March 5 2010: Remembering the 240th anniversary of the Boston Massacre

Crispus Attucks:To a true American hero. whose name is lost in the shadows of our founding fathers. may you rest in peace knowing you gave your life in the cause of freedom. To the first casualty of the American Revolution: Thanks for your bravery and your martyrdom -- your blood made fertile the land of a great nation. may you rest in peace on this day that a powerful message was presented towards the ideal of independence and freedom!

The 240th Anniversary of the Boston Massacre

7:00 p.m.Free; in front of the Old State House, at the corner of State and Congress streetsWitness the event that sparked the American Revolution! Join us and become a part of this infamous event as it is reenacted in front of the Old State House, in the very place where it took place in 1770. Decide for yourself if the soldiers fired into the crowd in self-defense or cold-blooded murder. Before the action unfolds, hear from patriots, loyalists, and moderates who will talk about the events and attitudes that led to that fateful night. You know me....history is important....Boston history is more important.

March 5, 1773 (The third anniversary of the Boston Massacre):
"I. . .devoted myself to endless labour and Anxiety if not to infamy and death, and that for nothing, except, what indeed was and ought to be all in all, a sense of duty. In the Evening I expressed to Mrs. Adams all my Apprehensions: That excellent Lady, who has always encouraged me, burst into a flood of Tears, but said she was very sensible of all the Danger to her and to our Children as well as to me, but she thought I had done as I ought, she was very willing to share in all that was to come and place her trust in Providence.
"Before or after the Tryal, Preston sent me ten Guineas and at the Tryal of the Soldiers afterwards Eight Guineas more, which were. . .all the pecuniary Reward I ever had for fourteen or fifteen days labour, in the most exhausting and fatiguing Causes I ever tried: for hazarding a Popularity very general and very hardly earned: and for incurring a Clamour and popular Suspicions and prejudices, which are not yet worn out and never will be forgotten as long as History of this Period is read...It was immediately bruited abroad that I had engaged for Preston and the Soldiers, and occasioned a great clamour....

"The Part I took in Defence of Cptn. Preston and the Soldiers, procured me Anxiety, and Obloquy enough. It was, however, one of the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested Actions of my whole Life, and one of the best Pieces of Service I ever rendered my Country. Judgment of Death against those Soldiers would have been as foul a Stain upon this Country as the Executions of the Quakers or Witches, anciently. As the Evidence was, the Verdict of the Jury was exactly right.
"This however is no Reason why the Town should not call the Action of that Night a Massacre, nor is it any Argument in favour of the Governor or Minister, who caused them to be sent here. But it is the strongest Proofs of the Danger of Standing Armies."

John Adams and the Boston Massacre Trial of 1770
As noted in the 2008 HBO mini-series chronicling the life and career of John Adams (1735-1826), as a young lawyer the future president served as counsel for the defense in the trial of eight British soldiers accused of murder during a riot in Boston on March 5, 1770. William Wemms, James Hartegan, William McCauley, Hugh White, Matthew Killroy, William Warren, John Carrol, and Hugh Montgomery, soldiers in the English 29th regiment of foot, were accused of murdering Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell, and Patrick Carr. The case was heard at the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Goal Delivery, on November 27, 1770, by adjournment, before justices Benjamin Lynde, John Cushing, Peter Oliver, and Edmund Troweridge. The Law Library of Congress has copies of reports and transcripts of the court proceedings published in 1770, 1807, and 1824, as well as a history of the Boston Massacre “consisting of the narrative of the town, the trial of the soldiers, and a historical introduction, containing unpublished documents of John Adams, and explanatory notes,” published one-hundred years later in 1870. Adams’s impassioned speech in defense of the soldiers resulted in their acquittal: it was reprinted in a “character sketch” by John Willard published in 1903. Details about the publications follow. Where possible, full text of the documents are provided as PDF documents and the images can be clicked to enlarge.

1. The trial of William Wemms, James Hartegan, William McCauley,Hugh White, Matthew Killroy, William Warren, John Carrol, and Hugh Montgomery, soldiers in His Majesty’s 29th regiment of foot, for the murder of Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell, and Patrick Carr, on Monday-evening, the 5th of March, 1770, at the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Goal Delivery, held at Boston, the 27th day of November, 1770, by adjournment. Before the Hon. Benjamin Lynde, John Cushing, Peter Oliver, and Edmund Troweridge, Esquires, justices of said court. Published by permission of the Court. Taken in short-hand by John Hodgson. Boston : Printed by J. Fleeming … 1770. Library of Congress Catalog Permalink

2. The trial of the British soldiers, of the 29th regiment of foot, for the murder of Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell, and Patrick Carr, on Monday-evening, the 5th of March, 1770, before the Honorable Benjamin Lynde, John Cushing, Peter Oliver, and Edmund Troweridge, Esquires, justices of the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Goal Delivery, held at Boston, by adjournment, November 27, 1770. Boston : Printed and Published by Belcher and Armstrong, 1807. Library of Congress Catalog Permalink

3. The trial of the British soldiers, of the 29th regiment of foot, for the murder of Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, Samuel Maverick, James Caldwell, and Patrick Carr, on Monday-evening, the 5th of March, 1770, before the Honorable Benjamin Lynde, John Cushing, Peter Oliver, and Edmund Troweridge, Esquires, justices of the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and General Goal Delivery, held at Boston, by adjournment, November 27, 1770. Boston : Published by William Emmons, 1824.

4. Kidder, Frederic. History of the Boston Massacre, March 5, 1770 : consisting of thenarrative of the town, the trial of the soldiers, and a historical introduction, containing unpublished documents of John Adams, and explanatory notes. Albany, N.Y. : J. Munsell, 1870.

John Adams and Boston Massacre
In 1770, a street confrontation resulted in British soldiers killing five civilians in what became known as the Boston Massacre

The soldiers involved, who were arrested on criminal charges, had trouble finding legal counsel. Finally, they asked Adams to defend them. Although he feared it would hurt his reputation, he agreed. Six of the soldiers were acquitted. Two who had fired directly into the crowd were charged with murder but were convicted only of manslaughter.
As for Adams's payment, Chinard alleges that one of the soldiers, Captain Thomas Preston, gave Adams a symbolic "single guinea" as a retaining fee, the only fee he received in the case. However, David McCullough states in his biography of Adams that he received nothing more than a retainer of eighteen guineas.

Adams's own diary confirms that Preston paid an initial ten guineas and a subsequent payment of eight was "all the pecuniary Reward I ever had for fourteen or fifteen days labour, in the most exhausting and fatiguing Causes I ever tried. Despite his previous misgivings, Adams was elected to the Massachusetts General Court (the colonial legislature) in June 1770, while still in preparation for the trial.

Crispus Attucks



Crispus Attucks (c. 1723 – March 5, 1770) was the first of five people killed in the Boston Massacre in Boston, Massachusetts. He has been frequently named as the first martyr of the American Revolution and is the only Boston Massacre victim whose name is commonly remembered. He is regarded as an important inspirational figure in American history.
Little is known for certain about Crispus Attucks beyond his death in the conflict. Two major sources of eyewitness testimony about the Boston Massacre, both published in 1770, did not refer to Attucks as a "Negro," or "black" man. The first was a report commissioned by the town of Boston, "A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre," which contained over one hundred depositions from locals about what they saw on March 5, 1770. The second source, "The Trial of William Wemms," referred to Attucks more than a dozen times as a “mulatto” or “molatto,” and once as an “Indian,” another as a “tall man,” and yet another as a “stout,” or muscular man. While 19th-century anti-slavery advocates later focused on Attucks' African heritage, Bostonians in 1770 considered him mixed-race.
It was only in the early nineteenth century, as the Abolitionist movement gained momentum in Boston, that Attucks was lauded as an example of a black American who played a heroic role in the history of the United States -- thereby shaping the story of Attucks' identity. Because Crispus Attucks had Wampanoag ancestors, his story also holds special significance for many Native Americans.

Possible ethnicity and ancestry
Few facts are known about Crispus Attucks prior to his death in the Boston Massacre. There is a theory that he went by a different name, Michael Johnson. In addition, with regard to his mixed heritage, during the colonial period, it was not uncommon for Native and African-descent people to unite and have children together. Attucks in all likelihood had both Wampanoag and African ancestry.

Because slavery and racial discrimination were conditions of life in the 18th century, few detailed accounts of ordinary people from the colonial period exist. The name "Crispus" was mentioned in some records from the period; without a surname, it is impossible to determine if these refer to Attucks. Thus, historians have speculated whether an advertisement placed in the Boston Gazette on October 2, 1750 referred to Crispus Attucks:
“
Ran away from his Master William Brown of Framingham on the 30th of Sept. last a mulatto Fellow, about 27 years of age, named Crispus, 6 Feet and 2 inches high, short curl'd Hair, his Knees near together than common; and had on a light colour'd Beaverskin Coat, plain new buckskin breeches, blue yarn stockings and a checked woolen shirt. Whoever shall take up said runaway and convey him to his aforesaid master shall have 10 pounds old tenor reward, and all necessary charges paid. And all masters of vessels and others are hereby cautioned against concealing or carrying off said servant on penalty of law.
”
In the aftermath of King Philip's War in 1676, a Wampanoag man named John Attucks was executed for treason. Throughout the 17th to 19th centuries, the surname “Attucks” was used by Praying Indians around Natick and Framingham. The anthropological research of Frank Speck, as well as the work of Algonquian linguistics scholars Ives Goddard, Kathleen Bragdon, and Jessie Little Doe Baird, suggest that "Attucks" is likely an Anglicisation of the Wôpanââk word, ahtuq, meaning "deer," in combination with, ees, meaning "little."

