George Washington will haunt your dreams

Washington Square was called Southeast Square in William Penn’s original plan for the City of Philadelphia, but for the first 90 years of it’s existence the Square was better known as “that place we toss dead people no one cares very much about.”  Prior to the Revolution, it was the final resting place of the poor and the anonymous.  During the War, soldiers who died in Philadelphia (generally of disease) were thrown into mass graves here.  When the British occupied Philadelphia, the old Walnut Street Prison (which overlooks the park) became a “Dantesque vision of hell” and those who died at the prison were tossed in the park.  When the Americans retook the city, dead British soldiers were added to the pile.  In short, Washington Square Park is made of dead people.

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was commissioned in 1954 and completed in 1957.  The “unknown soldier” was exhumed from the mass graves beneath the park by an archaological team, who determined that he was approximately twenty years old when he was killed by a musket shot to the head.  Due to the sordid history of the park, there is no way to be certain that the soldier was fighting for the Americans or the Brits.

The bronze statue of Washington is not an original, but a replica of Jean-Antoine Houdon’s marble statue of Washington at the Virginia State Capitol, commissioned by Thomas Jefferson and dedicated in 1788.  He stands above a stone sarcophagus that holds the remains of the Unknown Soldier, looking toward Independence Hall.  The Traditional Fine Arts Organization describes Houdon’s statue thusly:

“The statue presents Washington erect, head uncovered, sword on the left, cane in the right hand — representing in device what Washington had so forcibly expressed in his reply to the address of the General Assembly of Virginia: the subordination of the military to the civil power. The fasces and ploughshare are by his side; the one representing authority, power and honor and the other, the peaceful arts most congenial to his taste and feelings. Houdon’s monument to America’s foremost Revolutionary War hero recalls his life as a soldier, statesman, and lover of the peaceful arts.”

Behind Washington is a wall bearing three inscriptions.  Above his head a large inscription reads “FREEDOM IS A LIGHT FOR WHICH MANY MEN HAVE DIED IN DARKNESS.”  To his right, a smaller inscription reads “IN UNMARKED GRAVES WITHIN THIS SQUARE LIE THOUSANDS OF UNKNOWN SOLDIERS OF WASHINGTON’S ARMY WHO DIED OF WOUNDS AND SICKNESS DURING THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.”  To his left is inscribed a portion of his 1794 farewell address:  “THE INDEPENDENCE AND LIBERTY YOU POSSESS ARE THE WORK OF JOINT COUNCILS AND JOINT EFFORTS OF COMMON DANGERS, SUFFERINGS AND SUCCESS.”

As a grammar maven, I can’t help noting the lack of a serial (or “Oxford”) comma on that last inscription, rendering it more in-line with British grammar than American.

The monument has been added to several times.  In 1976, for the United States Bicentennial, an eternal flame was added in front of the sarcophagus.  In front of the eternal flame is a small sign that is my favorite in all of Philadelphia.  It reads “Caution – Open Flame – Do Not Touch; Touching Flame or Metal Guard Will Cause Injury.”  Indeed.

On the ground near the monument is a plaque, original to the monument’s construction, that reads “THIS MONUMENT together with its COURT OF FLAGS, the FOUNTAIN and the COLONIAL WALL surrounding the SQUARE were made possible by the generosity of many interested business firms and individual friends of WASHINGTON SQUARE.  Dedicated June 28, 1957.”

Nearby that plaque is inset a brick, apparently installed in 1987 to commemorate 200 years of the Constitution, inscribed: “Through Your Sacrifice The CONSTITUTION Lives.  We The People 1787-1987″

Architect: G. Edwin Brumbaugh
Dedicated: 1957
Location: Washington Square, central