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Part of the American
History & Genealogy Project |
Mero L. (White) Tanner 1844 ~ 1904
Mero L. White was born at Jefferson, Schoharie County, September
13, 1844, the daughter of Alfred S. and Julia Snyder White. She
was educated at the New York Conference Seminary at
Charlotteville, New York. At the age of thirteen she passed an
unusually brilliant examination and for several seasons
thereafter was a very successful teacher of a district school.
On November 17, 1866, she became the wife of James Tanner, and
in 1869 they moved to the city of Brooklyn, where she continued
to live until 1889, then removing to Washington upon the
appointment of her husband as United States Commissioner of
Pensions, resided there until her tragic death through an
automobile accident on June 29, 1904, at Helena, Montana.
She left surviving her husband and four children, James Alfred,
an attorney-at-law in Philadelphia, Earle White, a captain in
the Eleventh Infantry, United States Army, and two daughters,
Ada and Antoinette, who reside with their father who is the
Register of Wills for the District of Columbia. The mental
endowments of Mrs. Tanner were of a very superior order. She was
a deep, careful and omnivorous reader of the best literature of
her day. Her nature was very sympathetic and at the same time
very practical. She possessed to a marked degree executive
capacity and force. The misfortune and helplessness of others
always appealed to her most strongly.
During her twenty years' life in the city of Brooklyn she was a
most earnest and efficient worker on the board of directors of
the Brooklyn Nursery, one of the most efficient and helpful
institutions of its kind in the United States. She -was
especially interested in the welfare of the old comrades of her
husband who survived the Civil War and struck many a blow in
their defense and for their help. Thousands of personal appeals
made to her by or for those in distress met with instant and
helpful action. During the time of the Spanish-American War her
ability, resourcefulness, and executive capacity came into full
play. She had been allied for years with the national body of
the Red Cross and during that struggle she was a member of the
executive committee. Her fellow members, recognizing her
peculiar fitness, gave her a very free hand and her work was on
large lines. Possessing for many years the personal acquaintance
and friendship of President McKinley and Secretary of War Alger,
she was particularly well situated to do effective work, and
many a negligence and much wrong doing was corrected by a quiet
word from her to the President or the Secretary, and thousands
upon thousands of sick and wounded soldiers were the unknowing
beneficiaries of her words and deeds. It would take no small
volume to give in full a statement of her work at that time.
Besides all this, she took a great interest in legislation
putting the rights of womankind on a much more just basis than
had hitherto existed. It is owing to her efforts and those of
some of her intimates that a law was enacted by Congress which
wiped out the hideous monstrosity of a father having power
through his will to bequeath away from the control and care of
the mother who bore it, a minor child.
On June 29, 1906, while accompanying her husband, who was then
commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, on a tour
over the United States, and while being escorted around the city
of Helena in an automobile ride, there was an accident,
resulting in the upsetting of the machine and the fatal injuring
of Mrs. Tanner, who died on the spot forty minutes later.
By the personal direction of President Roosevelt and because of
the great interest she had always taken in behalf of the
veterans of the Civil War, a beautiful plot was assigned to her
in the National Cemetery at Arlington alongside of the main
thorough-fare, near the auditorium, where, on each recurring
Memorial Day, the waves of oratory and music will roll above her
last resting place. This seems all the more appropriate by
reason of the fact that prior to her time, interment in the
National Cemetery of wives or widows of private soldiers had
been prohibited. Against this prohibition she had made strong
protest, and had secured the kindly and favorable interest of
General Robert Shaw Oliver, assistant Secretary of War. After
her death General Oliver, while acting Secretary of War, issued
the order which annulled the long time prohibition. There her
remains were laid to rest on the 5th of July, 1906, and over
them her husband's comrades erected a beautiful memorial. With
large work, well done on a high plane, her place, as one of
those women because of whose living the world is better, is
secured for all time.
Women of
America
Source: The Part Taken by Women in
American History, By Mrs. John A. Logan, Published by The Perry-Nalle
Publishing Company, Wilmington, Delaware, 1912.
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