Elmer Ellsworth and John Newman

I don't believe Elmer Ellsworth ever met Grant, but he was a friend and political ally of Lincoln. The young colonel's death -- the first Union officer killed in the Civil War -- shocked the country. Ellsworth was from Malta, NY, and the town historian, Paul Perreault, not long ago produced this display board which can be seen in the community center there, near the public library.

Ellsworth is buried in nearby Halfmoon, outside Mechanicville, in Hudson View Cemetery. His grave had grown neglected a decade ago, which I wrote about in the newspaper. That story, along with Bruce Squiers' photo, did prompt the powers that be to clean up the grave site -- but I don't know what it looks like now.

Not far away in the same cemetery is the grave of the Rev. John Newman. A fashionable and successful preacher by 1885, he had done more hazardous civilian duty in Louisiana from 1864 to 1869, ministering to and educating African-Americans during the Civil War and Reconstruction. Newman was a friend of Grant, and especially of Julia, but was no friend of Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain). Like them, he is a character in The Last Circle of Ulysses Grant.