Gracie Mansion

A portrait in Gracie Mansion of Elizabeth Stoughton Wolcott, who was the daughter of Oliver Wolcott, Jr., governor of Connecticut, and Elizabeth (Stoughton) Wolcott. At the age of 18, she was married on July 2, 1813, to William Gracie, son of Archibald Gracie (1755-1829), builder of Gracie Mansion. John Trumbull, a friend of the family, probably painted the subject from life sometime between his return to New York from England in 1816 and her death in 1819. Oct. 23, 2015

Ah, Ye Olde Gracie Mansion. New Yorkers know it as our very own “Little White House,” home to the Mayor of our fair city. Built in 1799 as a private residence for the very enterprising Scotsman, Mr. Archibald Gracie, the Mansion sits inside Carl Schurz Park at the intersection of East End Avenue + 88th Street, near a lovely little bend in the East River, known as Horn’s Hook. (In 1799, they had no idea they would eventually look out onto the future skyway of the Triborough Bridge + Hell Gate.)

Gracie was a successful merchant and founder of The Archibald Gracie and Sons, East India Merchants Company. East India, you say? Yes. In fact, he was a business associate to A dot Ham, Mr. Alexander Hamilton. Gracie went on to hold several high-profile positions in the banking industry. Eventually, he became an insurance man. He married twice + had 10 children.

It’s his daughter-in-law, Elizabeth Stoughton Wolcott Gracie whose presence endures at the mansion. She died suddenly of Apoplexy, or stroke on June 24th, 1819 at the age of 24, just six years after her marriage to William Gracie. She died at Gracie Mansion. Her presence has been seen multiple times “floating about the house from time to time.” If so, she’s “floating about” a very long way from her final resting place in The Trinity Churchyard downtown.

(SIDENOTE: Col. Archibald Gracie IV, came to notoriety as a survivor of the sinking of The RMS Titanic. He died eight months later due to complications from the effects of Hypothermia. He was the last person to leave the Titanic alive + the first adult survivor to die as a result of his injuries.)

So, what’s with the eerie statue of that little girl? (She came up several times in my online research for this story because her name happens to be Gracie, little Gracie Watson.) Hers is one of the most visited sites in Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah, GA. She died of pneumonia in 1889 at the age of six. Her father managed the prestigious Pulaski Hotel in town. Gracie was a favorite among the guests there, always putting on little performances for them when she visited her father. The family was so devastated by her loss that they commissioned sculptor John Walz to create a life-sized monument of her from a photograph.