A National Cemetery System (Historical Marker)

Here follows the inscription written on this roadside historical marker:

A National Cemetery System
Civil War Dead
An estimated 700,000 Union and Confederate soldiers died in the Civil War between April 1861 and April 1865. As the death toll rose, the U.S. government struggled with the urgent but unplanned need to bury fallen Union troops. This propelled the creation of a national cemetery system.

On September 11, 1861, the War Department directed commanding officers to keep "accurate and permanent records of deceased soldiers." It also required the U.S. Army Quartermaster General, the office responsible for administering the needs of the troops in life and in death, to mark each grave with a headboard. A few months later, the department mandated interment of the dead in graves marked with numbered headboards, recorded in a register.

Creating National Cemeteries
The authority to create military burial grounds came in an Omnibus Act of July 17, 1862. It directed the president to purchase land to be used as "a national cemetery for the soldiers who shall die in the service of the country." Fourteen national cemeteries were established by 1862.

When hostilities ended, a grim task began. In October 1865, Quartermaster General Montgomery C. Megis directed officers to survey lands in the Civil War theater to find Union dead and plan to reinter them in new national cemeteries. Cemetery sites were chosen where troops were concentrated: camps, hospitals, battlefields, railroad hubs. By 1872, 74 national cemeteries and several soldiers' lots contained 305,492 remains, about 45 percent were unknown.

Most cemeteries were less than 10 acres, and layouts varied. In the Act to Establish and to Protect National Cemeteries of February 22, 1867, Congress funded new permanent walls or fences, grave markers, and lodges for cemetery superintendents.

At first only soldiers and sailors who died during the Civil War were buried in national cemeteries. In 1873, eligibility was expanded to all honorably discharged Union veterans, and Congress appropriated $1 million to mark the graves. Upright marble headstones honor individuals whose names were known; 6-inch-square blocks mark unknowns.

By 1873, military post cemeteries on the Western frontier joined the national cemetery system. The National Cemeteries Act of 1973 transferred 82 Army cemeteries, including 12 of the original 14, to what is now the National Cemetery Association.

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Reflection and Memorialization
The country reflected upon the Civil War's human toll - 2 percent of the U.S. population died. Memorials honoring war service were built in national cemeteries. Most were donated by regimental units, state governments and veterans' organizations such as the Grand Army of the Republic. Decoration Day, later Memorial Day, was a popular patriotic spring event that started in 1868. Visitors placed flowers on graves and monuments, and gathered around rostrums to hear speeches. Construction of Civil War monuments peaked in the 1890s. By 1920, as the number of aging veterans was dwindling, more than 120 monuments had been placed in the national cemeteries.

Erected 2015 by U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Cemetery Administration.

Closeup of detail on marker:
Soldiers' graves near General Hospital, City Point, Va., c. 1863. Library of Congress

Closeup of detail on marker:
Knoxville was established after the siege of the city and Battle of Fort Sanders in 1863. Cemetery plan, 1892, National Archives and Records Administration.

Closeup of detail on marker:
Lodge at City Point, Va., pre-1928. The first floor contained a cemetery office, and living room and kitchen for the superintendent's family; three bedrooms were upstairs.

Closeup of detail on marker:
National cemetery monuments, left to right: Massachusetts Monument, Winchester, Va., 1907; Maryland Sons Monument, Loudon Park, Baltimore, Md, 1885; and Women's Relief Corps/Grand Army of the Republic Monument to the Unknown Dead, Crown Hill, Indianapolis, Ind., 1889.


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Here follows an excerpt about the history of the cemetery as published by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs on their website:

Alexandria National Cemetery is located near the Old Town section of Alexandria, VA, amid several other community cemeteries. The original cemetery consisted of approximately four acres known as Spring Garden Farm. Most of this land was acquired by the United States in the 1860s, and by November 1870 the cemetery had reached its current size of a little over five acres.

Alexandria was one of the principal campsites for Union soldiers sent to defend Washington, DC, at the outbreak of the Civil War. These troops, composed primarily of "three-month volunteers," were unprepared for the demands of war. When they tried to turn the Southern advance at Bull Run, they were decisively defeated and hastily retreated back to Washington. At one point in the war, General Robert E. Lee and his Southern troops rode the outskirts of Alexandria where they were close enough to view the Capital dome. As the tide of the war turned, especially after Gettysburg, the frontlines of the war moved west and away from Washington, DC. The fortress area at Alexandria, however, continued to serve as a major supply and replacement center throughout the remainder of the war.

Alexandria National Cemetery is one of the original 14 national cemeteries established in 1862. The first burials made in the cemetery were soldiers who died during training or from disease in the numerous hospitals around Alexandria. By 1864, the cemetery was nearly filled to capacity, which eventually led to the planning, development and construction of Arlington National Cemetery.

As of 1871, Alexandria National Cemetery encompassed a cobblestone avenue, a fountain, an ornate wrought-iron rostrum, graveled walks and paths, a small pond and a greenhouse. Today, the superintendent's lodge is the primary building on the grounds and the oldest surviving structure. It was constructed of reddish Seneca sandstone and brick around 1870. Seneca sandstone was popular during Washington, DC's, "brownstone era" (1840–1880), and can be found in many of the region's prominent buildings, including the Smithsonian Institution "Castle," and the U.S. Capitol floor and rotunda door frames. U.S. Quartermaster General Montgomery C. Meigs designed the lodge in a Second French Empire style; approximately 55 of these lodges were constructed in national cemeteries between 1870 and the end of the century.

