What Is The Significance Of On Hallowed Ground Affect The Arlington National Cemetery

On Hallowed Ground, written by Robert M. Poole, lives to tell the story of how Arlington National Cemetery came to be. On June 15th, 1864, General Montgomery Meiggs officially makes the Arlington National Cemetery become reality by making the land that once was the Arlington plantation, now an official union military cemetery. The property the Arlington National Cemetery sits on today was once owned by Robert E. Lee and Mary Curtis Lee. However, during and after the Civil War, the U.S. government was desperately trying to find areas to bury all the dead bodies from the war. Union troops and the union alike thought the union had complete control and right to own the Arlington plantation as the government created a fake auction to make it seem

government deciding to bury union troops on the Arlington plantation and ultimately deciding to make the property the Arlington National Cemetery. However, with building this cemetery for the fallen union troops, many elements came into play, such as the legal case between the Lee Family and the United States along with the discrimination and inequality of the cemetery. These elements along with others affected the Arlington National Cemetery in design, purpose and historical legacy. While all elements were significant, the element of how Lee’s mansion and property was affected throughout the Civil War proved to have the greatest significance on historical legacy and design of the cemetery due to affecting the Lee family legacy which was important in the history of the United States, but also it had the greatest effect on the purpose of the cemetery because changing the property’s original purpose allowed the cemetery to serve its true

Before the war, Lee is described as to be pushing his slaves to trying to get his property back to greatness: “Using as many of Arlington’s sixty-three slaves as he could press into service, Lee drained and fertilized the fields, planted oats, and corn, restored the fences, attacked encroaching brush.” (Poole 12). Before the war even started, Lee’s property’s main purpose was to ultimately make a profit using slaves. It wasn’t used to help send off the dead soldiers into another life properly, to respect the soldiers, nor was it used to protect public health from all the dead bodies soaking up all the current graves. Later on however, the purpose of the property was changed with the area starting to perform burials. “It was an act of improvisation born of necessity to process the war’s carnage before it became a public health or a public relations nuisance” (Poole 58). The purpose of the Arlington National Cemetery at first was to protect public health and relations, but the thing is, the property that was once used to make a profit for one man and his family, was now having the purpose of sending the Union soldiers off into the next life. Lee’s property starting to take burials towards the end of the war