Book details artist's Civil War interviews

NEW YORK -- Late in his life, artist James Edward Kelly tried to publish his memoirs, a book that would have featured his colorful interviews with the many Civil War figures who posed for him. But by then, the Great Depression had set in and publishers told him no one was interested in a war long past... The book, "Generals in Bronze," comes out Nov. 1, and is already generating tremendous buzz in the world of Civil War buffs... One general told Kelly how Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's drinking had led him to resign as a captain in 1854. The account claims that Grant remarked: "I'll make my mark yet. I don't propose to remain in the gutter."... Kelly, born in New York in 1855, had demonstrated an aptitude for art early in life. His work appeared in publications including Scribner's and Harper's. Five of his bronze reliefs adorn the Monmouth Battle Monument in Freehold, N.J... The artist died at age 77 in 1933. He had no known survivors. When Styple looked for Kelly's grave in St. Raymond's Cemetery in the Bronx, he found that it was unmarked."