Boston Massacre

In the fall of 1768, British soldiers were sent to Boston to help control growing colonial unrest, but this only increased tensions with those colonists who opposed the presence of troops. After dusk on Monday, March 5, 1770, a crowd of colonists confronted a sentry who had struck a boy for complaining that an officer was late in paying a barber bill.

This 19th century lithograph is a variation of the famous engraving of the Boston Massacre by John Bufford. Produced soon before the American Civil War, this image emphasizes Crispus Attucks, who had become a symbol for Abolitionists. (John Bufford after William L. Champey, ca. 1856)
As anger escalated, a church bell rang, which drew people out of their homes. The British soldiers of the 29th Regiment of Foot were called to duty. In turn, townspeople responded by hurling snowballs and debris at the soldiers. A group of men led by Attucks approached the vicinity of the government building (now known as the Old State House) with clubs in hand. Violence soon erupted, and a soldier was struck with a thrown piece of wood. Some accounts named Attucks as the person responsible. Other witnesses stated that Attucks was "leaning upon a stick" when the soldiers opened fire.
Five Americans were killed and six were mortally wounded. Attucks was the first one killed; he took two bullets in the chest.

Attucks’ body was carried to Faneuil Hall, where it lay in state until Thursday, March 8, when he and the other victims were buried together.
Based on the premise of self-defense, John Adams successfully defended the British soldiers against a charge of murder. Two of the soldiers were found guilty of manslaughter. As soldiers of the King of England, they were given the choice of hanging or being branded on their thumbs. They both chose to be branded. In his arguments, Adams called the crowd "a motley rabble of saucy boys, blacks and molattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs."
Two years later, Samuel Adams, a cousin of John Adams, named the event the "Boston Massacre," and helped assure that it would not be forgotten. Boston artist Henry Pelham (half-brother of the celebrated portrait painter John Singleton Copley) created an image of the event. Paul Revere made a copy from which prints were made and distributed. Some copies of the print show a dark-skinned man with chest wounds, presumably representing Crispus Attucks. Other copies of the print show no difference in the skin tones of the victims.
The five who were killed were buried as heroes in the Granary Burying Ground, which contains the graves of John Hancock and other notable figures. While custom of the period discouraged the burial of black people and white people together, such a practice was not completely unknown. Prince Hall, for example, was interred in Copp's Hill Burying Ground in the North End of Boston 35 years later

Crispus Attucks
1723?-1770
Introduction
Historian George W. Williams in History of the Negro Race in America described the Boston Massacre as "the bloody drama that opened the most eventful and thrilling chapter in American history." Neither a soldier nor a leading town citizen proved the hero of that pre-Revolutionary War struggle. Instead, the first of five men to die in the massacre was a runaway slave turned sailor, Crispus Attucks. His death has forever linked his name with the cause of freedom.
Narrative Essay
Historians know little about Attucks, and they have constructed accounts of his life more from speculation than facts. Most documents described his ancestry as African and American Indian. His father, Prince Yonger, is thought to have been a slave brought to America from Africa and that his mother, Nancy Attucks, was a Natick Indian. Researcher Bill Belton identified Attucks as a direct descendent of John Attucks, an Indian executed for treason in 1676 during the King Philip War. The family, which may have included an older sister named Phebe, lived in Framingham, Massachusetts.
Apparently, young Attucks developed a longing for freedom at an early age. According to The Black Presence in the Era of the American Revolution, historians believe that an advertisement placed in the Boston Gazette on October 2, 1750, referred to him: "Ran away from his Master William Brown from Framingham, on the 30th of Sept. last, a Molatto Fellow, about 27 Years of age, named Crispas, 6 Feet two Inches high, short curl'd Hair, his Knees nearer together than common: had on a light colour'd Bearskin Coat." The owner offered a reward of ten pounds for the return of the slave and warned ship captains against giving him refuge. George Washington Williams noted that the advertisement appeared again on November 13 and November 20. Biographers surveyed that Attucks escaped to Nantucket, Massachusetts, and sailed as a harpoonist on a whaling ship.
Historians definitely place Attucks in Boston in March of 1770. While in Boston, probably awaiting passage on a ship to the Carolinas, he found a job as a dockworker. Some writers proposed that he was using the name Michael Johnson. Assuming that the Boston Gazette advertisement did refer to him, he would have been about 47-years old.
Boston Massacre
By 1770 Boston had become "a storm center of brewing revolt," according to Benjamin Quarles in The Negro in the American Revolution. The British had stationed two regiments in the city following protests by the colonists against unfair taxes. Citizens welcomed neither the troops walking the streets nor the two canons aiming directly at the town hall. Describing the setting, historian John Fiske explained in Unpublished Orations that "the soldiers did many things that greatly annoyed the people. They led brawling, riotous lives, and made the quiet streets hideous by night with their drunken shouts. ... On Sundays the soldiers would race horses on the Common, or would play `Yankee Doodle' just outside the church-doors during the services."
As tensions mounted, the atmosphere grew ripe for confrontation. Fiske pointed out that during February of 1870, "an unusual number of personal encounters" had occurred, including the killing of a young boy. Regarding the evening of March 5, 1770, he explained, "Accounts of what happened are as disorderly and conflicting as the incidents which they try to relate." A barber's apprentice chided a British soldier for walking away without paying for his haircut. The soldier struck the boy, and news of the offense spread quickly. Groups of angry citizens gathered in various places around town. Someone rang the church bell and such a summons usually meant that a fire had broken out. This night, however, it presaged an explosive situation between the soldiers and the townspeople.
Captain Thomas Preston called his Twenty-ninth Regiment to duty. Townspeople began pelting the troops with snowballs. From the dock area, a group of men, led by the towering figure of Attucks, entered King Street, armed with clubs. Some accounts maintained that Attucks struck soldier Hugh Montgomery. Others, for example, John Fiske, stated that he was "leaning upon a stick" when the soldiers opened fire. However the incident occurred, Attucks lay dead, his body pierced by two bullets. Ropemaker Samuel Gray and sailor James Caldwell also died in the incident. Samuel Maverick, a 17-year-old joiner's apprentice, died the next day. Irish leather worker Patrick Carr died nine days later, and six others were wounded. Citizens immediately demanded the withdrawal of British troops. Fiske noted in Unpublished Orations that the deaths of these men "effected in a moment what 17 months of petition and discussion had failed to accomplish."
John Adams reluctantly agreed to defend the British soldiers, two of whom were charged with manslaughter and branded. At the trial, Adams focused on Attucks, portraying him as a rabble-rouser. Because of accounts given at the trial, some historians have questioned the motives of the massacred men. Fiske evaluated that although we cannot know their motives, "we may fairly suppose them to have been actuated by the same feelings toward the soldiery that animated Adams and Warren and the patriots of Boston in general."
Boston Honors
The town's response to the murders expressed the significance of the sacrifices these men made. The bodies of Attucks and Caldwell lay in state at Faneuil Hall; those of Gray and Maverick lay in their homes. For the funeral service, shops closed, bells rang, and thousands of citizens from all walks of life formed a long procession, six people deep, to the Old Granary Burial Ground where the bodies were committed to a common grave. Until the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Boston commemorated their deaths on March 5, "Crispus Attucks Day." According to Ted Stewart in Sepia, Boston abolitionist Wendell Phillips stated on the first such occasion, "I place...this Crispus Attucks in the foremost rank of the men that dared."
Through the years, people have remembered Attucks in a variety of ways. Paul Revere created a woodcut of the incident, and the National Archives housed a painting by noted New England artist Benjamin Champney depicting the event. Negro military companies took the name Attucks Guards. Poets dedicated works to his memory, and communities named schools after him.
In 1888 Boston erected a monument to the heroes of the massacre which James Neyland in Crispus Attucks called "the first ever to be paid for by public funds" in Massachusetts. City officials had rejected earlier petitions for such a monument. Even in 1888, various Boston factions heatedly debated the appropriateness of this gesture. At the unveiling, speaker John Fiske called the Boston Massacre "one of the most significant and impressive events in the noble struggle in which our forefathers succeeded in vindicating, for themselves and their posterity, the sacred right of self-government."
In his 1995 biography, James Neyland wrote about Attucks: "He is one of the most important figures in African-American history, not for what he did for his own race but for what he did for all oppressed people everywhere. He is a reminder that the African-American heritage is not only African but American and it is a heritage that begins with the beginning of America." Although obscure in life, Attucks played an important role in U.S. history through his death. Bill Belton in the Negro History Bulletin contended that the name of Crispus Attucks will stand "forever linked to the birth of this nation and its dream of freedom, justice, and equality."

Today is the feast day of Saint Saint Katharine Drexel

Sister Beatrice Jeffries, of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, reads scripture as part of the special canonization Mass for Saint Katharine Drexel, the order's founder!

The Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, leans on his staff during the special Mass of canonization for St. Katharine Drexel.

The tapestry of St. Katharine Drexel was hung on St. Peter's Basilica along with those of the other saints declared today.

