Celebrated author and historian Nick DiBrino poses in front of the memorial
to Confederate General Lloyd Tilghman in the Observatory Plot at
Woodlawn Cemetery here in the Bronx on April 13, 2010.
Photo by Bill Twomey
BRONX TIMES REPORTER, FEBRUARY 2 BTR 2-28, 2019 53
BRONX SCENE
Confederate interred in Woodlawn Cemetery
Nick DiBrino was walking
through Woodlawn Cemetery
one day when he chanced
upon the grave of General
Lloyd Tilghman in the eastern
area of the Observatory
Plot. What I found most interesting
about his burial
there is that he was a Confederate
General killed in action
at the Battle of Champion’s
Hill in Mississippi during the
Vicksburg Campaign of 1863.
He was hit by a cannonball
on May 16th of that year and
died within hours. I was curious
as to the circumstances
that led to his being interred
in the Bronx.
Tilghman was born into
a military family near Claiborne,
Maryland on January
26, 1816. It was a family
with a proud heritage as his
grandfather served as a senator
in the Continental Congress
and also served as a
lieutenant colonel in the Continental
Army where among
other duties he served as
an aide-de-camp to General
George Washington. It was
no surprise, therefore, when
Lloyd was admitted to West
Point from which he graduated
on October 1, 1836 with a
commission as a second lieutenant
and an engineering
degree.
He found work as a construction
engineer on the
railroads before enlisting in
the volunteer artillery as a
captain in his home state of
Maryland. Later he would
settle down in Paducah, Kentucky
with his wife, Augusta,
and his children, where he
worked as an engineer for the
Mobile and Ohio Railroad.
While there he joined the 3rd
Kentucky Infantry with the
rank of major and was soon
promoted to colonel. When
the Civil War erupted in 1861,
his Kentucky State Guard
unit joined the Confederate
cause even though the
state maintained neutrality.
Tilghman was promoted to
brigadier general in the Confederate
Army the following
October.
When the war was over,
the general’s wife, Augusta,
moved to Tennessee for a
while before returning home
to New York.
Therein was found the answer
to the mystery of why
a Confederate general managed
to be buried in a Bronx
graveyard. His wife was
originally from New York
and simply had his body exhumed
from his Mississippi
grave and transported closer
to her home. There is, however,
a monument to him in
Vicksburg as well as one in
Paducah, Kentucky. Augusta
Murray Tilghman passed
away at the age of 79 and
joined her husband beneath
the sod of Woodlawn Cemetery
on February 1, 1898 here
in the dear and glorious borough
of the Bronx.
As a postscript, some
may fi nd it interesting that
a grand-nephew, Lloyd W.
Tilghman, later settled
nearby in Marble Hill at 130
West 228th Street. He was
an organizer for the Catholic
Extension Society.
REPRINTED FROM 4-22-2010