Presidential memorial honoring American Civil War general and 18th United States President Ulysses S. Grant
General Information
Take Massachusetts Ave NW, 9th St NW and Pennsylvania Avenue NW to 1st St NW. Drive to 1st St NW.
The Ulysses S. Grant Memorial is a presidential memorial in Washington, DC, honoring American Civil War general and 18th United States President Ulysses S. Grant. It sits at the base of Capitol Hill (Union Square, the Mall, 1st Street, between Pennsylvania Avenue and Maryland Avenue), below the west front of the United States Capitol. Its central sculpture of Grant on horseback faces west, overlooking the Capitol Reflecting Pool and facing toward the Lincoln Memorial, which honors Grant's wartime president, Abraham Lincoln. Grant's statue is raised on a pedestal decorated with bronze reliefs of the infantry; flanking pedestals hold statues of protective lions and bronze representations of the Union cavalry and artillery. The whole is connected with marble covered platforms, balustrades, and stairs. The Grant and Lincoln memorials define the eastern and western ends, respectively, of the National Mall.
The memorial includes the second-largest equestrian statue in the United States and the fifth-largest in the world. The central, equestrian statue of Grant with one of the four lions. The Grant Memorial is in Union Square, which also encompasses the Capitol Reflecting Pool. The platform for the Monument, made of Vermont marble, is 252 feet long and 71 feet wide and is divided into three sections. The tall, middle section features a 10,700-pound, 17-foot-2-inch high equestrian statue depicting Grant astride his war horse Cincinnati on a 22½-foot high marble pedestal.
The Artillery Group to the south shows a caisson carrying three artillerymen and pulled by three horses. Astride the horse on the left is the guidon (flag) carrier who is signaling a sharp right wheel. Despite the impending course change the horse on the right is able to continue lunging forward due to a broken strap on the right bridle bit. To the north the Cavalry Group depicts a color squad consisting of seven cavalrymen charging into battle. The horse on the right has fallen and the rider, modeled after Shrady himself, is moments from being trampled by the onrushing horses.
The Capitol Reflecting Pool is located at the eastern end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Six acres in size, it occupies over half of the area known as Union Square. It is set into a plaza that includes, on the east, the Ulysses S. Grant Memorial; to its west is a tree-dotted grassy area that extends to Third Streets, NW and SW. Nearby tourist destinations include the Capitol, the U.S. Botanic Garden, and the museums and galleries along the Mall.
This article uses material from the Wikipedia articles "Ulysses S. Grant Memorial", and "Capitol Reflecting Pool" which are released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0
Ulysses S Grant Memorial Pics