Saint Katharine Drexel was born on Nov. 26, 1858 in Philadelphia, Philadelphia CountyPennsylvania and she died on Mar. 3, 1955 in BensalemBucks CountyPennsylvania. She was the daughter of Francis Drexel, a banking magnate and business partner of J.P. Morgan. She was raised in a world of mansions, world travel and private tutors. She shocked the City of Philadelphia at the age of 30 and entered a convent. Sister Katharine used her multi-million inheritance to establish a missionary order. In her lifetime, the order, Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, established 12 American Indian schools and more than 100 rural and inner-city schools for black students. Sister Drexel was only the second American-born saint; the other is Sisters of Charity founder Elizabeth Ann Seton. She died at the age of 96 at the Mother House in Bensalem, Pa., a Philadelphia suburb, of simple complications from old age. Pope John Paul cannonized her in Saint Peters Square, Rome, on October l, 2000. Her feast day is celebrated each March 3rd.

Burial:Mother House Sisters of Blessed Sacrament

Bucks County, Pennsylvania, USAPlot: St Katherine Drexel Shrine

Katharine Mary Drexel (November 26, 1858 – March 3, 1955) is a Roman Catholic Saintand daughter of the wealthy Francis Anthony Drexel and Hannah Langstroth of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Katharine dedicated her life and considerable inheritance to the needs of oppressed Native Americans and Blacks in the West and Southwest United States, and was a vocal advocate of racial tolerance. To address racial injustice and destitution and spread the Gospel to these groups, Katharine established a religious order, the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament for Indians and Colored People. Because Katharine felt a universal need for education, especially among Blacks and Native Americans, she financed more than 60 missions and schools around the United States. She was canonized by Pope John Paul II on October 1, 2000, becoming the second canonized American-born saint (after Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton who was canonized in 1975).

Sainthood
Katharine was beatified by Pope John Paul II on November 20, 1988. The Vatican identified in Katharine a fourfold legacy: A love of the Eucharist and her perspective on the unity of all peoples; courage and initiative in addressing social inequality among minorities; her efforts to achieve quality education for all; and her selfless service, including the donation of her inheritance, for the victims of injustice. She is known as the Patron Saint of racial justice and of philanthropists.
Her feast day is March 3, the anniversary of her death. She is buried in Cornwells Heights, Bensalem Township.

Saint Katharine Drexel Mission Center and Shrine
The Saint Katharine Drexel Mission Center and Shrine is located at 1663 Bristol Pike, Bensalem, Pennsylvania. The Mission Center offers retreat programs, historic site tours, days of prayer, presentations about Saint Katharine Drexel, and lectures and seminars related to her legacy. Furniture and exhibits tell the story of St. Katharine Drexel, the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, and the accomplishments of black and Native American people.
The saint's tomb lies under the main altar in St. Elizabeth Chapel, where visitors may pray daily.

Saint Katharine Drexel
Abbess
Born
November 26, 1858(1858-11-26), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Died
Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania

Venerated in Roman Catholic Church

Beatified: November 20, 1980 by Pope John Paul II
Canonized: October 1, 2000 by Pope John Paul II

Major shrine
Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania

Feast Day is March 3 Patronage:
philanthropists, racial justice

For Bensalem and the world, it's St. Katharine Drexel
The Bensalem nun, who turned her back on a privileged life to embrace two forgotten peoples, is now St. Katharine Drexel.
By ELIZABETH FISHER
The tapestry of St. Katharine Drexel was hung on St. Peter's Basilica along with those of the other saints declared today.
St. Katharine Drexel's Miracles
In February, 1974, Robert Gutherman, then 14, had an ear infection that destroyed the three bones in his right ear causing deafness in that ear.
His family began praying to Mother Katharine Drexel for relief of his pain. By September, several months after surgery, a medical checkup showed that the bones regenerated and Gutherman's hearing was restored.
In August, 1993, Amy Wall was diagnosed with incurable nerve deafness and was enrolled in the Katzenbach School for the Deaf in Trenton. In November, her family prayed to Drexel.
By March, a teacher noticed that Amy was responding to noise. Medical tests showed that Amy had perfect hearing.
ROME - The Bensalem nun, who turned her back on a privileged life to embrace two forgotten peoples, is now St. Katharine Drexel.
Huddled under umbrellas for several hours, 70,000 pilgrims from all over the world gathered today to witness the elevation of four individuals, including Drexel, to sainthood.
About 3,000 people from the Delaware Valley, including many from Bucks County, were in the crowd to mark the occasion. Rain and wind whipped through the square, soaking the congregation but not dampening the solemnity of the ceremony. The crowds started snaking their way to St. Peter's before dawn, waiting patiently for the 10 a.m. ceremony to begin.
The sound of cheers rose above the clatter of rain at the moment of canonization when Pope John Paul II uttered the traditional: "Lo ordiniamo."
Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, Archbishop of Phildelphia, was one of the concelebrants of the Mass. Bevilacqua has promoted Drexel's cause for canonization since 1988, when she was beatified.
Many members of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament were present. Sister Beatrice Jeffries, vice president of the order, read scripture, one of the few times that English was used in the liturgy. Amy Wall and Robert Gutherman sat near the papal altar during the Mass. Eight-year-old Amy occasionally got restless during the long ceremony. The little girl, her mother Connie and Gutherman all received Holy Communion from the Holy Father.
Amy and Gutherman, both of Bucks County, were cured of deafness after their families prayed to Drexel. The Church considered them miracles attributable to Drexel. Before an individual is canonized, two miracles are required. Sister Beatrice Jeffries, of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, reads scripture as part of the special canonization Mass for Saint Katharine Drexel, the order's founder.

"I originally asked if I could just sit next to Amy so she wouldn't be there by herself," Connie Wall said. "Then I was invited to receive Communion from the pope, too."
The pope praised Drexel for her work among blacks and Native Americans through social service and education. He also held up the three other new saints as examples of Christian piety.
"Two thousand years from the beginning of the Redemption, today we make the words of the Gospel our own, while we have before us such models of sanctity: Agustin Zhao Rong and 119 companions and martyrs in China, Mary Joseph of the Hart of Jesus Sancho di Guerra, Katharine Mary Drexel and Josephine Bakhita," the pope said.

"To all of you, dear brothers and sisters, who have gathered here in such great numbers to express your devotion toward those shining witnesses of the Gospel, I extend my heartfelt greeting," he said. The pope hailed Drexel as a compassionate woman who expanded on her parents' teachings on sharing wealth.

"She began to devote her fortune to missionary and educational work among the poorest members of society. Later, she understood that more was needed. With great courage and confidence in God's grace, she chose to give not just her fortune but her whole life totally to the Lord. Miracle recipient Amy Wall clings to her mother, Connie, before entering the St. Peter's Square for the canonization ceremonies.

"To her religious community, the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, she taught a spirituality based on prayer for union with the Eucharistic Lord and zealous service of the poor and victims of racial discrimination," he said. The Holy Father prayed that young people understand that "no greater treasure can be found" than following in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, and by generously using their gifts to benefit the poor. After the Mass, Cardinal Bevilacqua called on Catholics to follow in Drexel's footsteps by using their resources to help others in need. "Whatever we have, we should be using to assist others who are needier than we are," Bevilacqua said. "You don't have to be poor to be needy. We can offer prayers or assist in times of sickness." The cardinal said the key to emulating Drexel is to love everyone, no matter what their color or race.

The Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, leans on his staff during the special Mass of canonization for St. Katharine Drexel. "Katharine Drexel used all her resources to help others." he said.
Two Bucks County women, a mother and daughter from Bensalem, used the Drexel canonization as an opportunity to see Rome. Mary Gradel and her daughter, Laura, 24, said the bad weather was insignificant compared to the magnitude of the event.
"I've always wanted to come to Rome to see the pope," said Mary Gradel. "This was such a moving experience" Her daughter agreed. "Seeing the canonization was worth all the rain, all the nasty weather," Laura Gradel said. "It made you want to smile and cry at the same time."
Philadelphia resident Marion Matticola came full circle with this visit to Rome. She attended Drexel's funeral in 1955.

"This is all part of a spiritual journey, a testament to our faith," she said. "It's so touching to see so many Catholics gathered here in one place. All the people here are here because of faith."
Virginia and James Carlin of Fairless Hills and Sister Maryann Poole (Virginia's sister) of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, watched the canonization ceremonies from front row seats.
Over her lifetime, Drexel built 60 schools and missions to serve and educate blacks and Native Americans. Drexel was born Nov. 26, 1858, the daughter of wealthy Philadelphia banker Francis Drexel and his wife, Hannah Longstreth. Hannah died shortly after her daughter's birth and two years later, Francis Drexel married Emma Bouvier.
It was Emma who taught the young Katharine that wealth was to be shared. At an early age, Katharine and her sisters, Elizabeth and Louise, helped their mother distribute food and clothing to the poor in Philadelphia. As they grew into young women, the three Drexel daughters started religion classes for the children who lived near the Drexel home in Torresdale, where Frankford Hospital now stands. The family's charity work amounted to about $20,000 a year, a stunning amount for the last of the 19th century. Because of her early charitable works and her extensive travels out west with her family, Drexel understood the alienation endured by blacks and Native Americans. She wanted to do something that would help the two peoples take their rightful place in society. The seeds of her future vocation were sowed.

