Who is buried in General Grant’s Tomb?

The question is a good little quiz question and let’s see if you can give the correct answer to the question – the answer will come at later in this entry so you can check it later.

 

Grant’s tomb – officially known as the General Grant National Memorial is the final resting place of the late General Ulysses Grant and his wife Julia. Grant had gone up through the ranks of the US army and during the civil war he became the top General of the Army. His success as a commander in the war made him very popular at least in the northern states and he became a president of the USA a few years after the end of the civil war. His popularity meant there was a demand for him to have a significant final resting place.

 

Grant had made the request to have his wife laid next to him at his final resting place. This reduced the number of places his final resting place could be since military cemeteries at the time wouldn’t allow women to be buried there. Hence it was necessary to find a different location.

 

A private effort based in New York started raising money for a final resting place for General Grant – they had the first mover advantage and were partially the reason New York was chosen as the place where Grant would get his tomb instead of Washington or his home state of Ohio.

 

The target of the fundraising committee was to raise a million dollars which was a huge amount back in 1885 when Grant died. It took a long time to raise the money but finally they manage to get enough funds – they missed the million dollar target but still got an impressive 600,000. The money was enough to make the massive monument down at a park on the western side of Manhattan. It is actually the biggest mausoleum in the USA.

Grant memorial has become a part of the national park service of the USA and is dedicated a national monument. I guess it is appropriate Grant’s Tomb is a part of the national park system considering he was president in 1872 when Yellowstone was designated as the first national park of USA and the world. Back in the early part of the twentieth century Grants Memorial was one of the most visited sights in the USA since the president was held in high esteem by the veterans of the civil war. No less than a million people attended the parade dedicating the tomb in 1897. Later the number of visitors has dropped significantly – it started after the First World War as the survivors of the civil war had died off and there was another war to remember. So if you go and visit the place you will find it fairly quite compared to other sights of New York.

 

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Grant is placed in a sarcophagus in the basement of the tomb next to his wife. Around them in a big room are statues of his main generals of the civil war.

So now back to the question – who is buried in Grants Tomb? Grant and his wife Julia? No. Grant and Julia is placed in sarcophagi’s in the tomb above the ground. Hence they are not buried in the ground. So the answer to the question is nobody is buried in Grants tomb.