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“Apotheosis”
1883 (to 1783). "A hundred years--Rest!!--Ta, ta."
Evacuation
Day on November 25 was a holiday celebrated in New York City from the
late-eighteenth century into the early decades of the twentieth century.
It marked the departure of British troops from the city following
the end of the American War for Independence.
After the Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, the
British commander in New York City, General Guy Carleton, made sure that
British loyalists had safely left the city before removing his troops,
making them the last to surrender their post in the newly recognized
United States. As the 7500
British servicemen boarded ships on November 25, General George
Washington and Governor George Clinton of New York led 800 Continental
Army soldiers in a triumphant parade from the Bowery to Pearl Street to
Wall Street to Broadway. At
1 p.m., the British Union Jack was lowered and the American Stars and
Stripes raised at the Battery’s Fort George, as thousands of New
Yorkers cheered.
In the featured cartoon marking
the hundredth anniversary of Evacuation Day, an American man from 1883
orders the saluting American Revolutionary soldier from 1783 to
“rest” (i.e., to be “at ease”).
The cartoon’s title—“Apotheosis” (the process whereby a
human becomes divine, or an ideal example)—is meant sarcastically, and
implicates a decline in the character of American men over the century. The image contrasts the dutiful vigilance of the elderly
soldier with the attire and affectations of his modern counterpart, who
mimics the British upper class with his monocle, boutonniere, bowler
hat, pointed shoes, walking stick, and genteel good-bye (“ta, ta”). To the cartoonist, the American War for Independence was
fought for manly republican virtue, not so that later American men could
imitate the effete heirs of the British aristocracy whom their ancestors
had defeated.
The annual observance of
Evacuation Day seems to have begun in the mid-1790s, and was marked by
parades, fireworks, and patriotic speeches.
Over the ensuing decades, it was increasingly overshadowed by
Independence Day festivities, but was revived with a major celebration
on its hundredth anniversary in 1883.
Harper’s Weekly editor George William Curtis criticized
New Yorkers’ neglect of anniversary observances, and lamented that
“a large part of the crowd which will gaze upon the pageant of the
celebration of Evacuation-day will wonder what Evacuation-day was…”
He predicted that “the electric national appeal of great national
anniversaries … will be wanting here.”
It was to be the final event in a series of centenary
celebrations of the nation’s birth, which began with the 1874
commemoration of the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia and
continued through the United States’
Centennial
two years
later and other events.
The cover of the post-dated
December 8, 1883 issue of Harper’s Weekly, in which the
featured cartoon appeared, was a full-page illustration of the
Evacuation Day unveiling of an imposing statue of George Washington, by
sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward, at Federal Hall, site of the federal
sub-treasury at Wall and Nassau Streets.
Ward’s artwork actually commemorated Washington’s
inauguration in New York City on April 30, 1789 as the nation’s first
president, thus accounting for the figure’s civilian dress, rather
than the typical military uniform used in other representations of the
first commander in chief. The
bronze statue is 12-½ -feet high and stands on a marble pedestal.
Harper’s
Weekly
reported that the chilly rain on November 25 did not dampen “the
universal glow of patriotism” manifested by the cheerful crowd at the
Evacuation Day centenary. The
event was attended by President Chester Arthur, seven governors from the
original thirteen states, and hundreds of thousands of spectators who
braved the weather to watch the four-hour procession.
The ceremonies culminated with the unveiling of the Washington
statue, at which editor Curtis spoke.
The observance of Evacuation Day largely disappeared after World
War I because of the waning of anti-British sentiment and the
holiday’s close proximity to Thanksgiving.
However, a bicentennial was celebrated in 1983.
Robert C. Kennedy
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