Robert Gutherman's daughter, Mary Katharine, isn't as excited before the canonization ceremony as her father, who was the recipient of St. Drexel's first miracle.
It was in 1889, after her parents died, Drexel entered the novitiate of the Sisters of Mercy in Pittsburgh, where she studied, prayed and learned enough convent structure to enable her to start her own order, the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament in 1891.
Drexel spent the last days of her life as an invalid. Soon after her death in 1955, those who knew her immediately began petitioning the Philadelphia Archdiocese to begin the work that could lead to her sainthood. Today's events have special meaning for Maureen Clark Ramsey, who was a member of the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament from 1961 to 1970.
Now married and the mother of three children, the Southampton, N.J. resident said her children gave her the money to make the trip."

"I left the order because I felt that that part of my life was finished," she said. "But [the canonization] is still important to me. It is for all of us a continuation of our spiritual journey back to God." Shortly after the canonization, as the last of the pilgrims headed back to their hotels to prepare for the celebration dinner at the Sheraton Roma, the clouds abruptly rolled away. The sky over St. Peter's turned a perfect blue and a warm sun hovered over the abandoned square.
Sunday, October 1, 2000.

St. Katharine Drexel's Miracles
In February, 1974, Robert Gutherman, then 14, had an ear infection that destroyed the three bones in his right ear causing deafness in that ear.
His family began praying to Mother Katharine Drexel for relief of his pain. By September, several months after surgery, a medical checkup showed that the bones regenerated and Gutherman's hearing was restored.
In August, 1993, Amy Wall was diagnosed with incurable nerve deafness and was enrolled in the Katzenbach School for the Deaf in Trenton. In November, her family prayed to Drexel.
By March, a teacher noticed that Amy was responding to noise. Medical tests showed that Amy had perfect hearing.

Saint Katharine Drexel: I was truly impressed when Pope John Paul II announced that he created you as one of the newest saints in the Catholic Church, may you rest in peace! Happy feast day too!

Truly a sick idea to show off a tragic event in American History!

Sen. Robert F. Kennedy talks to campaign workers just moments before his assassination on June 5, 1968. The Los Angeles Police Department apologized for including the clothes he wore that day in a recent exhibition.

LAPD Regrets RFK Death Shirt Display:

March 3) -- The Kennedys were offended, and the Los Angeles Police Department apologized for showcasing clothing worn by Sen. Robert F. Kennedy when he was assassinated in 1968.Kennedy's dress shirt, tie and jacket were put on display this week at the California Homicide Investigators Association Conference in Las Vegas.The exhibition, "Behind-The-Scenes: The LAPD Homicide Experience," showcased evidence from notorious cases during the past 100 years, including actress Marilyn Monroe's death, the Manson family murders and the O.J. Simpson saga.

Sen. Robert F. Kennedy talks to campaign workers just moments before his assassination on June 5, 1968. The Los Angeles Police Department apologized for including the clothes he wore that day in a recent exhibition.Police Chief Charlie Beck said the LAPD apologized and removed the clothing from the showcase after a member of the Kennedy family complained to the department about being "offended," according to the Los Angeles Times."The last thing we want to do is traumatize a victim's family, and I am very sensitive to that," Beck told the newspaper. "But at the same time, we want to preserve the history of the city of Los Angeles and improve the quality and understanding about our homicide investigations."

The assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, a United States Senator and brother of assassinated President John F. Kennedy, took place shortly after midnight on June 5, 1968 in Los Angeles, California. Robert F. Kennedy was killed during celebrations of his successful campaign in the California primary elections while seeking the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. The assassin was a twenty-four year old Palestinian immigrant named Sirhan Sirhan, who remains incarcerated for this crime as of 2010.

The shooting was recorded on audio tape by a freelance newspaper reporter, and the aftermath was captured on film. Kennedy's body lay in repose at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York for two days before a funeral mass was held on June 8. His body was interred near his brother John at Arlington National Cemetery. His death prompted the protection of presidential candidates by the United States Secret Service.

Hubert Humphrey went on to win the Democratic nomination for the presidency, but ultimately narrowly lost the election to Richard Nixon.
As with his brother's death, Robert Kennedy's assassination and the circumstances surrounding it have spawned a variety of conspiracy theories, particularly in relation to the existence of a supposed second gunman.

Assassination

Four hours after the polls closed in California, Kennedy claimed victory in the state's Democratic presidential primary. At approximately 12:15 a.m. PDT, he addressed his campaign supporters in the Ambassador Hotel's Embassy Room ballroom, in the Mid-Wilshire district of Los Angeles.

At the time, the government provided Secret Service protection for incumbent presidents but not for presidential candidates. Kennedy's only security was provided by former FBI agent William Barry and two unofficial bodyguards, former professional athletes. During the campaign, Kennedy had welcomed contact with the public, and people had often tried to touch him in their excitement.

Kennedy had planned to walk through the ballroom when he had finished speaking, on his way to another gathering of supporters elsewhere in the hotel. However, with deadlines fast approaching, reporters wanted a press conference. Campaign aide Fred Dutton decided that Kennedy would forgo the second gathering and instead go through the kitchen and pantry area behind the ballroom to the press area. Kennedy finished speaking and started to exit when William Barry stopped him and said, "No, it's been changed. We're going this way."

Barry and Dutton began clearing a way for Kennedy to go left through swinging doors to the kitchen corridor, but Kennedy, hemmed in by the crowd, followed hotel maître d' Karl Uecker through a back exit. Uecker led Kennedy through the kitchen area, holding Kennedy's right wrist but frequently releasing it as Kennedy shook hands with those he encountered. Uecker and Kennedy started down a passageway narrowed by an ice machine against the right wall and a steam table to the left.

Kennedy turned to his left and shook hands with busboy Juan Romero as Sirhan Sirhan stepped down from a low tray-stacker beside the ice machine, rushed past Uecker, and repeatedly fired what was later identified as a .22 caliber Iver-Johnson Cadet revolver.
After Kennedy had fallen to the floor, security man Bill Barry hit Sirhan twice in the face while others, including maître d's Uecker and Edward Minasian, writer George Plimpton, Olympic gold medal decathlete Rafer Johnson and professional football player Rosey Grier, forced Sirhan against the steam table and disarmed him. Sirhan wrestled free and grabbed the revolver again, but he had already fired all the bullets.

Barry went to Kennedy and laid his jacket under the candidate's head, later recalling: "I knew immediately it was a .22, a small caliber, so I hoped it wouldn't be so bad, but then I saw the hole in the Senator's head, and I knew".

Reporters and photographers rushed into the area from both directions, contributing to the chaos. As Kennedy lay wounded, Juan Romero cradled the senator's head and placed a rosary in his hand. Kennedy asked Romero, "Is everybody safe, OK?" and Romero responded, "Yes, yes, everything is going to be OK".

Captured by Life photographer Bill Eppridge and Boris Yaro of the Los Angeles Times, this moment became the iconic image of the assassination.
Ethel Kennedy stood outside the crush of people at the scene, seeking help.She was soon led to her husband and knelt beside him. He turned his head and seemed to recognize her.After several minutes, medical attendants arrived and lifted Kennedy onto a stretcher, prompting him to whisper, "Don't lift me."

He lost consciousness shortly thereafter. Kennedy was taken a mile away to Central Receiving Hospital, where he arrived near death. One doctor slapped his face, calling, "Bob, Bob", while another massaged Kennedy's heart. After obtaining a good heartbeat, doctors handed a stethoscope to Ethel Kennedy so she could hear her husband's heart beating, much to her relief.

After about 30 minutes, Kennedy was transferred several blocks to the Hospital of the Good Samaritan for surgery. Surgery began at 3:12 a.m. PDT and lasted three hours and 40 minutes.

Ten and a half hours later, at 5:30 p.m. PDT on Wednesday, spokesman Frank Mankiewicz announced that Kennedy's doctors were "concerned over his continuing failure to show improvement"; his condition remained "extremely critical as to life".
Kennedy had been shot three times. One bullet, fired at a range of about 1 inch (2.54 cm), entered behind his right ear, dispersing fragments throughout his brain.

Two others entered at the rear of his right armpit; one exited from his chest and the other lodged in the back of his neck. Despite extensive neurosurgery at the Good Samaritan Hospital to remove the bullet and bone fragments from his brain, Kennedy died at 1:44 a.m. PDT on June 6, nearly 26 hours after the shooting.

Five other people were also wounded: William Weisel of ABC News, Paul Schrade of the United Auto Workers union, Democratic Party activist Elizabeth Evans, Ira Goldstein of the Continental News Service and Kennedy campaign volunteer Irwin Stroll. Although not physically wounded, singer Rosemary Clooney, a strong Kennedy supporter, was present in the ballroom during the shooting in the pantry and suffered a nervous breakdown shortly afterwar

The Crime
This is the official version of the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, as put forward by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) and the LA District Attourney's office (LADA).
On 5th June 1968, 12.15am, Senator Robert F. Kennedy was making his way from the ballroom at the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, to give a press conference, after winning the California Primary. The prearranged route went through a food service pantry. While making his way through this area, a Palastinian Arab, Sirhan Sirhan, stepped forward and fired a .22 revolver at the Senator. Although Sirhan was quickly subdued, Kennedy and five others were wounded, although only Kennedy was fatally wounded. Sirhan was arrested at the scene, charged and convicted of first degree murder. He was to have been executed, but the U.S. Supreme Court voided the constitutionality of the death sentence before the sentence could be carried out. Sirhan has been incarcerated at Corcoran State Prison, California, since then. Under Californian law, he should have been automatically scheduled for release in 1984, but this was not the case.

