Throwback Thursday: How Kentucky’s Henry Clay had a piece of George Washington’s coffin

October Throwback stories are always filled with odd, spooky, unusual, and macabre stories. This one is no different. Let’s get into some graverobbing lore and special thanks to Chris Bratton for leading the research on this.

In 1850, when Henry Clay rose to speak in the U.S. Senate, the Kentuckian held a fragment from George Washington’s coffin. In his lifetime, Clay had been elected to both the Kentucky and the U.S. House, serving as Speaker for both. He had been a U.S. Senator four different times. President John Quincy Adams had appointed him Secretary of State. But in 1850, the 72-year-old Lexington lawyer had only two more years of life left, and he was once again trying to keep the nation out of a civil war.

He clutched a certain piece of coffin to make a point. Clay asked if it represented the death of the United States, torn apart by slavery. “No, sir,” he answered. “It was a warning voice, coming from the grave to the Congress,” to beware of any purposes which shall destroy the Union. How Clay had a piece of Washington’s coffin is a complicated story.

When our first president died in 1799, a fight broke out over where to bury him. His last will and testament designated Mount Vernon, his Virginia estate. Congress had other ideas. A burial chamber for him was built two stories below the rotunda of the Capitol building, but that took time to complete. Meanwhile, Washington was buried in his family’s vault in Virginia. Martha Washington had agreed to transfer her husband’s body to the new tomb when it was finished, but by that time, she too had died. The new head of the estate refused to disturb his remains.

Adding to the controversy, the Mount Vernon crypt had fallen into disrepair. A gardener had even broken in to steal Washington’s skull. The mausoleum was in such disorder, he accidentally took the head of a nephew instead. This desecration caused much outrage. Henry Clay wanted the federal government to buy Mount Vernon to keep it safe.

Eventually the family built a new, secure crypt for the first president, and his old coffin was broken up into keepsakes. One of Clay’s supporters sent him a piece. Washington’s tomb at the Capitol sits empty today. His crypt at Mount Vernon became a memorial symbolizing our democracy.

Leaders from all over the world, seeking that magic mix of freedom and government combined, paid homage there, from Miquel Aleman in 1947, Mexico’s first civilian President after a long line of revolutionary generals, to Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1951, the Prime Minister of Iran who was eventually toppled with help from the CIA. Even kings and princes came to pay their respects to America’s first president.