The Matthew Perry Statue, image from the NHS Collections
Earlier we revisited the movement of Oliver Hazard Perry’s remains from Trinidad to Newport. His brother Matthew also had his own internment issues following his death in 1858. As a resident of New York City, Perry’s remains were buried in his wife’s Slidell family vault at St. Mark’s In-The-Bouwerie Church in lower Manhattan. In 1866, at the request of his daughter Caroline and her husband August Belmont, Perry’s remains were moved to his native Newport and buried at Island Cemetery in a place now known as Belmont Circle. Biographers and New Yorkers were reluctant to let go of Perry for almost one hundred years, claiming his remains were still at St. Mark’s. In 1953 the mayors of Newport and New York had to prove Perry’s whereabouts by producing the transfer certificate from the Dept. of Health as well as opening the Slidell family vault which revealed one missing Commodore Perry.