Cut it out! The big scissors of Paterson

Paterson is known as Silk City for good reason: at one point, two-thirds of the nation's silk output came from the city's 175 silk mills, which employed over 20,000 people.

The giant scissors of Paterson have absolutely nothing to do with that. Well, except that they're now displayed in the Passaic County Museum at Lambert Castle, the former home of silk magnate Catholina Lambert. Ivan and I found them not long after we discovered the world's largest spoon collection.

The story goes like this: like many employees, teachers in Paterson's school system wanted to know when the 'big boss' might come by to check on their work. Given that they were assigned to their particular rooms, it wasn't easy for them to communicate when classes were in session. Children would go unsupervised if one teacher went to tell another that the superintendent of schools was in the building, and that certainly wouldn't reflect well on them if the principal (or, God forbid, the superintendent) happened to notice. Thus, they had to find a way of getting the message around quickly. AND they had to do it in a way that didn't sound like "Act busy... the boss is coming!"

The big scissors!

A brilliant teacher came up with the perfect idea. You probably had a teacher or two who'd always be borrowing things from his or her colleagues, using students as the messengers. I can remember being sent to the next classroom to ask the teacher if he had some extra oaktag because Mrs. So-and-so had come up one sheet short for the class project. It happened often enough (more with some teachers than with others) that seeing a kid go from one classroom to the next was unremarkable and wouldn't be questioned.

Of course, you couldn't send a student to the next classroom to tell the teacher that Superintendent Wilson was in the building, but you also didn't want to send her with a request for something the teacher might have had available. The requested item had to be unusual enough to warrant asking a few teachers, but not so odd that it would raise suspicion.

It's apparently not known who came upon them as the perfect request, but the teachers agreed that if one of them saw the superintendent in the building, she'd send a student to the next room for the big scissors. That next teacher would say she didn't have them and send the child on to another teacher in the 'hopes' he'd have them on hand. In this very innocent way, the whole faculty would be alerted, and the principal and students would be none the wiser.

We also don't know if Superintendent John Wilson ever got word of the big, constantly-missing scissors during his visits, but they made a special appearance at his retirement dinner in 1944. Teachers presented him with a large wooden pair of shears and let him in on the secret. He must have been amused by the gag; he kept the prop and later donated it to the Passaic County Historical Society as an example of life in Paterson's school system.

Mercer: a county, a tree and a kick-butt general

Every once in a while, we run into a place or a story that is so remarkable that we wonder why in heck we'd never heard it. Our visit to the Princeton Battlefield revealed the contributions of a Revolutionary War officer who was so tough that, well, he could teach nails how to be tough. His grit and heroism made such an impression on his contemporaries that a county, a fort and a tree in New Jersey were named in his honor though he never lived here. Add to that the fact that he sired a family that produced, among others, General George Patton, and it's odd to think that more of us don't know his story well.

Hugh Mercer, in a study
by painter John Trumbull

Originally trained as a physician, Hugh Mercer first saw combat in his native Scotland as an assistant surgeon in the army of Bonnie Prince Charles during the battle to regain the Scottish monarchy. Fleeing to America to escape persecution, he settled in Pennsylvania and practiced medicine, but the call of battle came once again, this time the French and Indian War. He joined the British cause in 1755, first as a surgeon and then as a soldier, serving honorably in both roles. It's said that after suffering serious injury and being separated from his troops in a battle against the Delaware and Shawnee tribes, he walked 100 miles back to his fort. His feats earned him the rank of colonel and some influential new friends, most notably George Washington.

Fast forward to the American Revolution. Mercer was first appointed Colonel within the Virginia Line and then Brigadier General of the Armies of the United Colonies. In the latter role, he supervised the construction of Fort Lee on the Palisades, and his brigade was among the troops who retreated in November 1776 following the British attack on the fort. You'll recall that after the Continentals' arrival in Pennsylvania, Washington set into motion the surprise attack that would startle the Hessians at Trenton and turn the tide of the war in the Americans' favor.

The success at Trenton emboldened Washington to attempt to take Princeton on January 3, 1777, with Mercer's brigade at the lead. Hitting the British head on at Thomas Clarke's farm outside of town, Mercer found himself separated from his troops as he had during the French and Indian War. This time, however, the outcome was not to be as favorable for him. Having shot his horse from under him and confused him for Washington, the British surrounded Mercer and demanded that he surrender. Instead, he drew his sword and charged, despite being substantially outnumbered. The Brits set on him with musket butts and bayonets, beating him severely and stabbing him seven times before leaving him for dead. They clearly underestimated the amount of fight left in the man: he endured another nine days before perishing.

