Page 87 - Montecito Journal Glossy Edition Winter/Spring 2013/14

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his thorax where he’d been shot and said he would send it to the Medical
Museum in Washington.”
“The whole country was electrified with grief,” wrote Joel, “and all
were bent on revenge upon any person or persons who in the mildest way
sympathized with the assassins or their friends.”
“Slippery Dick” Connolly
After the war, Joel Adams Fithian became the vice president of one
of the largest banks in Richmond, Virginia. Then on May 3, 1866, he
married Fannie B. Connolly of New York City. He opened Fithian &
Co. Tobacco and became involved in stock operations on Wall Street as
well as railroad enterprises. Joel was soon to discover that his father-in-
When war broke out, he opened a recruiting office and formed
the Kearny Guards, which became Company F of the 24
th
New Jersey
Infantry. He was elected captain and mustered into service in September
1862 with the Twenty-fourth Regiment of which he was made major.
He took part in the battles of Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. At
war’s end, he was Additional Paymaster of the U.S. Army and ordered to
Richmond to assist in the final payment of soldiers at Appomattox.
In April 1865, Fithian was in Washington, D.C., staying at the
National Hotel, as was the actor John Wilkes Booth. He remembered that
Booth had been a great favorite with the ladies, who vied for his company.
On the night of April 14, he was awakened by loud knocking on his
bedroom door and the porter shouting, “The President has been shot!”
Rushing outside, he found the city in a frenzy, with soldiers and
police patrols swarming the streets. Then news came that Lincoln had
died. In an 1872 memoir, Fithian wrote, “Everyone seemed to be awe-
stricken at the calamity – all heads were bowed in submission to the will
of God. Many unable to restrain themselves burst into tears. Sleep was
impossible. Everyone seemed to be upon the streets.”
Several days later, after Booth had been killed and his body taken
to the monitor USS
Montauk
, which was docked near the Navy Yard
at Washington, Fithian was invited aboard to view the body of the
“miscreant.” Joel reported, “The Surgeon General cut out two inches of
law, Richard Barrett Connolly, would determine the course of his life in
unexpected ways.
When he was still a young boy, Irish-born Richard Barrett Connolly
came to live with an older brother in New York. He learned arithmetic
from his instructors in the public schools and politics from the Irish
politicians at Tammany Hall. Connolly worked his way up the ladder of
political offices, and in 1866, he won the Tammany Hall nomination for
Controllership of the City of New York.
Thanks to Tammany Hall inspectors who threw out the votes for
Moguls & Mansions
(Opposite page)
Joel Remington Fithian and Richard Barrett Fithian served the country during WWI
(Courtesy Joel Remington Fithian II)
(Above left)
Joel Adams Fithian
(Middle)
Joel Remington Fithian
(Right)
Fannie Connolly with Joel Adams Fithian circa 1866 (Courtesy Santa Barbara Historical Museum)