Patriot Name: David Kennison
Type of Service Provided: Boston Tea Party participant, maybe
Cemetery Name: in Lincoln Park, Chicago, IL
Text of the Grave Marker:
In Memory of - David Kennison, the last survivor of the `Boston Tea Party,` who died in Chicago, February 24, 1852, aged 115 yrs, 3 mos, 17 da, and is buried near this spot; this stone is erected by the Sons of the Revolution, the Sons of the American Revolution, the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Grave Marker Type: Stone with aluminum marker
Historical Background:
But there is controversy. According to the Encyclopedia of Chicago: David Kennison arrived in Chicago in the 1840s as an old man. He was a veteran of the War of 1812, but became a local celebrity by falsely claiming to be the last survivor of the Boston Tea Party and a veteran of the Revolution. Though historians have established that he was approximately 85 years old when he died in 1852, Chicagoans believed he was 115, and buried him with the pomp they thought was owed to the last survivor of the Tea Party. In 1903 aging Chicagoans who still remembered the 1850s erected a monument to Kennison at his gravesite in Lincoln Park.
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