The 'new' Mercer Oak,
descendant of the original.

While Mercer himself was unsuccessful in repelling the British, his courage ultimately helped turn the tide in the Americans' favor. Washington rallied Mercer's retreating troops to return to the conflict, resulting in another decisive battle that lifted American morale and forced Cornwallis back to New York. Not long afterward, Fort Mercer, on the Delaware River, was named for him.

So, now we know about the general, but what's this about a tree? Legend holds that the mortally injured Mercer was propped beneath a white oak tree on the Princeton battlefield, and that he refused to leave his troops until they had won the battle. In truth, he was brought to the nearby Clarke House for treatment as soon as he could be retrieved, but you have to admit that the tree story is a lot more compelling. A reminder of the general's heroism, the oak became the symbol of Mercer County and Princeton Township, as well as New Jersey's Green Acres program. (So much for the Salem Oak.) Unfortunately the tree succumbed to old age and collapsed in 2000, but a healthy successor tree, sprouted from an acorn of the original in 1980, now stands next to the stump of the trunk against which Mercer was said to have leaned. Let's hope that this descendant lasts many years, to help tell the story its parent is said to have witnessed.

A classical ruin and the preservation of a battlefield

If you have interest in historic preservation, you're likely familiar with the many protracted fights to keep development from encroaching on some of America's most important battlefields. The past 40 years or so have seen attempts to build a Disney theme park on the Civil War-era Manassas battlefield in Virginia (also known as the "Third Battle of Manassas"), and here in New Jersey, the encroachment of residential sprawl on portions of the historic site of the Battle of Monmouth.

It goes without saying that your Hidden New Jersey explorers are firmly on the side of preserving historic battle sites. Keeping battlefields undeveloped is crucial to helping visitors understand the the challenges our forebears faced in liberating and defending our nation. Somehow, watching a reenactment on a developed battlefield -- as I did for the 225th anniversary of the Battle of Springfield -- loses its impact when you see Hessians marching past a CVS.

Thing is, we've been building on battlefields for as long as there's been a United States. Many of the battles took place on privately owned land, and when the wars were over, the owners were more concerned with making their land profitable than they were in preserving history. You really couldn't blame them, especially farmers who were trying to get as much from their acreage as possible.

I hadn't given too much thought to the old development issues until we stopped by the Princeton Battlefield a few weekends ago. A key location in the ten crucial days that turned the tide of the Revolution in the Americans' favor, the Battlefield State Park includes the site of the recently-deceased Mercer Oak, under which General Hugh Mercer was said to have collapsed after having been bayonetted by Redcoats several times. The Clarke House, which was used as a hospital during and after the battle, is also still on site.

And then there's the Colonnade -- a set of Ionic columns topped by a large lintel and supported by brick walls on the sides. It sits on the northern side of the park, atop a hill far opposite the Clarke House, looking very out of place and incomplete. There's no statue of Mercer or Washington or anyone else beside it to give it context, and the casual passer-by is left to wonder what in heck it is. If it were in Greece or Italy, you'd shrug it off as just another classical ruin, but in Princeton? Ivan and I took a walk up the hill to check it out (and, well, to see if we could find winter finches, but that's another story).

Long story short, the Colonnade is a ruin -- of not one, but two houses. Originally, it served as part of the facade for a Philadelphia mansion designed by U.S. Capitol architect Thomas U. Walter in 1836 for a merchant named Matthew Newkirk. After the Newkirk home was demolished in 1900, the columns were brought to Princeton and recycled for the entrance of Mercer Manor, a grand home built at the edge of the battlefield.

Mercer Manor stood on the site for over 50 years, until it was severely damaged in a fire. Mostly unsalvageable, the mansion was demolished in 1957, except for the Colonnade that stands today. Its then owners, the Institute for Advanced Study, donated the property to the State for inclusion in the Battlefield Park.

A view of the battlefield from behind the Colonnade.

Since then, the four Ionic columns have become the focal point of a memorial to unidentified soldiers killed in the battle -- 21 British and 15 Americans who are buried somewhere behind the site where Mercer Manor once stood. Nearby, there's a plaque on which is printed a memorial poem written in 1916 by visiting Princeton professor and future Poet Laureate of England, Alfred Noyes.

