James Fingal Gregory
This heavily AI spiffed-up photo of Colonel James F. Gregory derives from an unspiffed one in Find-a-Grave uploaded by Mike Serpa on Jan 1, 2016. He got it from an obituary on page 12 of Annual Reunion of the Association of the U. S. M. A. Graduates, 1898.
James Fingal Gregory was born November 22, 1843 in Watervliet (now West Troy) New York. His father was the Reverend Oscar H. Gregory, D. D., a Dutch Reform minister. He briefly attended Troy University and Union College before entering West Point on July 1, 1861, just as the Civil War began. He graduated June 23, 1865 as the war ended. As an Army engineer he held many important posts. See his Cullum file for a summary of his military record.
In 1872, James F. Gregory worked on the 49th parallel boundary survey to determine the U.S. boundary with Canada. His name appeared on this 1875 reconnaissance map of the “topography adjacent to the 49th Parallel” as assistant to William Johnson Twining, Chief Astronomer:
Gregory accompanied Chester A. Arthur on an expedition to Yellowstone Park in 1883. I've circled him in the photo below.
That's Chester Arthur seated in the middle. The military man seated on the president's proper right is Philip Sheridan.
On March 26, 1889 James Gregory married Marianne Minnegerode. Her father was Rev. Charles Minnegerode, D. D., who as rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Richmond, Va. became known as the “Father Confessor of the Confederacy” and is rumored to have introduced the custom of decorating Christmas Trees to Americans. (See his biography in Find-a-Grave.)
When James Gregory died of natural causes in the Seminary Hotel in Cincinnati Ohio on July 31, 1897, his body was sent to Washington, D.C. and he was buried in Arlington Cemetery, with elaborate military ceremony. His funeral was described in The Washington Times, Aug. 5, 1897.
Mrs. Gregory died on Oct. 4, 1897. Her obituary in the Washington Evening Star claims that James was “the inventor of the cipher code of the Signal Corps which is now used in the army.”
But, perhaps, the main reason J. F. Gregory is remembered today is the large rose-quartz bolder which serves as the Gregory's memorial in Arlington National Cemetery.
James Fingal Gregory
Major
Corps of Engineers, U.S.A.
Died July 30th, 1897,
Marianne M. Gregory
Died October 20th, 1898.
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