PARK AND CEMETERY. 
784 
THE STORY OF OUR NATIONAL CEMETERIES 
Modern nations build stately mauso- 
leums for their great generals, but 
are usually content to allot only the 
hasty trench or ditch to the common 
soldier. The bones of British sol- 
diers, for example, are scattered the 
world around, says Kipling; 
“Walk wide o’ the Widow at Wind- 
sor 
For ’alf o’ creation she owns; 
We ’ave bought ’er the same with 
the sword an’ the flame. 
An’ we’ve salted it down with our 
bones. 
(Poor beggars! — It’s blue with our 
bones!)’’ 
To this rule of indifference as to the 
final resting place of obscure heroes 
the United §tates forms an honor- 
able exception. There are today 
eighty-four national cemeteries, which 
contain the graves of some 360,000 
American soldiers and sailors. 
These cemeteries are among the 
finest of “God's acres” in the world 
and are lovingly cared for by a large 
corps of superintendents, overseers 
and gardeners. 
The national cemeteries are mainly 
a result of the civil war. In Septem- 
ber, 1861, the secretary of war, by 
general order, directed accurate and 
permanent records to be kept of de- 
ceased soldiers and their places of 
burial. The work was assigned to the 
quartermaster general’s department. 
That department already had charge 
of the burial of officers and soldiers, 
but its care had ordinarily ended with 
the drifting smoke of the guns that 
were discharged over their graves. 
By act of July 17, 1862, congress 
empowered the president to purchase 
cemetery grounds, to be used for the 
burial of “soldiers who shall die in 
the service of their country.” Such 
was the intensity of the great war 
that for some time no action was 
taken under the law. 
Following the battle of Gettysburg, 
Governor Curtin of Pennsylvania in- 
augurated a movement whereby sev- 
eral states purchased seventeen acres 
of ground embracing the center of the 
union line and caused to be disin- 
terred and reburied there the bodies 
of the soldiers who had been buried 
outside this area. The cemetery was 
dedicated by Lincoln, November 19, 
1863, in that perfect tribute to the 
“honored dead” who there “gave the 
last full measure of devotion.” The 
cemetery was subsequently taken over 
by the nation. 
The cemeteries at Antietam, Mur- 
freesboro, Chattanooga and other 
places were likewise begun by states 
or by federal troops acting under or- 
ders of their commanders. That at 
Chattanooga was largely^ the result of 
the activity of Gen. George H. Thom- 
as, in charge of the department. It is 
related that when the work of rein- 
terring the dead was proceeding a 
question arose as to whether they 
should be buried together according 
to the states from which they came. 
“We have heard enough about 
states and states’ rights lately,” said 
Thomas, who, though a Virginian, 
had remained loyal to the union. 
“Let us mix them up and nationalize 
them a little.” 
Other cemeteries sprang up by 
mere accumulation of interments 
about military centers, hospitals, 
prisons, etc. At Andersonville, for 
example, the dead were buried by 
parties of their comrades, who not- 
withstanding the horrors of their own 
lot, took pious care to keep accurate 
records and even erected many rude 
headboards. From first to last about 
50,000 men were confined at Ander- 
sonville. In August, 1864, there were 
32,193 prisoners penned in that dread 
area, the greatest number at any one 
time. The first death occurred Febru- 
ary 27, 1864; the last, April 28, 1865. 
In that short period there was a total 
of 12,912 — a mortality of 25 per cent. 
In the summer of 1865, a force of 
men under Capt. James Moore were 
sent to Andersonville to inclose the 
grounds and provide headboards for 
each grave. They were able to identi- 
fy 12,461 of the graves, leaving only 
451 “unknown.” The world famous 
nurse. Miss Clara Barton, accompa- 
nied this expedition, and wrote a re- 
port so vir id that the reader cannot 
avoid the impression that he is view- 
ing the scenes she describes. 
Immediately after the war the work 
of formally establishing national cem- 
eteries in places where union soldiers 
and sailors were buried proceeded 
rapidly. The last such cemetery to 
be established was that at Greene- 
ville, Tenn., provided for by an act 
of congress approved June 12, 1906. 
This cemetery contains the tomb of 
former I’resident Johnson and only 
ten others, though it has an area of 
fifteen acres. 
The eighty-four national cemeteries 
are divided according to importance 
into twenty-six first-class, twenty sec- 
ond-class, sixteen third-class and 
twenty-two fourth-class. Those in 
the first class include Arlington, An- 
dersonville, Antietam, Chalmette, 
Chattanooga, Nashville, Corinth, 
Gettysburg, Fredericksburg, Jefferson 
Barracks, Shiloh and Vicksburg. 
In the number of interments, that 
at Arlington stands first, with about 
22,000. That at Vicksburg is a rather 
close second, with 16,892. The Nash- 
ville cemetery is third, with 16,691. 
Arlington, as is generally known, 
formerly belonged to the wife of Gen. 
Robert E. Lee. Mrs. Lee was a 
daughter of George Washington 
Parke Custis, who was a grandson 
of Martha Washington. The stately 
mansion whose classic columns have 
been seen by every visitor to Wash- 
ington Citjq was inherited by her, 
and at the outbreak of the Civil war 
it was the Lee home. Lee, then a 
colonel in the United States army, 
wrote his resignation there, April 20, 
1861. Two days later he quitted his 
beautiful home forever to accept com- 
mand in the military forces of his 
state. 
In 1864 the estate was sold for tax- 
es by the “rump” Union government 
of Virginia, and was bought by the 
national government, which set it 
apart as a cemetery. After the war 
Lee considered making an attempt to 
regain the property, but finally de- 
cided that the time was not ripe. 
