful conditions and God’s grace on the assembled company.
Dr. B. B. Foote, Jr., who was Chairman of the ceremony, held in his hand a little green box, which is to be buried under the monument. In it there was a piece of gray material, resembling putty. According to the Chairman, it is all that remains of Thomas Paine — an authentic part of his brain. The body was originally buried about twenty yards south of where the monument stands today, and was removed to England by Cobbett in 1819 in the belief that it might be the means of stirring up a revolution in England that did not materialize. The bit of the patriot’s brain was purchased in London a few years ago by Moncure D. Conway.
Dr. Conway kept the fragment secret until he learned of the action of New Rochelle in appropriating the money to restore and move the cottage in Grove Street, where Paine’s body was buried and where he spent his last years. He then wrote to the committee in charge of the celebration here. It had been decided that as soon as the remains of the man who gave the world the “Age of Reason” and plead with the Paris Commune to kill monarchy, but spare the King, can be placed in a casket, the relic will be buried under the monument.
In the lower right hand corner of the printed statement that the brain was obtained by B. Tilly, who was secretary to Paine, on Tuesday, Jan. 7, 1833, when he visited Cobbett’s home in Bull Court, Fleet Street, London. At the same time Tilly took one of Paine’s locks, which has not been accounted for.
The Mayor told the pupils Mayor and Aldermen of New Rochelle that the citizens’ decision last January to postpone the rededication of the monument to the city library did not deter Mayor Mabie. “The occasion was too many, for New Rochelle is a city of churches and Sunday Schools, and parents took children half a day from school to attend the ceremony. The attendance and size of the exercises saw to it that there were three times as many present as there had been on the Fourth of July, when the city polling was covered with red, white, and blue bunting.”
After the procession, including the two companies of United States Infantry and National Guard artillery of two pieces, members of the Grand Army of the Republic, patriotic organizations, Sons of Continental uniforms, reached the municipality at the end of North Street, it was placed there by Mrs. Adeline Le Port of New York, in a ceremony attended with cheers from the assembled 1,500 or 1,600 children. The accompaniment was played by the Fort Slocum Band. Dr. B. B. Foote, Jr., told the history of the monument.
The remains of Paul Jones have been brought home and placed in a tomb at Annapolis; it is now fitting that the Mayor of New Rochelle that such as can be gathered of those of Thomas Paine be enshrined at this spot on a grant of land given by the State in recognition of his services to the nation.
Theodore Schroder of the Brooklyn Unionist Club, was next called, and made an address on “Paine, the Author Hero of the American Revolution.”
“We are honored in that we can understand and appreciate the real value of a great man while he is in his grave,” he said. “His mind was not dulled by a college education. He was not misled by being helped in doing things and not because he had any hope of being honored for doing things. He had the good fortune to find the occasion and the ability to meet it. He had no idea of going to war or nation as the means of avoiding war.”
“When the morale of the Continental Army was on the point of collapse he published ‘Crisis,’ writing by the light of a camp fire in 1776, which cheered the troops and made victory possible. The sword of Washington — the Continental Army was as much due to his pen as to the Generalship of Washington. He had the idea that the world was his country, and after the Revolution went back to Europe to promote liberty there.
“His greatest act was when a member of the French Convention, and escaping the hands of the mob, he voted against killing the king and for keeping him in banishment. He knew what peril he was running in doing so at that time.” he said.
Edward Hagaman Hall, Vice President of the American Scenic and Historic Society, who appeared with others in Continental uniform, paid this tribute to the soldiers who were present: “The contrast was striking with the appearance of those who wore the blue uniforms. I acknowledged that their uniforms could not have done as good service as the Continental uniforms.”
The children and the Fort Slocum band were both very impressive. The little ones seemed frightened, and a member of the Grand Army commented by saying somebody must have been telling them something about Thomas Paine. He had heard the tales told about Paine were not in keeping with true with the children.
C. S. Darrow of Chicago, whose chairman’s address was “Why Patriots Honor Paine.” He then delivered some brief remarks to the children and to those present. The children said to be repeated that Mr. Darrow gave five items to them to remember:
First — Thomas Paine suggested and mostly achieved American Independence.
Second — In France he did more than any one person to establish the first Democratic Republic.
Third — The Federal Union of States in his accomplishment.
Fourth — He was the first to point to the emancipation of the slaves and the religion of humanity. That is being recognized to-day by the foremost thinkers, by the greatest statesmen in the world, and by the present Republican Vice President.
Fifth — Still to be accomplished is the principle of nations trading with each other and not fighting one another.
Mayor Mabie formally accepted the monument on behalf of the city from the Paine Monument Committee, Dr. Foote, President, and the Thomas Paine Historical Committee, represented by Dr. Foote. The “thirteen guns sounded in the dear mingled klaxner” when the guns in the clearing were thought to honor the assembled. A veteran of the Grand Army was present who knew well how to play the Thomas Paine “salutation” and the clarion sounded when the last gun of the salute to the “thirteen” was heard across the hills.
Advertising Men to Meet.
The International Advertising Association of America will hold its fall reception at the Waldorf-Astoria on Oct. 17, at 8 o’clock, after which an informal banquet will be held. “Advertising, the soul of business” is the subject. By Charles Emory Smith, J. Hamilton Lewis, James A. Storrow and others.