Hatred, War Helped Create Arlington National Cemetery

Hatred is a terrible, ugly thing. It robs peace from those who allow it to harbor in their mind. Some may point to reasons to grasp it tightly. They may believe it valid to hate as justification for actions that, otherwise, they would never allow.
On Monday, we will observe Memorial Day. Note I did not say “celebrate,” but rather “observe.” The day is to be set aside for solemn remembrances, not festivities, although that is what is has become.
Recently, I was looking up some of the history of Arlington National Cemetery. It may be said that hatred is what caused the place to be preserved as our most revered national resting place for thousands of military heroes, recognized or who died simply doing their duty, following orders.
What amazed me most was to reflect on the acid-lke hatred that existed between those in the Union and those in the Confederacy. Some scars remain today. I don’t know if we can truly understand their loathing of each other. Perhaps some of us may think we know, but others are puzzled by hate.
Those of us who cling to religious beliefs of forgiveness and love may question what it was that motivated Montgomery Meigs, the man who, according to information about Arlington, was “a self-important man who despite his birth in Georgia had developed an intense hatred for the South since the start of the war.”
Meigs had served under then-Col. Robert E. Lee in the Engineer Corps in 1838. But, it seemed, there was a fault line that ran deep between Lee and Meigs for some unknown reason.
It did not help that Gen. and Mrs. Lee owned and lived in Arlington House that was a tribute to George Washington, who was a distant relative to Lee’s wife.
Since Meigs was filled with so much hatred, especially for the Confederates, he recommended that part of the farm be used as a military graveyard, thus rendering it no good to produce food.
The first soldiers to be laid to rest there were interred in May 1864. It was stated that about 2,600 bodies, “roughly the carnage of the Wilderness Campaign” were buried by June 30 of that year.
“. . .He (Meigs) expected to find the house nearly unapproachable due to the number of new graves. Instead, he found the mansion much as it had been when it was first occupied by federal troops. The graves had been neatly arranged some distance from the house. Furious, Meigs demanded that 26 bodies be brought immediately from Washington, and in the heat of that mid-August day, he personally supervised the burial of these fallen soldiers around Mrs. Lee’s once famous rose garden only yards from the house.” (Peters 26).
Fast forward to the end of the horrible war that divided our nation. The cannon were silent, but wounds were still fresh on torn bodies and in minds, both North and South.
There were many Confederate soldiers buried at Arlington. Beneath the sod, resting for the ages, they were separated from their Union counterparts. A group of North Carolina soldiers were buried in a section that was marked only with a pine board which was marked, “N.C. Rebel.”
Hatred, not quieted by death, extended beyond the grave.
“The surviving Confederate widows and veterans took great pains to honor their war dead, no matter how far away they might be. But friends of the Rebellion were not wanted within Arlington’s gates,” one historian wrote.
“When in 1868 a group of Southern women asked to place flowers at the Confederate graves, “they were curtly refused” to enter the grounds. Gen. John A. Logan of the Grand Army of the Republic ordered that the rebels be specifically ignored by the hundreds of volunteers who decorated Union graves that day.
This sort of treatment led many of the Southern families to reclaim their lost sons; writing in 1899 John Ball Osborne documented that of the 377 Confederate soldiers buried in the cemetery, 241 had been removed (32). This seems to indicate a desire on the part of Southern families to keep their dead off ground now held sacred to the enemy,” wrote another historian.
Those Confederate widows and veterans were not deterred from their mission.
The Raleigh Ladies’ Memorial Association during the latter part of September 1883 made arrangements to have the North Carolina soldiers buried at Arlington Cemetery returned home. In the first week of October 1883, the remains were disinterred and brought to Alexandria, Va. by undertaker Wheatley, where they were placed in four caskets for shipment to Raleigh,” according to another history of Arlington.
When their remains were finally buried with honor in their beloved state, Gov. Jarvis called them “patriot soldiers” who went forth at the command of their state and its governor. It was recorded that, among the 5,000 assembled at that solemn occasion, no sound was heard.
The four caskets were laid in two graves immediately south of the Confederate monument. Volleys were fired over the graves, after which the full honors of a marching salute were paid as the troops filed past. Over the two graves were placed two markers stating “Arlington Dead.”
On Monday, many of us will relive that moment somewhere. We will recall our own kin who fell in some war, killed by hatred.
We may ask “Why?” Why did they hate then? Why do we hate now? We know there is no answer.