Week 2, part five

Visiting Arlington National Cemetery was a strange experience. We don’t have any cemeteries so vast in England. The atmosphere was a mixture of sobriety and pomp. The graves of the Kennedys are simple, with plain wooden crosses and plaques, but somehow they are all the more powerful that way. J.F Kennedy’s eternal flame (a constantly burning torch in his memory) is surrounded by some of his most famous quotes. The tomb of the Unknown Soldier is accompanied by a guard of honour, which march along an elevated white marble strip, armed and in uniform, and change position frequently, in a ceremony which everyone is required to stand for. I read on a sign, which I had to check twice, that over 2,000 men are buried in a mass civil war grave. All of this takes place in a setting of hills, streams and greenery, offset by Grecian style monuments. The view from the cemetery overlooks the entirety of D.C, because of the low-rise style of the District of Columbia’s buildings. The Pentagon is also visible on the right hand side, and is the next Metro stop on that line.

Panoramic view of D.C from the house of General Lee, preserved at the cemetry

 More darkly, Arlington National Cemetery is also a story of revenge. The cemetery was established on the family estate of General Robert E. Lee, leader of the Confederate forces during the American Civil War. This was so that even if the Confederate defeated the Union, General Lee would never be able to return home without being confronted daily by the graves of those who had died during the conflict, and the guilt that that would bring.

Looking back towards the Lincoln Memorial

 

Perhaps it is because the cemetery looks over the Washington monument, the Capitol building, the Lincoln memorial, but the place really extrudes an aura of being in the middle of history, rather than belonging firmly in the past. Even today hundreds flock to walk the well-trodden paths of the cemetery, to watch the guard changing and bells chiming over the hills. I couldn’t help but think that, on September the 11^th 2001, the plane which was driven into the Pentagon would have been visible to anyone standing towards the summit of the cemetery, by the graves of the Kennedys for example.

View of the Jefferson Memorial from the cemetry