At Abraham Lincoln’s death, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton declared, “Now he belongs to the ages,” but the meticulous, 150th anniversary funeral procession his hometown presented has proved how profoundly the prairie city still considers the slain president its own.
Thousands of people, including many in period costume, yesterday gathered at the Old State Capitol, where the 16th president lay in state, to pay tribute to the simple, country lawyer who saved the Union and thrust the nation toward abolishing slavery.
Lincoln was assassinated just after the American Civil War ended. He is widely considered America’s greatest president by historians for preserving a unified US and declaring that black slaves in southern states would be freed.
Ranks of soldiers in Union blues and pallbearers, including several direct descendants of those who accompanied Lincoln’s casket in 1865, retraced the route from a downtown train station to the old capitol square, where the coffin was taken from a replica hearse and placed on a catafalque during opening ceremonies.