Unintended as it might have been, the Colonnade could be considered a fitting tribute to the brave Americans who fought at Princeton. These patriots were battling for a new republic and victory that until then appeared unlikely. Their humble contributions helped forge a country that has stood strong for well over two centuries.

Good enough for the elite: Chatsworth Lake

Our salute to Carranza completed, we found our way northward to Tabernacle and then eastward toward Chatsworth. The small town center is known to locals and a small group of Jerseyphiles as the capital of the Pinelands, but a hundred years or more ago, it was the preferred home of royalty.

Royalty? In the Pines? Absolutely, and specifically on Chatsworth Lake, near County Route 532.

Burlington County is no stranger to titled residents -- consider exiled Spanish King Joseph Bonaparte, who established his Point Breeze estate in Bordentown. With all due respect, though, the remote Pinelands doesn't seem to be much of a place for a monarch to settle. Why, of all the places in the world, would an aristocrat choose Chatsworth?

As many New Jersey transplants have experienced, family has a lot to do with it. A New York real estate baron named Joseph D. Beers had bought a substantial amount of land in the Pinelands in the early and 19th century, perhaps on speculation, given the success of the region's glass and iron industries. Once those businesses declined, however, Beers' family was left with about 25,000 acres of land in what was then called Shamong.

In the late 1800s, one of Beers' granddaughters, Palma de Tallyrand Perigold, married Italian Prince Mario Ruspoli, who was then serving his country as an attache in Washington, D.C. Palma had inherited 7000 acres of Beers' land, and with her husband built a Queen Anne style home fashioned after the Chatsworth estate in England. Given their stature in New York and Washington society, they entertained widely, attracting a veritable who's who of late 19th century and early 20th century elites.

As the story goes, Ruspoli and a partner developed the Chatsworth Club, a country club for their well-to-do friends and associates. Located on the lake visible from Route 532, the club grew to over 700 members, including Astors, Vanderbilts, Biddles, Drexels and even J.P. Morgan. The Jersey Central Railroad's Blue Comet ran through Chatsworth on the way to Atlantic City, delivering the famed and wealthy to the club in style from New York.

Just by happenstance, I found a trace of the story in Henry Charlton Beck's classic Forgotten Towns of Southern New Jersey. As he tells it, the club was founded by a coterie of New York capitalists including Levi Morton, who was vice president of the United States under Benjamin Harrison. It's supposed that Morton and his fellow power-brokers wanted a place where they could enjoy hunting, fishing and socializing with whomever they chose, without worrying about inquisitive newspaper reporters. Beck also opines that the Ruspoli/Perigold home served as the Chatsworth Club's main building and conveniently burned to the ground as the club itself was failing financially.

Regardless of which is true -- the Chatsworth community's own account or Beck's tale -- the Club is no more. Today, the only vestige of the venture is the 1860's era White Horse Inn, which once served as a stopping point in town for visitors to the club. A local group called the Chatsworth Club II is working to restore the Inn as a museum, using proceeds from the annual Cranberry Festival to fund their work. When Ivan and I stopped in town, the building looked good indeed. It seems they're well on their way.

Meeting the Lindbergh of Mexico... in Tabernacle

Even as we uncover obscure places, people and facts around New Jersey, I keep a short list of more widely-known destinations in the back of my head for further exploration if we happen to be in the area. I've seen a good number of the old reliables that the guidebooks and other media have featured, but there are a few I haven't gotten to for one reason or another.

The Carranza Memorial is one of them. Deep in the Pinelands, it marks the spot where Mexican Air Force Captain Emilio Carranza's plane crashed on July 12, 1928. Dubbed the Charles Lindbergh of Mexico, the aviator was concluding a goodwill tour in the United States with an attempt to fly from Long Island to Mexico City. If successful, he would have achieved the second longest non-stop airplane flight to date, after Lindbergh's own New York to Paris achievement the year before. Unfortunately, it was not to be. The dashing young pioneer ran into a thunderstorm over southern New Jersey, and his plane plummeted to the ground in dense woods outside Tabernacle.

Carranza may have crashed in an obscure area, but he was not to be forgotten. A few years later, the crash location was marked by a monument erected by the Mexican government and funded by contributions from the country's school children. Constructed of brick stones mined from every state in Mexico, the moderately-sized obelisk is marked with an Aztec eagle and an arrow to represent the flight, plus inscriptions in Spanish and English.

