On Memorial Day 1889, Civil War veterans gathered with civilians at the Allegheny Cemetery in Lawrenceville, Pa., just east of Pittsburgh, to reminisce and remember those lost not only on the battlefield but on the home front as well. Notably, Lawrenceville was the site of the war’s largest industrial and home-front disaster—the Allegheny Arsenal explosion of September 17, 1862. A simple obelisk had been placed near the southern end of the cemetery to memorialize that day’s horrific events. Below it lay the unidentified remains of about 40 of the 78 workers who had perished in the blast and subsequent fire. Family members, friends, and survivors solemnly laid flowers about the site and listened to a powerful eulogy delivered by the Rev. Richard Lea, a local pastor who had experienced the tragedy firsthand.
Although overshadowed in national periodicals by the Battle of Antietam, occurring the same day, the arsenal accident continued to resonate heavily with the local community for more than a century. On September 18, 1862, John Symington, the arsenal’s colonel of ordnance, noted that “the whole proceeds of the day…exploded, amounting to about 125,000 of .71 and .54 [caliber] small arm cartridges, and 175 rounds of field ammunition assorted for 12-pounder and 10-pounder Parrott guns.” Though Lawrenceville was far from the battlefields, the thought of that day conjured up warlike memories for survivors and witnesses alike. As military veterans honored their fallen on battlefields postwar, Lawrenceville’s civilians likewise paid their respects at the hallowed ground of the arsenal.
A native of Coventry, England, Lea had served as a pastor in the Pittsburgh area for at least 55 years—a majority of that period at the Lawrenceville Presbyterian Church, which stood less than a block away from the arsenal grounds. He was a revered member of the community who oversaw a large