As a historian and a big fan of the Kennedys especially Robert Francis Kennedy, I think this idea was truly idiotic and stupid. It's ashame that they have to show a piece of history on which it was a tragic event but showcasing that, truly stupid. They should keep it in a preserve setting and allow it be examine or sent back to the Kennedy Library! Only time will tell on what they will do with it! Robert F Kenedy is a hero of mine and he once said:"The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of bold projects and new ideas. Rather, it will belong to those who can blend passion, reason and courage in a personal commitment to the great enterprises and ideals of American society." I hope someday that people will understand on what he said in 1966, allow those who want to condemn history be the sorry ones to see what happens to them in the future!

The Vatican celebrates the 200th birthday of Pope Leo XIII

Today 2 March 2010 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Pope Leo XIII, Gioacchino Pecci, who was born on 2 March 1810, elevated to the See of Peter in 1878 and died in 1903. It may be fitting to recite today the Prayer to Saint Michael the Archangel which he composed:


This is a stain glass picture of Pope Leo XIII at the church of Our Lady of Pompei which is in the Village, I took this picture, I think its a great likeness of this Pope!

Saint Michael the Archangel,defend us in battle;be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.May God rebuke him, we humbly pray:and do thou, O Prince of the heavenly host,by the power of God,thrust into hell Satan and all the evil spiritswho prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.

Pope Leo XIII (2 March 1810 - 20 July 1903), born Count Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci, was the 257th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, reigning from 1878 to 1903 in succession to Blessed Pope Pius IX. Reigning until the age of 93, he was the oldest pope, and had the third longest pontificate, behind his immediate predecessor Blessed Pius IX and Venerable John Paul II. He is known for intellectualism, the development of social teachings with his encyclical Rerum Novarum and his attempts to define the position of the Church with regard to modern thinking.

Born in Carpineto Romano, near Rome, he was the sixth of the seven sons of Count Lodovico Pecci and his wife Anna Prosperi Buzi. From 1810 to 1818 he was at home with his family, "in which religion counted as the highest grace on earth, as through her, salvation can be earned for all eternity".

Together with his brother he studied in the Jesuit College in Viterbo, where he stayed until 1824. He enjoyed the Latin language and was known to write his own Latin poems at the age of eleven.

In 1824 he and his older brother Giuseppe Pecci were called to Rome where their mother was dying. Count Pecci wanted his children near him after the loss of his wife, and so they stayed with him in Rome, attending the Jesuit Collegium Romanum. In 1828, Giuseppe entered the Jesuit order, while Vincenzo decided in favour of secular clergy.
He studied at the Academia dei Nobili, mainly diplomacy and law. In 1834 he gave a student presentation, attended by several cardinals, on papal judgements. For his presentation he received awards for academic excellence, and gained the attention of Vatican officials.

Cardinal Secretary of State Luigi Lambruschini introduced him to Vatican congregations and to Pope Gregory XVI, who appointed Pecci on 14 February 1837, as personal prelate even before he was ordained priest on 31 December 1837, by the Vicar of Rome. He celebrated his first mass together with his priest brother Giuseppe. He received his doctorate in theology in 1836 and doctorates of civil and Canon Law in Rome also.

Today we celebrate the birth of Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci. This remarkable guy ascended the Throne of St. Peter as His Holiness Pope Leo XIII just shy of his 68th birthday. He would go on to serve as Vicar of Christ for 25 years. Next time you think about wanting to retire, remember Pope Leo having to tough it out in the most important job in the world until he was 93.

When I was in college, one day during my Vatican classes, I was looking through the book and I spoted Pope Leo XIII in a picture. I thought he was an interesting man because he was the last pope of the 19th century and the first pope during the beginning of the 20th century. By all accounts, he was an outstanding man with regards to intellect and morality. It was also abit ironic that I found a biography of him in the school's library, I wished I had the opportunity to obtain and purchase that book but it was also ironic that year in my junior year of college, I went to Rhode Island and I went to this town with a unique antique store. I always find something interesting in this store. I believe that year was a key year for me, I said to myself it would be interesting to find an old biography of Pope Leo XIII. I was about to leave the store and something caught my eye. This big red book caught my eye, I went to it and I was amazed it was an old biography of Pope Leo XIII and it was published in the year 1903, the same year on which this pope died. I had to get it and I asked how much was it and the owner allowed me to have it for nothing cause he was closing the shop and I was a great customer today, to this day I still have the book and it is truly a remarkable read and great condition also. Pope Leo XIII has some interesting papal trivia about him. He's the only camerlengo ever elected to the papacy. He's also the first pope that we have film and audio recordings.

He confronted the problems of modern secularism by writing letters to leaders and nations all over the world, including America. Ecumenical issues were dealt with, even when doing so meant reality checks for the opposition, as was the case when he declared Anglican orders invalid. Before St. Pius X was fighting modernism, Pope Leo was already standing in the breach, though he admittedly was condemning the heresy one doctrine at a time rather than treating it as a cohesive object.

As soon as he was elected to the papacy, Leo XIII worked to encourage understanding between the Church and the modern world. When he firmly re-asserted the scholastic doctrine that science and religion co-exist, he required the study of Thomas Aquinas and opened the Vatican Secret Archives to qualified researchers, among whom was the noted historian of the Papacy Ludwig von Pastor.

Leo XIII was the first Pope of whom a sound recording was made. The recording can be found on a compact disc of Alessandro Moreschi's singing; a recording of his performance of the Ave Maria. He was also the first Pope to be filmed on the motion picture camera. He was filmed by its inventor, W. K. Dickson, and blessed the camera. I have this footage and it is truly an amazing film footage!

Leo XIII was the first Pope to come out strongly in favour of the French Republic, upsetting many French monarchists. In his relations with the Italian state, Leo XIII continued the Papacy's self-imposed incarceration in the Vatican stance, and continued to insist that Italian Catholics should not vote in Italian elections or hold elected office. In his first consistory in 1879 he elevated his older brother Giuseppe a cardinal.

Pope Leo XIII and the United States: The United States at many moments in time attracted the attention and admiration of Pope Leo. He confirmed the decrees of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884), and raised James Gibbons, archbishop of that city, to the cardinalate in 1886.American newspapers criticized Pope Leo because they claimed that he was attempting to gain control of American public schools. One cartoonist drew Leo as a fox unable to reach grapes that were labeled for American schools; the caption read "Sour grapes!"

According my book, "Lives of the Popes" by Ricard P.McBrien, he ranks Pope Leo XIII as the 10th above average popes . According to McBrien, "Pope Leo XIII was the 1st pope to attempt to reconcile the Catholic Church in the modern world and condemneding Americanism without really understanding the difference between American democracy and certain views that are being expressed at that particular time period". Plus he is the 1st pope to speak out towards non-Catholics like Protestants and Orthodox to return into a union within Rome. I also was pleased that he allowed an individual in Church history to convert from an Anglican to a Catholic and he became a great theologian in the Catholic. His name is Venerable Cardinal John Henry Newman whom Pope Benedict XVI will be beatifying him in London when he goes there this year. His canonisation would make Newman the first English person to have lived since the 17th century to be declared a saint. In 1991, Newman was proclaimed "Venerable" by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. His beatification is expected to be officially proclaimed on 19 September 2010.

There is another person in the time of Pope Leo XIII's papacy on whom I believe should be recoginzed in celebration. Her name is Saint and Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini. She visited Rome to obtain an audience with Pope Leo XIII. The Pope told Frances to go "not to the East, but to the West" to New York rather than to China as she had expected. She was to help the thousands of Italian immigrants already in the United States. In 1889, New York seemed to be filled with chaos and poverty, and into this new world stepped Mother Frances Cabrini and her Sister companions. Cabrini organized catechism and education classes for the Italian immigrants and provided for the needs of the many orphans. She established schools and orphanages despite tremendous odds. Within two weeks Mother Cabrini had made contacts in high places, and had several interviews with Cardinal Parocchi, who became her loyal supporter, with full confidence in her sincerity and ability. She was encouraged to continue her foundations elsewhere and charged to establish a free school and kindergarten in the environs of Rome. Pope Leo XIII received her and blessed the work. He was then an old man of seventy-eight, who had occupied the papal throne for ten years and done much to enhance the prestige of the office. Known as the "workingman's Pope" because of his sympathy for the poor and his series of famous encyclicals on social justice, he was also a man of scholarly attainments and cultural interests. He saw Mother Cabrini on many future occasions, always spoke of her with admiration and affection, and sent contributions from his own funds to aid her work. So I believe she should get some recoginiation in this celebration of this pope's 200th birthday!

Pope Leo XIII and Thomism: As Pope, he used all his authority for a revival of Thomism, the theology of Thomas Aquinas. On 4 August 1879, Leo promulgated the encyclical Aeterni Patris (“Eternal Father”) which, more than any other single document, provided a charter for the revival of Thomism—the medieval theological system based on the thought of Aquinas—as the official philosophical and theological system of the Roman Catholic Church. It was to be normative not only in the training of priests at church seminaries but also in the education of the laity at universities.

