Arlington National Cemetery

Arlington Mansion and 200 acres of ground immediately surrounding it were designated officially as a military cemetery in 1864.  More than 300,000 people are buried at Arlington Cemetery, including veterans from all the nation’s wars, from the American Revolution through Iraq and Afghanistan. Pre-Civil War dead were reinterred after 1900.  The federal government dedicated a model community for freed slaves, Freedman’s Village, near the current Memorial Amphitheater in 1863. More than 1,100 freed slaves were given land by the government, where they farmed and lived during and after the Civil War. They were turned out in 1890 when the estate was repurchased by the government and dedicated as a military installation. In Section 27, are buried more than 3,800 former slaves. Their headstones are designated with the word “Civilian” or “Citizen.”

Arlington National Cemetery is administered by the Department of the Army. Arlington House (Custis-Lee Mansion) and the grounds in its immediate vicinity are administered by the National Park Service.  The flags in Arlington National Cemetery are flown at half-staff from a half hour before the first funeral until a half hour after the last funeral each day. Funerals are normally conducted five days a week, excluding weekends.  Funerals, including interments and inurnments, average 28 a day. With more than 300,000 people buried, Arlington National Cemetery has the second-largest number of people buried of any national cemetery in the United States. Arlington National Cemetery conducts approximately 6,400 burials each year.  The Tomb of the Unknowns is made from Yule marble quarried in Colorado. It consists of seven pieces, with a total weight of 79 tons. The Tomb was completed in 1932. (Adapted from: ArlingtonCemetery.org)

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