The Funeral of Major General Grenville M Dodge

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Courtesy Historic Dodge Mansion

Major General Grenville Dodge had a problem when he served during the War. He couldn’t seem to stay out of the way of bullets, starting with an accident in 1861, when he shot himself. But he proved a capable leader, and an excellent engineer, and a formed friendship with General's Grant and Sherman, one that would last the remainder of their lives, helped him advance in rank rapidly, commanding a corps under Sherman at Atlanta - until another bullet found him.

Grenville Mellen Dodge died January 3, 1916, from cancer, at the age of 84, in Council Bluffs, Iowa. His mansion, shown in the above photo, still stands and is a museum today. While reported to be the last Civil War corps commander to die, former cavalry corps commander James H Wilson would survive him by nine years.

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Article on Funeral

The latter two photo's (and next) are courtesy the Council Bluffs Iowa Library
The next photo is a personal favorite and if you download this photo and zoom in with your photo viewer (I use the free Infranview if you don't have one) , you might recognize some of the Civil War photo's on his wall, and others that you may not be familiar with

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Pet lovers share a passion with this general
Prior to the war, Dodge was a railroad man, and returned to this profession afterwards. His biggest moment in US history, came at the completion of the Trans-Continental Railroad. Dodge is the man shaking hands on the right in this historic photo.

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According to the Encyclopedia of the Great Plains, General Dodge also founded the city of Cheyenne, Wyoming, selecting the site as a supply depot and naming it after the Cheyenne Indians.

 
What an incredible man! The juxtaposition of horses and cars in the photo above aptly describe this man's life. He was an civil engineer, combat soldier, railroad visionary, spy master and politician. Truly a Renaissance Man.
Regards
David
 
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I remember reading about his funeral in Maury Klein's book on the Union Pacific Railroad. There's something undoubtedly sad about Dodge and the other generals who lived as long as he did. They were men from another time, almost another country. They were walking museum exhibits, examplars of a world younger men could only hear of from their cloudy reminiscences (it was joked in Dodge's last years that the Council Bluffs children thought he fought in the Revolution). I was touched, reading of his mourners braving temperatures in the single digits to follow him on his last ride.

I'm somewhat reminded of my great-great-great grandfather - he survived a shoulder wound in 1863, and lived to be 84. When he died in 1919, he had outlived his eldest son, and had lived to see the birth of his great-grandson (my grandfather).
 
Why sad? I'm not being argumentative or critical, they seem like splendid examples of what is possible in life- some seem to have been able to channel a kind of kinetic energy, positively. Just had a member post of a grgrgrandfather who survived the war, capture, prison, the Sultana then built a farm and had ( I think ) 11 kids. That. I realize the war sure broke many. Some seem to have been able to go this route, who knows why.
 
General Dodge was commander of the District of Corinth for nearly a year in 62-63. He installed his wife, sister and daughter in a home on Fillmore Street while he used William Simonton's "Verandah House" a block away on Jackson Street, as his headquarters. One spring day in 1863 he and his staff posed for a group photo in the yard of his headquarters. In fact it was a "photo shoot" and at least six different images were taken. In some cases the differences are subtle while in others the staff members exchange places or disappear altogether. On the table is a detailed map of the Corinth fortifications and on top of the map is a scale model of those same earthworks.

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