William Curtis Wood's broken column headstone features some ivy leaves.
It is located in Grove Street Cemetery, a historic urban cemetery close to the Yale University Campus. It is on the National Registry of Historic Places and is the final resting place of two Nobel laureates. In addition, there are many Yale professors, including a small section for scientists. Eli Whitney and Noah Webster are also buried here.
In a booklet compiled in 1878 for the class of 1868 containing updates for the alumni there is a beautiful tribute to him. This book can be found via Google Books as "Yale University, New Haven, Conn. Class of 1868 - Pamphlet box." Source: (
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"William Curtis Wood was born April 20, 1849, at Mahabaleschwar, a health resort, about thirty miles from Satara, where his parents were then stationed as missionaries of the American Board. At an early age he came to this country and took up his residence with his grandparents at Groton, Mass, where he fitted for college. He came to New Haven with no expectation of taking high honors in his class. No vision of Valedictory at Yale had floated through his modest brain while he pursued his preparatory studies at the academy. When we first came together in the old Lyceum he was a mere lad. It soon, however, became evident to us all that he was to be one of the marked men of the class. He took the Woolsey Scholarship, led the class Sophomore year, and graduated as Salutatorian with a stand for 3.67.
No man had a purer soul than William C. Wood. He had no affinity with anything mean or vile; still he was no ascetic. The year after graduation he taught in the Hopkins Grammar School. Teaching put a heavy tax upon his sensitive nervous organization, and aggravated a trouble in the heart, which first showed itself in his boyhood. In the fall of 1869 he was elected to a tutorship in the college. He filled the place with conspicuous dignity for several months, but was compelled to resign owing to ill health. Some moths later he went West, where he remained for a time with relatives, and recruited his strength to a limited degree. In 1871 he returned to New Haven, where he continued to reside until his death. Here he gave private instruction, devoted himself to the study of philosophy and science, and later prepared himself for a position in the Patent Office, to which he had been appointed to President Woolsey. No one can tell what he might have been had his crescent powers reached their full strength. In the words of Hawthorne, he was "worn out by the very strength of his genius before half his life was lived."
He died at Tremont House, New Haven, July 15, 1875, at the early age of twenty-six. He was buried in the college lot in the old cemetery, New Haven, and a chaste marble monument, erected by one of his classmates, marks his final resting place.
"His life was gentle; and the elements
So mixed in him, that nature might stand up
And say to all the world, this was a man!"
APT [waymarker's note: I believe APT is Anson Phelps Tinker, a classmate who became a pastor]
An obituary in the Fitchburg Sentinel retrieved from newspapers.com revealed that William C. Wood died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the heart.