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that I shall always remember. Harold Ickes stood beside me, and Harold Ickes sniffed, and tears rolled down his cheeks. I would hardly have believed it possible, but he was very, very moved by the whole situation, you know. And as we moved away, he said to me, “Oh, God, if this could only have been prevented.” It was that sort of--how dreadful it is to have to lay him away.
Well, I spoke to Henry Wallace, I remember, as we came out, and Henry and I sort of held each other's hand. Henry said, “That was good.”
I said, “Yes, it was good.”
And Mary Norton said to me--she was a member of the Congressional delegation--“That was very beautiful, the most beautiful funeral I ever went to”, and she sort of gulped, you know, as one does. And it was very beautiful. Of course, as a matter of fact, the coffin was covered with the flag. That was the only sign that he had been more than an ordinary citizen. And the flag was folded up in the usual military fashion, you see, and given to Elliott, who presented it to his mother. I'm not sure if it was to Elliott or James, but to one of the boys, who presented it to Mrs. Roosevelt.
She stood. I mean, she stood for a large part of it, Certainly for the whole interrment, the last part of it, she stood up, and didn't act like a frail rood at all.
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