LOVELL K. REYNOLDS, LT, USN
Lovell Reynolds '76
Lovell Knowles Reynolds was admitted to the Naval Academy from Alabama on June 5, 1871 at age 14 years 4 months.
Prior to the publication of the Lucky Bag in 1894, most portraits of officers and midshipmen of the Naval Academy were captured in yearly photo albums. The album for 1876 is available in the collections of the Naval Academy's Digital Collections.
Special thank you to historian Kathy Franz for identifying this resource and then extracting several dozen photographs for this site.
Prior to the publication of the Lucky Bag in 1894, most portraits of officers and midshipmen of the Naval Academy were captured in yearly photo albums. The album for 1876 is available in the collections of the Naval Academy's Digital Collections.
Special thank you to historian Kathy Franz for identifying this resource and then extracting several dozen photographs for this site.
Loss
From Find A Grave:
Washington, February 17, 1893. Lieutenant Lovell K. Reynolds died in Washington yesterday from the effects of injuries received when he was run over by a horse car the day before. He was appointed to the Naval Academy from Alabama, was graduated in 1871 and attained his rank of senior Lieutenant in 1891. He was attached to the Coast Survey Steamer Endeavor.
Biography
From researcher Kathy Franz:
Lovell was born in Keokuk, Iowa. The family later lived in Montgomery, Alabama, and Washington, D.C. His father was the late Captain Robert M. Reynolds who had served in the 1st Iowa Cavalry and had been First Auditor of the Treasury. His mother was Orpha, his brothers were Robert and Frank, and his sister was Susan.
After graduating from the Naval Academy, Lovell was on the Hartford and then on the Constellation. The St. Louis Dispatch on March 5, 1893, remembered his gallantry during that voyage.
“In November 1879, while on a voyage from New York to Gibraltar, as ensign attached to the United States ship Constellation, a vessel was sighted showing signals of distress. A terrible storm was raging, and after the ship had approached as near as practicable, the life boat was manned with Ensign Reynolds in charge. So heavy was the sea that it seemed more than doubtful whether he and his companions could possibly escape destruction. By 8 o’clock that evening they had saved all but two of the crew of the Austrian bark Olivo. When he reported to the officer of the deck he was told that the Constellation would stand by the disabled vessel until daylight. Reynolds replied that she could not live through the night. A new lifeboat crew was ordered away and the two men were saved.
Reynolds swam from the boat to the wreck, poured oil over the cabin and set it afire; then returned to his ship after fourteen hours’ fight with the hungry waves to save as many lives. For this gallant deed he received – by permission of Congress – from the Austrian Government, the decoration of the Royal and Imperial Order of Francis (Franz) Joseph; and also a gold medal from the Life Saving Benevolent Association of New York.”
Lovell then served on Trenton, Kearsage, and then was a member of the Greely Relief Expedition on the steamer Bear in which the newspaper wrote that he “greatly distinguished himself.” He then spent the next seven years serving on the training ship Jamestown, the Alliance, the receiving ship Vermont, and finally the Coast Survey Endeavor. The newspaper wrote: “At the time of his death this gallant sailor and noble gentleman was in command of the United States coast survey steamer Endeavor. That, after so many desperate perils, he should die as he did, seems the very irony of fate.”
Lovell was trying to board a grip car while it was passing the Riggs Hotel in Washington, D.C. He missed his footing and his legs were broken at both knees by the wheels of the car. The gripman immediately applied the brakes, but Lovell was dragged some distance. They needed to lift the car before they could extricate Lovell from underneath it. He was taken to the hospital, but the ordeal was too much for him, and he died the next morning.
Lovell’s father also died in an accident in 1885. He fell over a railing from the third floor of a St. Louis Hotel into its rotunda. He had dressed himself early that morning. His room was full of gas, but the windows were open. An acquaintance said that he suffered from vertigo at times from a war injury. Lovell went to see the coroner to reverse the earlier decision of suicide. He told a reporter, “It is absurd … You see in the first place he was a man of a happy and cheerful disposition, who enjoyed life thoroughly. He has been in the harness for a long time, and this was his first holiday. When I last saw him he was full of plans for our summer vacation together in the mountains. I had fixed my official duties so as to be able to get away and go with him. There was no reason, whatever, why he should have done anything of the sort. [His finances] were in excellent shape. He had lately finished our home in Washington, which cost $15,000, of which but $5,000 remained to be paid. He had four other good houses in Washington all paid for, and seven or eight hundred acres of land in Kansas, stocked with several hundred head of livestock. He was comfortably well off, and I know that he regarded his release from the Treasury Department as a genuine holiday.”
Career
From Naval History and Heritage Command:
Midshipman, 5 June, 1871. Graduated 20 June 1876. Ensign, 28 December, 1878. Lieutenant, Junior Grade, 9 January, 1886. Lieutenant, 25 June, 1891. Died 16 February, 1893.
Memorial Hall Error
Lovell's loss does not meet the criteria for inclusion in Memorial Hall.
Lovell is one of 3 members of the Class of 1876 on Virtual Memorial Hall.
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