Sounds pretty cool, right? And with a bird on the monument, it's right up Ivan's alley, so why the delay for us? Fact is, we hadn't made it to the general Carranza-politan area because the Pinelands is seldom birded. Yeah, it's an enormous, reasonably pristine stretch of forest, punctuated only occasionally by a town or a county road, but the habitat is much less varied than what you find in other wooded parts of the state. Just about everywhere you look, you see sandy soil and slim conifers, maybe with an oak thrown in for good measure. I could go into a dissertation as to why this is, but the short answer has to do with the porousness of the soil and, to some extent, the burn cycles that favor the existing flora. Bottom line, less variety leads to fewer species of birds. And, of course, birders go where they'll find many species or a sought-after specialty.

In any case, it's been on my 'go to' list for years, and I knew it was accessible because Mexican consular officials and the local American Legion hold a ceremony there every year. "How?" was the question. Every time I noticed the memorial on a map, deep within Wharton State Forest, no decent roads seemed to lead to it. Certainly there had to be a path or trail, but I'd seen enough sand roads off thoroughfares in the larger Pinelands to think twice about taking them. Getting stranded miles from help didn't sound like much fun.

Our recent Brig jaunt brought us near the Pinelands, so I suggested we might make a lengthy detour and attempt to find Carranza. After all, we still hadn't seen our desired cone seed-eating crossbills and evening grosbeaks, we'd be surrounded by conifers, and ... eh, who was I kidding? We were going to scour vast acres of pine trees on the futile search for birds? Let's just dive in and go. We plotted a general route on county roads from the refuge and were on our way.

Thing was, we were basically aiming to get to our desired location from Wharton's southern boundary, when the best route was probably from the north. If I was reading Ivan's ancient New Jersey map properly, we were bound to run into some sandy two-track roads once we were in the forest proper, but they appeared to be unmarked and confusing. Maybe it made some sense to stop and grab a map at Batsto Village, on the southern edge of the forest. Finding that was easy, given all of the directional signs on the road.

Now, the historic community of Batsto deserves an entry all to itself, and we'll definitely get there again for a closer look, but it was too late in the day us to do it justice on this trip. The information desk folks were very friendly and advised us to head north on a county road lining the eastern edge of Wharton, then make a left onto Speedwell-Friendship Road, which would bring us to Carranza Road and the memorial, directly across from the Batona camp. The paved road would turn to gravel, but at least we'd avoid the rutted sand/dirt roads.

We zoomed east and then north on the prescribed county roads, past cranberry bogs I recognized from my past visit to Chatsworth (you mean I'd been that close and didn't realize it???). Now fully harvested, the bogs were dry, the plants a dark red color that made them look berry stained. We went on a bit longer until we arrived at our left turn, Speedwell-Friendship Road.

Now we were truly in the Pines. Thin, scraggled trees lined both sides of the road, many so close together it appeared impossible to hike between them. "A deer could never get a rack through there," I observed as Ivan directed the car down the straight road. About three miles in, the road track turned to gravel -- not as secure as macadam but definitely preferable to sand. Overall, the surface quality was decent, with few potholes or other potential perils. Still, I'd avoid driving it at night; the desolation and lack of streetlights would create quite a challenge, particularly for those who fear old JD.

We made the right turn onto Carranza Road, hoping our destination wasn't that much further ahead. Cars and SUVs became visible through the trees on the side of the road, which meant we'd either reached the Batona camp, the memorial was a lot less hidden away than I'd thought, or we'd totally messed up and were headed into a more populated area we hadn't known about. Then....

There it was! Located in a large clearing, the obelisk is bordered by several hardy plants that reminded me somewhat of agave or aloe vera. The park was bigger than I thought it would be; somehow I'd imagined the memorial was just planted among the pines. Visitors can learn Carranza's story from a bilingual wayside marker, and two holes in the ground appear to be there to receive American and Mexican flags for the annual ceremony.

We were starting to lose sunlight, and we wanted to stop in Chatsworth, so we were on our way after paying our respects to Carranza. As luck would have it, the road turned from gravel to macadam maybe a mile or less north of the memorial. Keep it in mind if you want to make a visit there: the trip is quicker and smoother going south from Tabernacle, but if you want more of a Pinelands experience, come in from the south.

As I've been thinking about Carranza, I'm struck by a couple of things related to the popular comparison of him to Lindbergh. It's interesting to think that just a few years after Carranza's plane, reportedly an exact replica of The Spirit of St. Louis, crashed in the wilderness of the Pinelands, Lindbergh moved his family to a remote location in New Jersey's Sourlands, looking for a respite from unrelenting public attention. Lindbergh was forced to leave the country to find peace after the kidnap of his first child. Carranza is a footnote in world aviation history but is remembered by family, country and a small but dedicated group of New Jerseyans who return to his death site every year. Lindbergh's Sourlands estate is maybe a little less remote, but still obscure and hard to find unless you've found a local who can tell you where it is. That's a Hidden New Jersey jaunt for another time.