He canonized the following saints:1881: Clare of Montefalco (d. 1308), John Baptist de Rossi (1696-1764), and Lawrence of Brindisi (d. 1619) 1883: Benedict Joseph Labre (1748-1783) 1888: Seven Holy Founders of the Servite Order, Peter Claver (1561-1654), John Berchmans (1599-1621), and Alphonsus Rodriguez (1531-1617) 1890: Blessed Giovenale Ancina (1545-1604) 1897: Anthony M. Zaccaria (1502-1539) and Peter Fourier of Our Lady (1565-1640) 1900: John Baptist de la Salle (1651-1719) and Rita of Cascia (1381-1457) In addition, he beatified Gerard Majella in 1893 and Edmund Campion in 1886. His Holiness also approved the cult of Cosmas of Aphrodisia.

Audiences: In 1901, Pope Leo XIII welcomed Eugenio Pacelli, his later successor Pope Pius XII, on his first day of fifty-seven years of service in the Vatican (1901-1958)One of the first audiences Leo XIII granted was to the professors and students of the Collegio Capranica, where in the first row kneeled in front of him a young seminarian, Giacomo Della Chiesa, his eventual successor, Pope Benedict XV.

While on a pilgrimage with her father and sister in 1887, the future Saint Thérèse of Lisieux attended a general audience with Pope Leo XIII and asked him to allow her to enter the Carmelite order. Even though she was strictly forbidden to speak to him because she was told it would prolong the audience too much, in her autobiography, Story of a Soul, she wrote that after she kissed his slipper and he presented his hand, instead of kissing it, she took it in her own hand and said through tears, "Most Holy Father, I have a great favor to ask you. In honor of your Jubilee, permit me to enter Carmel at the age of 15!" Pope Leo XIII answered, "Well, my child, do what the superiors decide." Thérèse replied, "Oh! Holy Father, if you say yes, everybody will agree!" Finally, the Pope said, "Go... go... You will enter if God wills it" after which time two guards lifted Thérèse (still on her knees in front of the Pope) by her arms and carried her to the door where a third gave her a medal of the Pope. Shortly thereafter, the Bishop of Bayeux authorized the prioress to receive Thérèse, and in April 1888, she entered Carmel at the age of 15. While known for his cheerful personality, Leo also had a gentle sense of humor as well. During one of his audiences, a man claimed to have had the opportunity to see Pius IX at one of his last audiences before his death in 1878. Upon hearing the remarkable story, Leo smiled and replied, "If I had known that you were so dangerous to popes, I would have postponed this audience further".

Death:

Leo XIII was the first Pope to be born in the 19th century. He was also the first to die in the 20th century: he lived to the age of 93, the longest living pope. At the time of his death, Leo XIII was the second-longest reigning pope, exceeded only by his immediate predecessor, Blessed Pius IX. Leo was not entombed in St. Peter's Basilica, as all popes after him were, but instead at St. John Lateran, a church in which he took a particular interest.

Pope Leo XIII :You are truly one of the most influential Popes in the 20th century, thanks for being a powerful leader in the Vatican, happy 200th birthday!

The World is Celebrating Chopin’s 200th birthday in 2010

On this day in 1810, a great man was born. Frédéric François Chopin is the name of this great composer or his christen name was Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin. Chopin is considered to be a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist.He was one of the great masters of Romantic music. Chopin was born in the village of Żelazowa Wola, in the Duchy of Warsaw, to a French-expatriate father and Polish mother. He was considered a child-prodigy pianist. At age twenty, on 2 November 1830, he left Warsaw for Austria, intending to go on to Italy. The outbreak of the Polish November Uprising 27 days later, and its subsequent suppression by the Russian Empire, led to his becoming one of many expatriates of the Polish Great Emigration.

In Paris, Chopin made a comfortable living as a composer and piano teacher, while giving few public performances. Though an ardent Polish patriot, in France he used the French versions of his given names, and traveled on a French passport, possibly to avoid having to rely on Imperial Russian documents.

For the greater part of his life Chopin suffered from poor health; he died in Paris in 1849, aged thirty-nine, of pulmonary tuberculosis.
Chopin's compositions were written primarily for the piano as solo instrument. Though technically demanding, they emphasize nuance and expressive depth rather than sheer virtuosity. Chopin invented musical forms such as the instrumental ballade and was responsible for major innovations in the piano sonata and waltz.

Poland celebrates 200th birthday of beloved icon Frederic Chopin

WARSAW, Poland - The stirring strains of Frederic Chopin's music are reverberating across the world as music lovers celebrate the composer's 200th birthday this year - from the chateau of his French lover to Egypt's pyramids and even into space.
But nowhere do celebrations carry the powerful sense of national feeling that they do in Poland, the land of his birth, where his heroic, tragic piano compositions are credited with capturing the essence of the country's soul.
Poland is going all out to display its best "product," as officials bluntly put it, staging bicentennial concerts and other events in and around Warsaw, the city where the composer - known here as Fryderyk Chopin - spent the first half of his life.
"Fryderyk Chopin is a Polish icon," said Andrzej Sulek, director of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in Warsaw. "In Polish culture, there is no other figure who is as well-known in the world and who represents Polish culture so well."
Perhaps nothing better conveys Chopin's importance - literally - than his heart. It is preserved like a relic in an urn of alcohol in a Warsaw church, encased within a pillar with the Biblical inscription: "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."
Just before his death at 39 from what was probably tuberculosis, a coughing and choking Chopin, fearful of being buried alive, asked that his heart be separated from his body and returned to his beloved homeland. His body is buried at the Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris, where Chopin spent the second half of his life.
Finding it unseemly, Polish authorities have repeatedly rebuffed scientists wanting to run DNA tests on Chopin's heart to explore a suspicion that he actually succumbed to cystic fibrosis, a disease not yet discovered in his day.
Sulek said Poland might one day agree but would rather have the world focus on the genius's life, not his death, during this bicentennial year.
Chopin was born in 1810 at a country estate in Zelazowa Wola, near Warsaw, to a Polish mother and French emigre father. Historical sources suggest two possible dates of birth - either Feb. 22, as noted in church records, or March 1, which was mentioned in letters between him and his mother and is considered the more probable date.
Since no one is sure, Poland is marking both. A series of concerts in Warsaw and Zelazowa Wola will take place over those eight days featuring such world-class musicians as Daniel Barenboim, Evgeny Kissin, Garrick Ohlsson, Martha Argerich and Krystian Zimerman.
Then, a refurbished museum opens in Warsaw on March 1 displaying Chopin's personal letters and musical manuscripts along with a multimedia narration of his life.
Celebrations span the globe, from music-loving Austria to concerts at Cairo's pyramids and across Asia, where his following is huge.
The astronauts who blasted into orbit on the Endeavor space shuttle Feb. 8 carried with them a CD of Chopin's music and a copy of a manuscript of his Prelude Opus 28, No. 7 - gifts from the Polish government.
The Endeavor commander, George Zamka, who has Polish roots, told the Polish news agency PAP ahead of his trip to the International Space Station that listening to Chopin in space would enhance the majesty of the cosmos.
"Chopin is universal," said Mariusz Brymora, a Foreign Ministry official who helped put Chopin's music in space. "We are convinced that Chopin is Poland's best brand, Poland's best product. There is nothing else like him."
In France, Chopin is valued as "the composer who ushered in the age of great French music," according to Adam Zamoyski, historian and author of the new biography "Chopin: Prince of the Romantics."
Chopin's entire musical output, about 15 hours worth all together, will be played by some 60 pianists at the end of February in the central French city of Chateauroux and in Paris in an event entitled "Happy Birthday Mr. Chopin." The program will be filmed and later shown on French television.
And the small chateau in Nohant of Chopin's famous companion for eight years, feminist writer Amandine Aurore Lucile Dupin - best known by her nom de plume George Sand - has been fixed up and will host three weeks of concerts in June. Chopin wrote some of his masterpieces at that inspirational spot in central France.
Poland's parliament has formally declared 2010 to be the "Year of Chopin," and officials in Warsaw feel his Polishness must be stressed because many non-Poles still associate him primarily with France.
Chopin always had a strong Polish identity. He surrounded himself with Poles in France whenever he could and never felt fully comfortable with the French language.
The matter touches a nerve in Poland, which has more often than not been controlled by foreign powers over the past two centuries - most recently during the decades of Moscow-imposed communist rule thrown off in 1989. Poles don't want to lose credit for Chopin, a genius whose universal appeal is even greater than that of Pope John Paul II and Lech Walesa - at least according to Brymora.
In Chopin's day, Poland was partitioned by Russia, Prussia and Austria and did not exist as a state. In 1830, soon after Chopin embarked on a tour of Europe, an uprising broke out in Warsaw against its Russian rulers. It was put down with brutality, and a period of Russian repression followed that sent many other Polish artists into exile.
Chopin never returned, mainly because it would have been "regarded as a betrayal of the others who were in exile," Zamoyski said. "Many of them couldn't return without facing prison - or worse, death."
Poles hear in his music a deep nostalgia for his homeland, and stress the Polish elements in his oeuvre - particularly in his Polonaises and Mazurkas, styles rooted in Polish folk music.
Halina Goldberg, author of "Music in Chopin's Warsaw," said that even before Chopin's death in 1849, Poles turned to his art to preserve a sense of their nationhood.
But others have also claimed him - Germans have said his music falls into the tradition of German Romanticism; Russians call him a Slavic genius.
"There is always a question of how much Polishness is in his music," Goldberg, a music professor at Indiana University, said. "Much of it is in the ear of the beholder."
Certainly Nazi Germany, which occupied Poland during World War II, heard something subversive and banned it. The Nazis were clearly aware of what German composer Robert Schumann, also born in 1810, called Chopin's "cannons hidden beneath flowers."
"As Chopin was one of the rallying points of Polish identity, it was just one more thing that needed to be forbidden and destroyed," Zamoyski said.
After his death, Chopin was eulogized movingly by the Polish poet Cyprian Kamil Norwid, who wrote that: "In the crystal of his own harmony he gathered the tears of the Polish people strewn over the fields, and placed them as the diamond of beauty in the diadem of humanity."
Now that Poland is again independent, it can savor that beauty without the tears.

