John B. Murray (August 13, 1822 – October 8, 1884) was an attorney and

United States Volunteers United States Volunteers also known as U.S. Volunteers, U.S. Volunteer Army, or other variations of these, were military volunteers called upon during wartime to assist the United States Army but who were separate from both the Regular Army and the ...

brevet

brigadier general Brigadier general or Brigade general is a military rank used in many countries. It is the lowest ranking general officer in some countries. The rank is usually above a colonel, and below a major general or divisional general. When appointed ...

of the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...

. John Boyce Murray is known as one of the founders of

Memorial Day Memorial Day (originally known as Decoration Day) is a federal holiday in the United States for mourning the U.S. military personnel who have fought and died while serving in the United States armed forces. It is observed on the last Monda ...

, along with druggist Henry C. Welles.

Biography

Murray was born in

Arlington, Vermont Arlington is a town in Bennington County, Vermont, United States. The population was 2,457 at the 2020 census. History The town of Arlington was chartered July 28, 1761, by New Hampshire Governor Benning Wentworth, as part of the New Hampshire ...

to Edward and Phoebe Manchester Murray. He married Angelina Savage in 1848 and they had two children, William and Maud while living in Bearytown (now Fayette), New York. He moved to Seneca Falls, NY in 1853 where he joined the state militia and began practicing law. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he was commissioned a Captain of the 50th New York State Engineers. He resigned his commission in the summer of 1862 but rejoined the 148th Regiment, New York Volunteers as a Major that fall. He was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in 1863 and to Colonel in 1864. He was brevetted to the rank of Brigadier General for meritorious service in 1865. He moved to

Waterloo, New York Waterloo is a town in Seneca County, New York, United States. The population was 7,338 at the 2020 census. The town and its major community are named after Waterloo, Belgium, where Napoleon was defeated. There is also a village called Waterl ...

after being elected Seneca County Clerk in the fall of 1865. It was here that he met Welles. Murray became active in the Grand Army of the Republic and was appointed postmaster. He resumed his law practice in 1880 and spoke at political rallies and Memorial Day services. It was following one of his speeches on October 7, 1884 that he became ill and succumbed the next day.

Presidential Proclamation

President Lyndon Johnson proclaimed Waterloo the birthplace of the holiday following the passage of House Concurrent Resolution (HCR) 587 in 1966. The resolution and proclamation were based on research done by eight members of the community who comprised the Research Committee of the Waterloo Memorial Day Centennial Committee. Their purpose was to promote the centennial of the founding of Memorial Day on May 5, 1866. The holiday was supposedly conceived by Welles who communicated the idea to Murray, the county clerk who helped carry it out.

Myth Exposed

In 2014, almost fifty years after the proclamation, Bellware and Gardiner published ''The Genesis of the Memorial Day Holiday in America'' and call into question the veracity of that claim. According to the research committee, there are no contemporaneous reports of this celebration. Their earliest sources date from 1882, sixteen years after the event. Bellware and Gardiner, however, uncovered evidence that this story was a myth. This evidence includes an earlier report from 1875 in a New York newspaper that describes, in detail, Waterloo’s first Memorial Day and places it in 1868 as well as other inconsistencies between the historical record and the story compiled by the Centennial Committee. They also note a complete lack of discussion or debate by the congressional committee behind HCR 587. Unlike Welles, Murray seems complicit in the hoax. He was called the founder of Memorial Day during his lifetime and was in demand as a Memorial Day orator. Bellware and Gardiner credit

Mary Ann Williams Mary Ann Williams (also known as Mrs. Charles J. Williams) (10 August 1821 – 15 April 1874) was an American woman who was the first proponent for Memorial Day, an annual holiday to decorate soldiers’ graves. Antebellum years Mary Ann Howar ...

and the Ladies Memorial Association of Columbus, Georgia as the true originators of the holiday as abundant contemporaneous evidence from across the nation exists to substantiate the claim. In 2016, ''VFW Magazine'' featured an article by Doris Wolf in recognition of the 150th anniversary of Waterloo's Memorial Day observance. The editors added a note at the beginning of the article advising the readers of the existence of Bellware and Gardiner's book, that the Columbus, Georgia event of April 26, 1866 predated the Waterloo event by nine days and that the article on Waterloo was being presented to provoke historical inquiry. In 2019, the hoax was further explored (and exposed) by author Marshall S. Berdan in Welles’ hometown of Glastonbury, CT. His article in ''The'' ''Glastonbury Citizen'' recounts Berdan’s disenchantment with the story after the staff of Waterloo’s National Memorial Day Museum was unable to provide the definitive evidence he sought prior to the placement of a plaque honoring Welles in Glastonbury. It also mentions some of Berdan's own research used to debunk the myth.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Murray, John B. 1822 births People from Arlington, Vermont 1884 deaths Union Army generals