Back to the Brig: life continues at Forsythe after Sandy

It had been a good long time since Ivan and I had been to Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, a.k.a. Brig. Looking back at my birding notes, our last visit was in August, when we went to see the ever amusing, rare to New Jersey reddish egret. We've had a good year at that location, with plenty of new life birds for me and a reportable sighting of two black-bellied whistling ducks for Ivan. Even without a big-name spotting, a couple of hours at Brig always leaves me with a warm feeling about the future for our regional wildlife. There's definitely a home for threatened and endangered species to nurture and raise their young.

A three month gap between visits doesn't seem like a lot, unless you consider that for a couple of weeks in that time, we couldn't have gone there if we'd wanted to. You see, Hurricane Sandy was as unkind to Brig as it was to most of the other Federal lands in the New Jersey area. Storm surges severely damaged the refuge's Wildlife Drive, pushing salt water to breach berms separating the Atlantic from freshwater pools, and strewing detritus around some of the more ecologically-sensitive areas. We were saddened to hear about the storm's impact on one of our favorite birding spots and hoped the problems could be resolved before the ecosystem suffered any further negative impact. Had the birds been so disturbed, had their habitat been so affected that they'd avoid the place for a while?

It was a question that was answered in less time than we thought. About ten days after the storm, Refuge staff reported on Facebook that the numbers of birds were continuing to increase day by day. Then on November 16, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reopened portions of Brig. The visitor center and walking trails are accessible, and portions of the land-based roadways are open to foot traffic, but the Wildlife Drive through the impoundment pools remains closed until repairs can be completed.

Obviously, we had to check it out. We knew that the inaccessibility of the impoundments meant we'd see fewer water birds close-up, but the Refuge's pines might yield the winter finches that have been eluding us. And yes, we had to see Sandy's impact for ourselves, if possible.

When we got to the parking lot yesterday, we found the place to be unusually quiet for a Sunday morning. Only one other car was in the lot, and since the drives were closed, we knew we had to be just about the only visitors to the property.

Undeterred, we started exploring the wooded areas nearest the lot. A quick check of the kids' area behind the restrooms revealed a wealth of species, including towhee, golden crowned kinglet and Carolina wren as well as your general winter yardbirds like cardinal, Carolina chickadee and white-breasted nuthatch. The pine grove near the administration building didn't yield any crossbills or grosbeaks, but the area looked fine, little changed by the storm.

The visitor center was open by the time we were about to walk past to go to the gull pond, so we stopped in. Staff members there corroborated what I'd been thinking: maybe the relative quiet of a human-light environment would encourage birds to get a bit braver about roaming closer to the public areas. One woman even mentioned she'd seen a larger number of harriers scanning the area than she had in quite a while. It seemed that if we weren't going to be able to see the hundreds of ducks and geese normally on the impoundment pools, we'd still find a good range of late fall and winter species on the property.

The gull pond is usually a reasonably short drive via a hard-packed sand road. Now open only to foot traffic, it offers a good view of a couple of expanses of water that often produce a variety of egrets, ducks, gulls and shorebirds. This time was no exception, including a large group of killdeer whose distinctive vocalizations announced their arrival. True to form, harriers were scanning the marsh grass, and we spied two adult bald eagles in the distance, apparently enjoying a nice flight together.

It was those eagles who gave me a real show later on. As Ivan and I were walking the Leeds trail on the other side of the visitable refuge area, I noticed the two raptors high up in the distance, performing a sky ballet together. They'd fly near each other, briefly part, and then soar almost in synch, one ahead of the other. A few times, one would fly almost upside-down beneath the other in what looked like a show-off stunt. I've seen birds hassle each other, but this was clearly not what these two were doing. Perhaps they were... flirting? Were they a mated pair?

I watched bare-eyed as they danced, enjoying the performance that apparently Ivan and I were the only humans present to see. Then, improbably, I saw one fly upside-down under the other, locking talons to perform the classic eagle maneuver of tumbling together toward the ground below. Was I witnessing a true mating ritual? "Omigod, omigod omigod..." I exclaimed, trying to get Ivan's attention as I brought the binoculars up to my eyes. And then they disengaged after a few tumbles, righted themselves and flew onward, out of view.