This picture is the birthplace of Frederick Chopin in Poland!

In Chopin's final years:

In 1847, Chopin's public popularity as a virtuoso waned, as did the number of his pupils. In February 1848, he gave his last Paris concert. In April, with the Revolution of 1848 underway in Paris, he left for London, where he performed at several concerts and at numerous receptions in great houses.

Toward the end of the summer he went to Scotland, staying at the castle in Renfrewshire, near Glasgow) of his former pupil and great admirer Jane Wilhelmina Stirling and her elder sister, the widowed Mrs. Katherine Erskine. Miss Stirling proposed marriage to him; but Chopin, sensing that he was not long for this world, set greater store by his freedom than by the prospect of living on the generosity of a wife.

In late October 1848 in Edinburgh, at the home of a Polish physician, Dr. Adam Lyszczynski.

Chopin wrote out his last will and testament—"a kind of disposition to be made of my stuff in the future, if I should drop dead somewhere," he wrote his friend Wojciech Grzymala. In his thoughts he was now constantly with his mother and sisters, and conjured up for himself scenes of his native land by playing his adaptations of its folk music on cool Scottish evenings at Miss Stirling's castle.

Chopin made his last public appearance on a concert platform at London's Guildhall on 16 November 1848, when, in a final patriotic gesture, he played for the benefit of Polish refugees. His appearance on this occasion proved to be a well-intentioned mistake, as most of the participants were more interested in the dancing and refreshments than in Chopin's piano artistry, which cost him much effort and physical discomfort.

At the end of November, Chopin returned to Paris.

He passed the winter in unremitting illness, but in spite of it he continued seeing friends and visited the ailing Adam Mickiewicz, soothing the Polish poet's nerves with his playing. He no longer had the strength to give lessons, but he was still keen to compose. He lacked money for the most essential expenses and for his physicians. He had to sell off his more valuable furnishings and belongings.

Feeling ever more poorly, Chopin desired to have one of his family with him. In June 1849 his sister Ludwika Jedrzejewicz, who had given him his first piano lessons, agreed to come to Paris. He had lately taken up residence in a very beautiful, sunny apartment at Place Vendôme. It was there, a few minutes before two o'clock on the morning of Wednesday, 17 October 1849, that Chopin died.

Later, many persons who had not been present at Chopin's death would claim to have been there. "Being present at Chopin's death," writes Tad Szulc, "seemed to grant one historical and social cachet.

Those actually around his bed appear to have included his sister Ludwika, Princess Marcelina Czartoryska, George Sand's daughter Solange and her husband Auguste Clésinger, and Chopin's friend and former pupil Adolf Gutmann, his friend Thomas Albrecht, and his confidant, Polish Catholic priest Father Aleksander Jelowicki.

Later that morning, Auguste Clésinger made Chopin's death mask and casts of his hands. Before the funeral, pursuant to Chopin's dying wish (which stemmed from a fear of being buried alive), his heart was removed and preserved in alcohol, perhaps brandy. His sister later took it in an urn to Warsaw, where it was sealed within a pillar of the Holy Cross Church on Krakowskie Przedmiescie, beneath an inscription from Matthew VI:21: "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." Chopin's heart has remained there—except for a period during World War II, when it was removed for safekeeping—within the church that was rebuilt after its virtual destruction during the 1944 Warsaw Uprising. The church stands only a short distance from Chopin's last Polish residence, the Krasinski Palace at Krakowskie Przedmiescie 5.

The funeral, to be held at the Church of the Madeleine in Paris, was delayed for almost two weeks, until 30 October. Chopin had requested that Mozart's Requiem be sung. The Requiem had major parts for female voices, but the Church of the Madeleine had never permitted female singers in its choir. The Church finally relented, but on condition that the female singers remain behind a black velvet curtain. The soloists in the Requiem included the bass Luigi Lablache — who had sung the same work at Haydn's funeral and had also sung at Bellini's funeral — and Chopin's and George Sand's friend, the mezzo-soprano Pauline Viardot.

Also played were Chopin's Préludes No. 4 in E minor and No. 6 in B minor. The funeral was attended by nearly three thousand people, but George Sand was not among them.Chopin was buried, in accordance with his wishes, at Père Lachaise Cemetery. At the graveside, the Funeral March from his Sonata No. 2 in B flat minor, Op. 35 was played, in Napoléon Henri Reber's instrumentation.

Chopin's grave, with its monument carved by Clésinger, attracts numerous visitors and is consistently decorated with flowers, even in winter.In 2008, a controversy arose over whether Chopin died of tuberculosis or cystic fibrosis, an incurable genetic disease whose complete clinical spectrum was not recognised until the 1930s, almost a century after his death. The Polish government declined to allow scientists to remove Chopin's heart from its repository for DNA testing.

There is various memorials to this great composer:

In 1909, to celebrate Chopin's centenary,there was an"symphonic poem in memory of Chopin", titled Zhelazova Vola, Op. 37, a reference to Chopin's birthplace.

Chopin statue in winter, Warsaw's Royal Baths Park

In 1926, a bronze statue of Chopin designed by sculptor Waclaw Szymanowski in 1907, was erected in the upper part of Warsaw's Royal Baths (Lazienki) Park, adjacent to Ujazdów Avenue (Aleje Ujazdowskie). The statue was originally to have been erected in 1910, on the centenary of Chopin's birth, but its execution was delayed by controversy about the design, then by the outbreak of World War I.

On 31 May 1940, during the German occupation of Poland in World War II, the statue was destroyed by the Nazis. It was reconstructed after the war, in 1958. Since 1959, free piano recitals of Chopin's compositions have been performed at the statue's base on summer Sunday afternoons. The stylized willow over Chopin's seated figure echoes a pianist's hand and fingers. Until 2007, the statue was the world's tallest monument erected to Chopin.

A 1:1-scale replica of Szymanowski's Art Nouveau statue is found in Warsaw's sister city of Hamamatsu, Japan. There are also preliminary plans to erect another replica along Chicago's lakefront in addition to a different sculpture commemorating the artist in Chopin Park for the 200th anniversary of Chopin's birth.There are numerous other monuments to Chopin around the world.

The most recent, and by a small margin taller than the Warsaw statue, is a modernistic bronze sculpture by Lu Pin in Shanghai, China, that was unveiled on 3 March 2007.The world's oldest monographic music competition, the International Frédéric Chopin Piano Competition, founded in 1927, is held every five years in Warsaw.

Periodically the Grand prix du disque de F. Chopin is awarded for notable Chopin recordings, both remastered and newly recorded work.Named for the composer are the largest Polish music conservatory, the Fryderyk Chopin Music Academy; Warsaw Frédéric Chopin Airport; and asteroid 3784 Chopin.

His music is truly unique and different. I am a big fan of this great composer!

Chopin, according to Arthur Hedley, "had the rare gift of a very personal melody, expressive of heart-felt emotion, and his music is penetrated by a poetic feeling that has an almost universal appeal.... Present-day evaluation places him among the immortals of music by reason of his insight into the secret places of the heart and because of his awareness of the magical new sonorities to be drawn from the piano."

It is very difficult to characterise Chopin's oeuvre briefly. Robert Schumann, speaking of Chopin's Sonata in B-flat minor, wrote that "he alone begins and ends a work like this: with dissonances, through dissonances, and in dissonances," and in Chopin's music he discerned "cannon concealed amid blossoms." Franz Liszt, in the opening of his biography about Chopin (Life of Chopin), termed him a "gentle, harmonious genius." Thus disparate have been the views on Chopin's music. The first systematic, if imperfect, study of Chopin's style came in F. P. Laurencin's 1861 Die Harmonik der Neuzeit. Laurencin concluded that "Chopin is one of the most brilliant exceptional natures that have ever stridden onto the stage of history and life, he is one who can never be exhausted nor stand before a void. Chopin is the musical progone.

Chopin's music for the piano combined a unique rhythmic sense (particularly his use of rubato), frequent use of chromaticism, and counterpoint. This mixture produces a particularly fragile sound in the melody and the harmony, which are nonetheless underpinned by solid and interesting harmonic techniques. He took the new salon genre of the nocturne, invented by Irish composer John Field, to a deeper level of sophistication. Three of Chopin's twenty-one Nocturnes were published only after his death in 1849, contrary to his wishes.

