Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial
By early 1864, the military cemeteries of Washington, D.C., and Alexandria, Virginia, were rapidly filling with war dead. Quartermaster General of the United States Army Montgomery C. Meigs proposed using of the Arlington estate as a cemetery. United States Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton approved the establishment of a military cemetery on June 15, 1864, creating Arlington National Cemetery. Meigs believed that since Lee had committed treason in deciding to fight against the Union, denying Lee use of the mansion after the war was a rough form of justice. Meigs decided that a large number of burials should occur close to Arlington House to render it unlivable. Officers were to be buried next to the main flower garden south of the house, and the first burial occurred here on May 17. Meigs ordered that additional burials commence immediately on the grounds of Arlington House in mid-June. When Union officers bivouacked in the mansion complained and had the burials temporarily stopped, Meigs countermanded their orders and had another 44 dead officers buried along the southern and eastern sides of the main flower garden within a month.
Baltimore National Cemetery
The area of the Baltimore National Cemetery was once part of an elevated site in Baltimore, referred to as early as 1750 as the Cloud Capped estate. It was originally owned by the Baltimore Company and Charles Carroll of Carrollton. In 1890 it was acquired by Blanchard and Susan Randall. When the nearby Loudon Park National Cemetery was deemed full, the War Department surveyed the area for a new site. In 1936 the federal government took possession of the land for a cost of $95,000, and began converting the estate to "Little Arlington". The old mansion was demolished, fences were put up, roads were constructed, and landscaping was done as part of a Works Progress Administration to invest in infrastructure during the Great Depression.The first interment took place on December 22, 1936, but the cemetery was not formally dedicated until May 30, 1941.