The news spread at once throughout the great city in which he had so suddenly fallen; friends were soon by his bedside, while a large crowd gathered about the hotel. A coroner's jury was at once impaneled, listened to the testimony of the physicians, and returned a verdict that death had resulted from cerebral hemorrhage. Impressions of the features were taken by Leonard W. Volk, the eminent sculptor, and the lifeless body was then arranged by kind, if strange, hands for the funeral casket. Before its removal to Detroit, thousands who cherished the memory of the man looked mournfully upon the dead face.
The telegraph bore the intelligence of this sudden death promptly throughout the country, and the announcement was answered by unusual demonstrations of national grief. Throughout the cities and towns of Michigan, at Washington, and in many other places where his name was well known, the insignia of mourning were at once displayed. Public men sent prompt dispatches of sympathy to his family, upon whom the blow had fallen with prostrating force. Especially significant were the newspaper tributes to the memory of the bold, resolute, and successful leader of men, whose star had not set, but had gone out at the zenith. The President of the United States issued this official order:
Executive Mansion, Washington, Nov. 1, 1879.
The sad intelligence of the death of Zachariah Chandler, late Secretary of the Interior, and during so many years Senator from the State of Michigan, has been communicated to the government and to the country, and, in proper respect to his memory, I hereby order that the several executive departments be closed to public business, and their flags, and those of their dependencies throughout the country, be displayed at half-mast on the day of his funeral.
R. B. HAYES.
From the Executive Mansion also came this dispatch of personal condolence:
Washington, D. C., Nov. 1, 1879.
Mrs. Z. Chandler.Mrs. Hayes joins me in the expression of the most heartfelt sympathy with you in your great bereavement.
R. B. HAYES.
GEN. U. S. GRANT'S TRIBUTE.
[His endorsement on W. A. Gavett's official notification, as a member of the Detroit Commandery K. T. to attend Mr. Chandler's funeral.]