The original location of the Civil War monument that is now located at the American Legion frontage on Partition Street was blended into the lot that surrounded it in 1957 and then lost to memory. It is interesting that the property purchased by the American Legion post was the home of Charles Davis and that the original deed to the land where the monument originally stood from 1904 to 1952 was also from the same Davis family. The Judge Davis collection of surveys and records is held in the Rosenblum and Lamb Law Office archives. This is what was found when the Civil War soldier statue was researched in the Lamb Archives.
In 1869 Jeremiah Russell, a leading citizen of Saugerties and member of the U. S. Congress in the 1840's, died. His farmlands that spread out to the northwest from his home at the corner of Market street and his turnpike were bought by John W. Davis. On August 10, 1904, after John W. Davis' death, his estate divided from this land a small lot with 40 feet of street frontage and 56 feet deep located on the north side of Ulster Avenue 65 feet up from a fire hydrant about opposite Elizabeth street. The deed was made to the Grand Army of the Republic, G.A.R., Tappen Post, “for monument purposes” and the deed was recorded in Book 383, Page 375, with George E. Carnright and Norman Conyes representing the G.A.R.
In 1920 an abandonment clause was added to the deed and recorded in Book 479, Page 325 for returning the land to the original owner when there were no longer monument uses.
In 1925 the American Legion post was incorporated and on October 25, 1950 the Lamouree-Hackett Post of the American Legion purchased the property of the granddaughter of John W. Davis where her father, Judge Charles Davis, had built his home in 1880 on a lot that spread between John and Partition streets. On November 6, 1952 the post signed an agreement with the village to have the monument moved from Ulster Avenue to a park created on the Partition street side of this property. By 1956 the G.A.R. had disbanded with the death of its last Civil War veteran member but the American Legion post today still honors the memory of Civil War veterans and our civil community where it maintains the grandeur of a landmark property of the village.
Memorial Day is for remembering and often the memorials that help us to do that have their own past to be remembered. So maybe this bit of background on the G.A.R. statue's move to the American Legion park and this bit about the home where the post is located will shed some light on another time in Old Saugerties.
