CANTON BATHED IN TEARS.
The funeral train proper, bearing the body of President McKinley,
arrived at 12 o’clock. It was met by Judge Day, at the head of the local
reception committee, while assembled about the station was the entire
militia of the State.
Mrs. McKinley, weeping piteously, was helped from the train by Dr. Rixey
and Abner McKinley and conducted to a carriage.
The body was then lifted from the catafalque car and carried on the
shoulders of the body-bearers through a pathway formed by President
Roosevelt and his cabinet to the waiting hearse. The surrounding
soldiers were at present arms and bugles sounded taps.
The President and cabinet then entered carriages. They were followed by
the guard of honor, headed by Admiral Dewey and General Miles in full
uniform, and the sad procession then moved up Tenth street in the
direction of the courthouse, where the body was to lie in state.
Soldiers at intervals all the way kept back the immense crowds which
thronged the streets. The procession passed all the way beneath big
arches draped with black.
President Roosevelt and the members of the cabinet were the first to
pass by the bier, followed by the highest officers of the army and navy,
Senator Hanna and many others high in public life.
Later the public was admitted to the chamber and thousands viewed the
body. Mrs. McKinley and the relatives did not go to the courthouse. She
stood the trip fairly well, and soon after arriving went to sleep in the
old home.
Mrs. McKinley was almost the first to leave the train. She leaned
heavily on the arm of Abner McKinley and was supported on the other side
by Dr. Rixey. She walked slowly toward the carriage prepared for her and
was taken to the home of which she has been mistress for so many years.
There was not a person of the hundreds who saw her at the depot but who
knew her. Her sweet face was not visible through the heavy black of her
mourning veil, but her frail form and bearing made her instantly
recognized by those assembled.
A sublime hush fell upon all. There were scores of women present and all
were in tears. It was a great, silent outpouring of deep sympathy for
the crushed soul of their beloved neighbor.
President Roosevelt and the cabinet left their car in the opposite
direction and took their places in the closed carriages for the funeral
procession. The great throng regarded them respectfully. For five years
those gathered here had annually received as President of the United
States their fellow townsman. The sorrow of the citizens of Canton was
yet too poignant to permit of the expression of any other emotion than
grief. Eight artillerymen and eight soldiers slowly trod down the steps
of the Pacific, the car in which the President’s body rested. A passing
cloud which had cast its kindly shade upon the dolorous form of the
President’s widow now withdrew from the face of the sun so as to permit
the warming rays to rest upon the casket of the dead President.
A window was raised toward the rear of the car, the same window through
which the body had been passed thrice before. The opening looked very
small. Eight of the guards, four bluejackets and four red-striped
sergeants of artillery, stood below to receive the heavy burden. A
moment later the end of the coffin, draped with the red, white and blue
of its silken covering, protruded. A few of the onlookers had not
thought it necessary to remove their hats, they had been so absorbed in
the incoming of the train. Their heads were bared instantly. The eight
soldiers and sailors received the great weight on their shoulders. They
were sturdy men, but their limbs trembled under the strain.
Preceded by Judge Day and other members of the reception committee, the
coffin was borne the whole length of the station platform, several
hundred feet. The militia surrounding the station stood at present arms.
At the end of the platform was the hearse chosen to carry the corpse in
the procession to the courthouse.
“Present arms!” came the command from the sergeant of hussars opposite
the hearse. Magnificently caparisoned in all the trappings of their full
dress, Troop A of the Cleveland Hussars had been chosen to precede the
hearse in the procession.
At the call one hundred swords were unsheathed and held pointing upward
from the broad bosoms of the cavalrymen. The bright blades, freshly
burnished for the occasion, flashed the sunlight like white fire. The
gold lace shone, and the bearskin caps, towering above the erect heads
of the hussars, added to the martial effect.
In the attitude of present, like a hundred equestrian statues, the
hussars remained motionless until the casket had been placed within the
hearse. If a horse moved its foot or whisked a fly from its sides the
motion was not apparent. The air was still, the crowd was still, the
engine at the head of the train was still, and the intense silence
pervaded the entire surroundings.
Heartrending beyond the power of pen to describe were the scenes at the
side of the bier while the simple folk of Canton walked slowly by in two
single files. The sorrow of those who knew the President was too intense
for utterance, but was so full it burst the bounds of control over the
emotions. Rough workingmen trembled from head to foot and their chests
heaved with emotion, as great tears rolled down their faces. The ghastly
appearance of President McKinley’s face, which was blue and thin, far
more discolored than it was when the body lay in state in Buffalo, made
the grief more poignant.
It seemed as though none who had known him in his genial vigor as their
fellow townsman and neighbor could see that discolored face, the result
of the assassin’s deadly work, without bursting into tears.
A farmer of 80, old, bent and weather-beaten, tottered in the line as he
wound his decrepit way through the black corridor to the bier. When he
saw the pinched, drawn face he placed his great gnarled hands to his
face and wept as no heart-broken child could weep. He was bowed and
broken when he entered the darkened hall and his step was shaky. When he
left his shaggy white head was bowed lower, his spirit seemed broken
almost to the point of leaving his aged frame and his step was a
staggering shuffle. He was the impersonation of abject, venerable grief.
The sight had been throughout profoundly impressive.
Up the street soldiers at intervals of ten feet with difficulty
restrained the solid wall of people. Canton had suddenly become a city
of 100,000, and the entire population was in the streets. The station
itself was cleared, a company of soldiers of the Eighth Ohio from
Worcester keeping the platform clear. Opposite, over the heads of acres
of people, on the wall of a big manufacturing establishment, was an
enormous shield thirty feet high, with McKinley’s black-bordered picture
in the center. The local committee, headed by ex-Secretary of State
William R. Day and Judge Grant, was on the platform.