He also endowed popular dance forms, such as the Polish mazurek and the Viennese waltz, with a greater range of melody and expression. Chopin's mazurkas, while based somewhat on the traditional Polish dance, were different from the traditional variety in that they were suitable for concerts halls as well as dance settings. With his mazurkas, Chopin brought a new sense of nationalism, which was an idea other composers writing both at the same time as and after Chopin would also incorporate into their compositions. Chopin’s nationalism was a great influence and inspiration for many other composers, especially Eastern Europeans, and he was one of the first composers to clearly express nationalism through his music.

Furthermore, he was the first composer to take a national genre of music from his home country and transform it into a genre worthy of the general concert-going public, thereby creating an entirely new genre.Chopin was the first to write ballades and scherzi as individual pieces. He also took the example of Bach's preludes and fugues, transforming the genre in his own Préludes.Further information: Nocturnes (Chopin), Preludes (Chopin), and Études (Chopin)Chopin reinvented the étude, expanding on the idea and making it into a gorgeous, eloquent and emotional showpiece. He also used his Études to teach his own revolutionary style, for instance playing with the weak fingers (3, 4, and 5) in fast figures (Op. 10, No. 2), playing in octaves (Op 25, No.10) and playing black keys with the thumb (Op. 10, No. 5).

InfluencePillar in Warsaw's Holy Cross Church. Contained within (bottom) is an urn with Chopin's heart.

Above is an epitaph with a verse from Gospel of Matthew: "For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."Several of Chopin's pieces have become very well known—for instance the Revolutionary Étude (Op. 10, No. 12), the Minute Waltz (Op. 64, No. 1), and the third movement of his Funeral March Sonata No. 2 (Op. 35), which is often used as an iconic representation of grief.

Chopin himself never named an instrumental work beyond genre and number, leaving all potential extra-musical associations to the listener; the names by which we know many of the pieces were invented by others.

The Revolutionary Étude was not written with the failed Polish uprising against Russia in mind; it merely appeared at that time. The Funeral March was written before the rest of the sonata within which it is contained, but the exact occasion is not known; it appears not to have been inspired by any specific personal bereavement.

Other melodies have been used as the basis of popular songs, such as the slow section of the Fantaisie-Impromptu (Op. posth. 66) and the first section of the Étude, Op. 10, No. 3. These pieces often rely on an intense and personalised chromaticism, as well as a melodic curve that resembles the operas of Chopin's day — the operas of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and especially Vincenzo Bellini.

Chopin used the piano to recreate the gracefulness of the singing voice, and talked and wrote constantly about singers.Chopin's style and gifts became increasingly influential. Robert Schumann was a huge admirer of Chopin's music, and he used melodies from Chopin and even named a piece from his suite Carnaval after Chopin.

This admiration was not generally reciprocated, although Chopin did dedicate his Ballade No. 2 in F major to Schumann. Franz Liszt was another admirer and personal friend of the composer, and he transcribed for piano six of Chopin's Polish songs. However, Liszt denied that he wrote Funérailles (subtitled "October 1849", the seventh movement of his piano suite Harmonies poétiques et religieuses of 1853) in memory of Chopin.

Though the middle section seems to be modeled on the famous octave trio section of Chopin's Polonaise in A flat major, Op. 53, Liszt said the piece had been inspired by the deaths of three of his Hungarian compatriots in the same month. Johannes Brahms and the younger Russian composers, too, found inspiration in Chopin's examples.

Chopin's technical innovations became influential. His Préludes (Op. 28) and Études (Opp. 10 and 25) rapidly became standard works, and inspired both Liszt's Transcendental Études and Schumann's Symphonic Studies. Alexander Scriabin was also strongly influenced by Chopin; Jeremy Siepmann, in his biography of the composer, lists pianists whose recordings of Chopin are generally acknowledged to be among the greatest Chopin performances ever preserved: Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Moriz Rosenthal, Ignaz Friedman, Vladimir Horowitz, Arthur Rubinstein said the following about Chopin's music and its universality.

Chopin was a genius of universal appeal. His music conquers the most diverse audiences. When the first notes of Chopin sound through the concert hall there is a happy sigh of recognition. All over the world men and women know his music. They love it. They are moved by it. Yet it is not "Romantic music" in the Byronic sense. It does not tell stories or paint pictures. It is expressive and personal, but still a pure art. Even in this abstract atomic age, where emotion is not fashionable, Chopin endures. His music is the universal language of human communication. When I play Chopin I know I speak directly to the hearts of people!

Although Chopin lived in the 1800s, he was educated in the tradition of Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart and Clementi; he used Clementi's piano method with his own students. He was also influenced by Hummel's development of virtuoso, yet Mozartian, piano technique. Chopin cited Bach and Mozart as the two most important composers in shaping his musical outlook.

The series of seven Polonaises published in his lifetime (another nine were published posthumously), beginning with the Op. 26 pair, set a new standard for music in the form, and were rooted in Chopin's desire to write something to celebrate Polish culture after the country had fallen into Russian control.

The Polonaise in A major, Op. 40, No. 1, the "Military," and the Polonaise in A-flat major, Op. 53, the "Heroic," are among Chopin's best-loved and most-often-played works.

Rubato: Chopin's music is well known for benefiting from rubato (which was how he himself performed his music),as opposed to a strictly regular playing. Yet there is usually call for caution when the music is performed with wobbly, over-exaggerated, inappropriate "rubato" (e.g. attempting to justify insecure playing, with reference to expressive rubato).
His playing was always noble and beautiful; his tones sang, whether in full forte or softest piano.

He took infinite pains to teach his pupils this legato, cantabile style of playing. His most severe criticism was "He—or she—does not know how to join two notes together." He also demanded the strictest adherence to rhythm. He hated all lingering and dragging, misplaced rubatos, as well as exaggerated ritardandos ... and it is precisely in this respect that people make such terrible errors in playing his works.—Friederike Müller , "From the Diary of a Viennese Chopin Pupil".

However, while some can provide restrictive quotes about Chopin such as the above, often to the effect that "the accompanying hand always played in strict tempo", these quotes need to be considered in better context in terms both of the time when they were made and of the situations that may have prompted the original writer to set down the thoughts. Constantin von Sternberg (1852–1924) has written:

It is amusing to note that even some serious persons express the idea that in tempo rubato "the right hand may use a certain freedom while the left hand must keep strict time." (See Niecks' Life of Chopin, II, p. 101.) A nice sort of music would result from such playing! Something like the singing of a good vocalist accompanied by a poor blockhead who hammers away in strict time without yielding to the singer who, in sheer despair, must renounce all artistic expression. It is reported by some ladies that Chopin himself gave them this explanation.

This suggests that Chopin is not to be found at commonly encountered one-sided extremes. The unbalanced views are:that Chopin requires metronomic rhythm in the left hand; that insecure performances of Chopin can be justified with reference to rubato. that performances with particular inflections, that result from technical limits/insecurities rather than a performer's intentions, can be justified with reference to rubato. Some performers' (and piano-schools') "too-strongly-held one-sided views on Chopin's way of playing rubato" may account for some unsatisfactory interpretations of his music.

Romanticism: Chopin regarded most of his contemporaries with indifference, though he had many acquaintances who were associated with romanticism in music, literature, and the fine arts—many of them via his liaison with George Sand. Chopin's music is, however, considered by many to epitomise the Romantic style. The relative classical purity and discretion in his music, with little extravagant exhibitionism, partly reflects his reverence for Bach and Mozart.

Chopin never indulged in explicit "scene-painting" in his music, or used programmatic titles. He castigated publishers who renamed his compositions in this way.

Nationalism Chopin monument at Zelazowa Wola, by Goslawski Zdzislaw Jachimecki notes that "Chopin at every step demonstrated his Polish spirit — in the hundreds of letters that he wrote in Polish, in his attitude to Paris's [Polish] émigrés, in his negative view of all that bore the official stamp of the powers that occupied Poland."

Likewise Chopin composed music to accompany Polish texts but never musically illustrated a single French or German text, even though he numbered among his friends several great French and German poets.

According to Arthur Hedley, Chopin "found within himself and in the tragic story of Poland the chief sources of his inspiration. The theme of Poland's glories and sufferings was constantly before him, and he transmuted the primitive rhythms and melodies of his youth into enduring art forms."

In asserting his own Polishness, Chopin, according to Jachimecki, exerted "a tremendous influence [toward] the nationalization of the work of numerous later composers, who have often personally — like the confirmed this opinion..."

Frédéric Chopin was born fifty kilometers west of Warsaw, at Zelazowa Wola in Sochaczew County, in what was then part of the Duchy of Warsaw. His father, Mikolaj (in French, Nicolas) Chopin, originally a Frenchman from Lorraine, had emigrated to Poland in 1787 at age sixteen and had served in Poland's National Guard during the Kosciuszko Uprising. He subsequently tutored children of the aristocracy, including the Skarbeks—one of whose poorer relations, Justyna Krzyzanowska, he married. Justyna's brother would become the father of American Union General Wlodzimierz Krzyzanowski

Mikolaj and Justyna were married in the 16th-century basilica in Brochów. There, too, their second child and only son, born 1 March 1810, would be baptized "Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin".

In 1892 a parish church document was found that cites his birthdate as 22 February 1810, but he usually gave 1 March as the date.

Burial: Holy Cross Church Warsaw Mazowieckie Voivodeship, Poland

Plot: Location of heart only, in accordance to Chopin's wishes. Specifically: Location of heart only.

Frederic Francois Chopin: thank you for wonderful talents in the music world, happy 200th birthday!