That experience brought me farther along the bald eagle circle of life that's been forming for me during visits to Brig. On my initial trip there last year, Ivan pointed out an immature eating its prey on an ice-covered impoundment pool. Since then I've seen enough juveniles and adults to realize that the refuge isn't just a stop-over for bald eagles; it's a place they count on for sustenance. And maybe now my dancing friends are preparing to raise a family there, if they haven't been doing that already.

Maybe there's still a lot of work to be done to bring the refuge back to its pre-storm state, and maybe only part of the property is open for visitation, but there's still a lot of life there, and tons to observe. You should get out there, and let us know what you discover for yourself!

Evergreen Cemetery: a brief visit to honor those who served

We sometimes have to be a bit strategic when we plan a Hidden New Jersey history field trip involving multiple locations. Sites seem to all be staffed for the same limited hours, so we need to determine if an before- or after-hours visit would be just as productive. And, of course, we have to be a bit flexible to account for the serendipitous stop at a must-see we find along the way.

I ran into this challenge a few weeks ago during Union County's Four Centuries weekend, when I had about four hours to make meaningful visits to as many sites as possible. Hillside's Evergreen Cemetery went on the 'later' list, so when I was in the neighborhood the other day, I stopped in to check it out.

Listed on the New Jersey and National Registers of Historic Places, Evergreen opened in 1853 as the state's first non-profit, non-sectarian cemetery. It's become the final resting places for six Members of Congress (and a non-voting delegate from pre-statehood Alaska), famous writers, a substantial Roma (Gypsy) population, and local luminaries including Newark's first black school principal and the first Jewish mayor of Elizabeth. I had some idea there were some must-visits, but I didn't know where they were, or, for that matter, how expansive the cemetery was.

The cemetery's grand gates welcome visitors from the center of a block on North Broad Street, but I snuck in a still-nicely-marked corner entrance. Almost immediately I saw one of the grand contemporary memorials that have made Evergreen a favored stop for current-day graveyard art enthusiasts. Out of place among the older sandstone and gray granite markers, many of them consist of black stone slabs well over five feet tall  joined by a common lintel, and usually engraved in gold lettering. The most interesting thing about them, in my opinion, is that some have been placed in the cemetery's older section, which was designed in the Victorian style: park-like, with graves placed in harmony with the landscape. This motif was common in the mid 1800s, when graveyards were popular places to picnic and enjoy a pleasant Sunday afternoon with friends.  

Unfortunately, Hurricane Sandy made her mark on some of what makes Evergreen such a pastoral spot. It's said that many of the cemetery's trees are over 300 years old, and as I made my way through, I saw that several limbs were down, some trees even toppled, taking with them more than a few monuments. Workers were busily collecting leaves and branches, but three weeks after the storm, they still have a lot of work to do.

Not far into my ramblings, I came to a section with several familiar-looking white grave markers placed in uniform rows. If I had any question on what I'd stumbled onto, it was answered by the pair of 100 pound cannons flanking the plot. I'd found the cemetery's Civil War section, set aside in 1862 for free burials of dozens of casualties and veterans of the War Between the States. Some of the stones were visible and easily read, while others were obscured by fallen tree limbs. A nearby flagpole was bent over a few feet above its base, perhaps by the branch that sat nearby, already sawed into sections to be carted away. I spent a good few minutes resetting many of the American flags that had fallen to the ground after presumably having been placed on the graves for Veterans Day.

Just by chance, I noticed two gravestones marked "US Col. Inf" or "USCI," meaning "United States Colored Infantry," the segregated troops that fought in the Civil War. Had I stumbled upon a large contingent of African American casualties' final resting places? I couldn't really tell -- while many of the markers didn't indicate service in the segregated service, other stones were totally inaccessible.

A little research at home uncovered a possibility. More than 75 black Civil War veterans are buried at Evergreen, some with stones that note their service in the segregated ranks. Some historians believe that others actually served in Union County regiments that had been assumed to be all white. Regardless, those buried here seem to have been honored well, considering the presence of the cannons, which I learned were procured by Elizabeth Mayor Dr. William Mack on Memorial Day, 1900.

Other Civil War veterans are interred at Evergreen within their own family plots or mausoleums, including Brevet Brigadier General James Vote Bomford and Medal of Honor recipient Captain William Brant, Jr. Their graves, however, would have to wait another day for discovery. There's way too much about Evergreen to limit it to a short visit, so I'll be back, next time with Ivan in tow.