The original 1887 "comfort station" at Alexandria was converted into a kitchen/store room and tool shed/toilet when a brick summer dining room was added in 1927. Although significantly altered, the old comfort station is one of few structures like these to survive. The 16-foot ornamental iron rostrum with a capacity to hold 24 chairs and one table was demolished sometime after 1931. An enclosure wall constructed of Seneca sandstone with River Blue Stone coping surrounds the property; visitors pass through 12-foot wide ornamental cast-iron entry gates at the Wilkes Street entrance.

During the 1930s, the Civilian Works Administration (CWA) made general repairs to the lodge and outbuildings and erected a new flagpole. Alexandria National Cemetery was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1995.

Monuments and Memorials:
One large granite boulder memorial was erected by the U.S. government on July 7, 1922, in honor of the Pursuers of President Lincoln's Assassin. The four men were Quartermaster Corps employees who drowned in the Potomac River on April 24, 1865, while pursuing John Wilkes Booth.


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Here follows an excerpt from the Annandale Chamber of Commerce website:

Alexandria National Cemetery
By: Marv Rodney, ENDEAVOR April 2012

Prior to the creation of The Alexandria National Cemetery was originally founded as the Soldiers' Cemetery in 1862.hat all Washingtonians simply refer to as Arlington, various military cemeteries were created. Collectively they are considered national cemeteries both in the US and abroad. One of the oldest is the Alexandria National Cemetery, established in 1862 as the Soldiers’ Cemetery, and located six blocks west of U.S. Highway 1 in the city of Alexandria. The need for military burial ground was especially great with the massive death toll of the Civil War, especially in Virginia where sixty percent of all Civil War battles took place.

The main entrance to the Alexandria National Cemetery is on Wilkes Street. It is the last in a series of aged cemeteries along this lane with graves dating back to the 18th century. An impressive twelve foot wide ornamental wrought and cast iron gate marks the entryway. Defining this relatively small property as a place of importance is a substantial red sandstone wall. It anchors this undulating ground as if to declare, “This ground, in perpetuity, is where heroes lie.”

The graves are marked with simple & dignified white marble headstones laid out like a regiment of soldiers with every two rows facing one another. Remembered for all time are 4,230 men who served in the Union Army of the Potomac.

The City of Alexandria was the site of one of the principal camps for northern Virginia troops sent to defend Washington at the outbreak of hostilities between the North and South. Here, in response to the popular slogan, “On to Richmond,” the Union Army of the Potomac was assembled from a miscellaneous collection of militia regiments. The force was approximately 2,000 strong and 722 of these men, thirty-six percent of the total force, both African American and Caucasian were native Alexandrians in local units.

Located within the city of Alexandria were a number of hospitals and convalescent centers for Federal troops wounded in the field. The Alexandria National Cemetery served as the burial ground for soldiers who died there and in the surrounding area. Two famous hospitals were at Camp Hall, a private residence seized by Union Troops and converted to a hospital at 806 Prince Street and Greens Mansion House Hotel (directly in front of the Carlyle House) along with the property that surrounded it at 121 North Fairfax Street. Known as the Manson House General Hospital, it was a 700 bed facility where Walt Whitman once visited.

The original superintendent’s lodge at the cemetery was constructed in 1862 and destroyed by fire in 1878. Nine years later, a brick Italianate utility building was extended from the original lodge which added a kitchen, store-room, and tool room. Landscaped by ancient yews and substantial boxwood shrubbery, this L-shaped lodge is of the Second Empire style and adds a warm and interesting welcome to the entrance. The first floor has an impressive ten foot ceiling height while three bedrooms can be found on the second floor, one of which has a corner partition for a hall bathroom.

In 1880, the City of Alexandria designated a tree estimated to be 200 years old, as an Alexandria Centennial Tree. It is a Liquidambar styracifua species and graciously shades the central portion of the cemetery. Much later, in 1946, a fieldstone and slate assembly area with flagpole was added where ceremonies to honor these veterans could be conducted. This assembly area is surrounded by low fieldstone walls with stone steps leading down from the flag to the plaza, facing away from the entrance gates and lodge. Although aligned with the main gate, by simply lowering the plaza, the tombstones are respectively allowed to remain the dominant feature.

Dignified white headstones stand as a regiment in this field for over 4,200 soldiers.

A final feature at this solemn yet beautiful place is a special monument, erected on July 7, 1922 by the United States Government in memory of the men who died while in pursuit of John Wilkes Booth. The monument is a bronze tablet on a granite boulder base and located in the center of the ceremonial flag plaza.

The four members of the Quartermaster Corps honored by this monument drowned in the Rappahannock River on April 24, 1865, while in pursuit of Abraham Lincoln’s assassin. They are buried in Section A, Graves 3174 – 3177. By 1864 this hollowed ground was almost filled to capacity which led to the development of the Arlington National Cemetery, the subject of next quarter’s edition of ENDEAVOR.

Listed in the National Register of Historic Places, Alexandria National Cemetery is administered by the Veterans Administration. For more photos, please see the April 2012 issue of ENDEAVOR on this website.