In Memoriam: President Garfield's Funeral March In Memoriam: President Garfield's Funeral March "In Memoriam: President Garfield's Funeral March" is a funeral dirge composed by John Philip Sousa in 1881, while serving as director of "the President's Own" United States Marine Band, for the state funeral of President of the United States James Garfield. It was debuted during the committal of Garfield's remains and, 51 years later, was performed at Sousa's own funeral by the Marine Band. It is one of only two compositions Sousa dedicated to an American president, both of which were made to Garfield. On July 2, 1881 at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad
James Monroe Trotter African Americans. His son William Monroe Trotter became a rights activist and was founder and editor of the "Boston Guardian", a progressive African American newspaper. James Monroe Trotter was born on February 7, 1842, twenty-five miles south of Vicksburg in the once-thriving community of Grand Gulf, Mississippi, in Claiborne County, Mississippi, although some sources give Trotter's date of birth as November 8, 1842. James was born into slavery; his mother Letitia was a slave and his father was her white master, Richard S. Trotter, then unmarried. After Richard Trotter married in 1854, he freed Letitia and their mixed-race children: James