All about were the black symbols of mourning. The approach of the train
was unheralded. No whistle was blown, no bell was rung. In absolute
silence it rolled into the station. Even the black-hooded locomotive
gave no sound. There was no panting of exhaust pipes. The energy that
brought it seemed to have been absolutely expended. At the mere sight of
the train the people who had been waiting there for hours were greatly
affected. Women sobbed and men wept.
For a full minute after it had stopped no one appeared. Judge Day and
his committee moved slowly down the platform in front of the line of
soldiers to the catafalque car and waited. Colonel Bingham, the
President’s aid, then gave directions for the removal of the casket from
the car. The coffin was too large to be taken through the door and a
broad window at the side was unscrewed and removed.
While this was going on the floral pieces inside were carefully lifted
out and placed upon the ground at the side of the track. When all was
ready the soldiers and sailors who had accompanied the body all the way
from Buffalo emerged from the car and took up their places. The soldiers
trailed their arms and the sailors held their drawn cutlasses at their
sides. Only the body-bearers were bareheaded and unarmed.
Meantime President Roosevelt, with his brother-in-law, Captain Cowles of
the navy, in full uniform, at his side, had descended from the car ahead
of that occupied by Mrs. McKinley. The members of the Cabinet, excepting
Secretary of State Hay and Secretary of the Navy Long, were present.
Secretary Cortelyou, Governor Nash, Lieutenant-Governor Caldwell and
Judge Marshall J. Williams of the Supreme Court, representing the three
branches of the State government of Ohio, followed President Roosevelt
from the train.
The President was met by Judge Grant of the Reception Committee, and the
official party then moved to the west of the station, where they formed
in line, with the President at the head. All were uncovered.
With the body placed in the hearse, the bugle note sounded again and the
hundred swords were sheathed. The hundred bright steels faced to the
right, and with slow step the men advanced to take the position of honor
before the hearse. At the given signal the soft notes of “Nearer, My
God, To Thee,” swelled up from the military band. The horses kept the
slow step perfectly. The two drivers of the hearse, who had kept their
heads bared reverently, replaced their hats and gave the sign to the
black horses which were to draw the catafalque.
The two steeds stepped forward and the funeral procession was in motion.
At that moment the power plant of the Canton Electric Light Company was
started. A mournful whir broke upon every ear. It was like the dirge
note of a Scotch bag-pipe. It fitted in with the notes of the
President’s hymn perfectly, as if the ancient pipers of the clan of the
McKinleys were sounding the dirge for their chieftain.
[Illustration:
DISPLAY OF FLOWERS IN FRONT OF RECEIVING VAULT, WESTLAWN CEMETERY,
CANTON, OHIO.]
[Illustration:
U. S. SENATE PASSING THE SPANISH WAR APPROPRIATION OF $50,000,000.]
Save the plaintive whir of the electric motor, the gentle notes of the
hymn and the slow and mournful click of the horses’ hoofs upon the brick
pavement all was silence. For the first time in over thirty years
William McKinley passed through the familiar streets of Canton and there
was silence.
With bared heads and tearful eyes the dense throngs that lined Cherry,
Tuscarawas and Market streets observed with restless eagerness the
progress of the funeral procession to the courthouse. It was
three-quarters of an hour after the column moved that the casket was
carried into the somber rotunda of the big public building, and in that
time thousands of women sobbed and men wept.
Following the President’s carriage were carriages containing members of
the Cabinet, after whom came the diplomats and citizens. It was nearly 1
o’clock when the President reached the courthouse. He waited until the
casket had been borne inside and placed on the catafalque. Then,
attended by Commander Cowles and the members of the Cabinet, the
Executive entered the rotunda, passed by the body of the illustrious
dead, bowed low a moment over the face of his predecessor and left the
building.
With the Commodore he went direct to the residence of Mrs. George H.
Harter, 933 North Market street, where he took luncheon. After the
President came the Cabinet members, Secretary Root leading, and then the
military guard of honor and the diplomatic corps in turn. Ten minutes
later the public was admitted in two columns, one passing on each side
of the casket.
The decorations of the rotunda were exceedingly impressive. A striking
conceit of the artist consisted of three chairs, all covered with crape.
They represent the chairs of state left vacant by the tragic deaths of
Lincoln, Garfield and the statesman mourned to-day. At the head of the
casket stands a Knight Templar, at the foot a member of the Ohio
militia, while the sides are guarded respectively by a regular army
soldier and a marine.
Meantime Admiral Dewey, General Miles and the other high officers of the
army and navy, who composed the guard of honor, had moved around the
east side of the station. They also entered carriages and took their
place in the larger procession that was now forming. All were attired in
the full uniform of their ranks. They were fairly ablaze with gold lace.
The shrill notes of the bugle had given the first sign to the waiting
multitude outside the station that the casket was approaching. Instantly
the long lines of soldiers became rigid, standing at present arms. The
black horses of the Cleveland Troop, immediately facing the station,
stood motionless, their riders with sabers lowered. Slowly through the
entrance came the stalwart soldiers and sailors, with solemn tread,
bearing aloft the flag-covered coffin of the man this city loved so
well. As it came into view a great sigh went up from the dense throng.
Immediately following the mounted troops came the hearse bearing its
flag-covered burden. This was the sight that sent a hush along the
dense, long lines of humanity stretching for a mile away to the
courthouse. As the casket passed every head was bowed and every face
evidenced the great personal grief which had come upon the community.