COLUMBIA | Strom Thurmond, history's longest-serving senator, traveled one last time over the long road to Edgefield to be buried where he was born more than 100 years ago.

He was eulogized Tuesday in Columbia by black and white, Democrat and Republican, as a man who redeemed himself by changing with the times.

Thurmond's flag-draped casket, which was on display for three days in South Carolina's Statehouse rotunda, was brought to the cavernous First Baptist Church by a horse-drawn caisson that clip-clopped through streets lined with mourners who watched silently in a drizzly rain.

An Army band played the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" as military pallbearers carried the casket down the south side of the Statehouse. An honor guard carried the flags of the United States, South Carolina and all military branches.

Thurmond, who died Thursday, retired in January after 48 years in Washington.

But during his lifetime he was also a teacher, a judge, a soldier; a Democrat, a Dixiecrat, a Republican; a governor, a presidential candidate, a U.S. Senator; a husband, a father, and in his last days, a grandfather.

Friends and colleagues from Thurmond's half century in Washington made the trip to Columbia to pay their respects. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld joined Vice President Dick Cheney to honor Thurmond's unshakeable support for a strong U.S. military. Former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan., flew in. Scores of aides and former aides, some still fresh-faced, some aged, gathered to salute the patriarch.

"There has never been a political career quite like Strom Thurmond's," said Cheney.

But mostly, it was South Carolinians who marked the man's passing.

"Our remembrance might differ somewhat" from the easy analysis of the cable pundits, the Rev. Wendell R. Estep said at the opening of the service. "We remember him as a friend."

He worked for the common people all through his life. Rare was the South Carolinian who missed a Social Security check without Thurmond dispatching his staff to find it, and rarer still was a constituent who won an award or lost a loved one without an appropriate message from the senator.

The word "courage" also kept coming up - speakers recalled times when Thurmond was right and times when he was wrong but never a time when he wasn't stalwart.

Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Delaware, said he entered the Senate at age 29 in hostile disagreement with Thurmond over most issues, most notably civil rights.

But, he said, he watched Thurmond change over the years, and the two ultimately became close friends.

"I grew to know him, and I looked into his heart," Biden said. "I tried to understand him, I learned from him, and I watched him change."

Rep. Tracy Edge, R-North Myrtle Beach, said the eulogies all had the common theme that Strom changed with the times. "It was a nice tribute to Senator Thurmond."

In the grandest funeral in South Carolina since Sen. John C. Calhoun was buried in 1850, Thurmond's body was led out of the church by a military guard and a bagpiper playing "Amazing Grace." The family followed behind.

Thurmond's wife, Nancy, was flanked by their two sons and the couple's daughter, Julie. Last month, Julie gave birth to a son; it was Thurmond's first grandchild.

Thurmond's body was taken from the city where he led a segregated state as governor in the late 1940s along the stretch of interstate that bears his name and to a rural family burial plot in the town of Edgefield, where he was born and died.

In Edgefield and along Interstate 20 between the funeral and the burial, people were standing on the overpasses and on the sides of the road to bid farewell to Thurmond.

Some people on the overpasses held flags, others just pulled their cars over and parked on bridges to watch the procession, which stretched more than a mile.

When the funeral caisson stopped between the courthouse and Thurmond's statue on the square, the broad sidewalks and green expanse of the plaza were lined with mourners and the curious.

The Ten Governors Cafe was closed, as were most of the other businesses on the square. Some had wreaths on their doors.

Nearly 1,200 people attended the graveside ceremony at Willowbrook Cemetery, sometimes under heavy rainfall.

Painted on the outside wall of Mims store is a 1932 quote from journalist W.W. Ball:

"Edgefield has had more dashing, brilliant, romantic figures, statesmen, orators, soldiers, adventurers and daredevils, than any other county of South Carolina, if not any rural county of America."

The town said goodbye to one of those brilliant figures Tuesday.

The Associated Press, Knight Ridder and The Washington Post contributed to this report.

Contact ERIN REED at 399-8738 or ereed@thesunnews.com.

'One of the last times that I visited Senator Thurmond was in his room at the Edgefield County Hospital when he was clearly in a very weakened condition and barely able to move on his bed. As I was leaving, he said to me, "Is there anything I can do for you?" Indeed, Strom Thurmond's entire life can be summed up in two simple words: "helping people." From early childhood until the day of his death, his life was governed by a strong sense of responsibility to help his fellow man.'

Bettis Rainsford | longtime family friend

Duane Oliver | Horry County GOP chairman

U.S. Sen. Joseph Biden | D-Del.

Judge Billy Wilkins | U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals Chief

'We remember him as a friend.'

The Rev. Wendell R. Estep | At the opening of the service

Rep. Tracy Edge | R-North Myrtle Beach

Sen. Kay Patterson | D-Columbia