SACRED TO THE MEMORY
OF MY SON
ALBERT HUBBELL WRIGHT
BORN JUNE 28, 1856
DIED AUG. 11, 1875

NEARER MY GOD TO THEE

The white marble monument for Albert Wright in the Green-Wood Cemetery in New York depicts a seated mourning figure. The inscription on the scroll on the front of the gravestone gives a glimpse into the devastating loss of a mother for her son.

The epitaph, “Nearer My God To Thee”, is the title for a Christian hymn written by Sarah Flowers Adams (February 22, 1805-August 14, 1848) in 1841. The old favorite is about death and about Jacob’s stairway to Heaven. The hymn is about greeting one’s maker on the other side and is based on Genesis 28: 11—12: KJV “11 And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun was set; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep.12 And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven: and behold the angels of God ascending and descending on it.”

1 Nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!
E’en though it be a cross that raiseth me,
still all my song shall be,
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

2 Though like the wanderer, the sun gone down,
darkness be over me, my rest a stone;
yet in my dreams I’d be
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

3 There let the way appear, steps unto heaven;
all that thou sendest me, in mercy given;
angels to beckon me
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

4 Then, with my waking thoughts bright with thy praise,
out of my stony griefs Bethel I’ll raise;
so by my woes to be
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

5 Or if, on joyful wing cleaving the sky,
sun, moon, and stars forgot, upward I fly,
still all my song shall be,
nearer, my God, to thee;
nearer, my God, to thee, nearer to thee!

The reference to the hymn seems to be a plea presumably for the grieving mother to be reunited with her son once she climbs the ladder—a poignant wish.

The figure atop the stone is depicted gazing to the Heavens with a bouquet of flowers in her lap, possibly as an offering for the grave. The act of placing flowers is a recurring funerary motif which is designed to remind the viewer that life is short. Mourning figures are a common motif in Victorian cemeteries and found throughout the United States and Europe. This monument is a memorial to a lost son, perhaps this particular figure is not a generic mourning figure but represents the mother of the son.