BI

BLIOGRAPHY

ie

ar tes

—— er


Soon after their marriage, the Custis’s began to refer to their home as Arlington House,
instead of Mount Washington.*+ Most likely the name was adopted from Arlington on the
Eastern Shore, a plantation which had been purchased by John Custis IV, G.W.P.’s great
grandfather and well-known plantsman, about one hundred years earlier. Arlington on the
Eastern Shore was approximately 500 acres and included a cemetery of the Custis family. By
1822, when G.W.P. Custis had the “old Arlington” property surveyed, only the chimney of the
manor house remained.°5

For the first thirteen years of the Custis’s life at Arlington, the construction on the cen-
tral portion of the house was halted due to a lack of funds. They lived in the two brick wings,
which were separated by an open yard approximately fifty-eight feet wide, perhaps connected
by a temporary hyphen structure or walkway. Though the design of the gardens around the
mansion at this time is unknown, evidence of continued development on and around the estate
exists. For instance in 1807 Custis began construction of flour and saw mills on the
Washington Forest Tract, an eleven-hundred-acre forested property along Four Mile Run
inherited by Custis at the death of Washington. These custom mills were small scale business
ventures serving only the needs of Custis and people of the immediate area.5© Throughout his
life, Custis would also sell land lots of timber from the Washington Forest Tract to supplement
his income. Interestingly he proposed a short lived development scheme—attempting to sub-
divide the Washington Forest Tract to develop a town named Mount Vernon.*7 In this Custis
was perhaps ahead of his time, for there was little interest in the lots, and the development
never occurred.

Washington, Georgetown and Alexandria, however, continued to grow in population.
In 1808, the Washington and Alexandria Turnpike Company was organized in Alexandria by
Jonah Thompson to construct the Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike from Long Bridge,
which was called Bridgepoint, on Alexander's Island south to the town of Alexandria. The fol-
lowing year a road was built from the ferry landing across from Analostan Island south through
Custis’s land to the Columbia Turnpike.58 No doubt this improved transportation—both the
Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike, and Custis’s ferry which had begun its route in 1807—
increased the property value of the Arlington Estate, or at the least enhanced the return from
the market garden and field crops.

Custis continued to promote the need for agricultural improvement in the country,
especially in the south. In describing his plan to form a National Board of Agriculture in 1810,
he elaborated on the state of American farming,

No country ever suffered more from the want of agricultural improvement than ours. The
general tillage of many parts of the union is a plunder of the soil and a robbery .. . what
must be the reflections of the foreigner on beholding the state of agricultural improvement
in the Southern country . . .would they not, on bebolding many of our fields, say, surely this
land has endured either the wrath of Heaven or the scourge of war and famine.59

1802 - 1861 | 39


estate were incorporated into the cemetery.?? Though the 1867 act committed Congress to
maintain a long range fiscal policy regarding cemetery expenditures, the enormous outlay of
funds required to erect permanent markers at hundreds of thousands of veterans’ graves
around the country called for a special appropriation. Such appropriations were not made
until 1873 when Congress set aside one million dollars for the erection of permanent head-
stones.?3 Until at least 1873, each soldier's grave at Arlington was marked by a rounded head-
board of oak or chestnut, whitewashed and printed with black lettering spelling out the names
and regiments of each of the deceased. As the superintendent of Arlington National Cemetery
lived in Arlington House the construction of “suitable quarters” was not needed.

Some national cemeteries were designed by prominent landscape professionals such as
William Saunders, the designer of the 17-acre Union burial area next to the decade-old rural
cemetery in Gettysburg, but for the first decade of development, the design and embellish-
ment of Arlington was overseen by military personnel of the Quartermaster General's office.?+
Though Saunders was eventually asked to serve as a consultant in the design of Arlington in
the early 1870s, it was Brigadier General Montgomery Meigs as Quartermaster General of the
Department of Army who had the most influence over the layout and embellishment of the
cemetery during the late 1860s and early 1870s. Meigs had been appointed Quartermaster
General by President Lincoln in 1861. As an engineer prior to the war, his work was signifi-

cant in the development of
Washington, D.C. He was in
charge of the construction of
the Washington Aqueduct
from 1852 to 1860 and super-
vised the building of the wings
and dome of the national
Capital. As previously dis-
cussed, Meigs oversaw the
burials in all national cemeter-
ies during the war, including
Arlington. He also suggested
design elements. In 1870,
after returning from a trip to
Europe, Meigs proposed that
a “sylvan hall,” or “temple” of
elms or maples in a pattern to

suggest the knave of a gothic

cathedral be planted at every

national cemetery in the

National Archives

62 Plan of Sylvan Hall,
©1870, general design by
Montgomery C. Meigs

1865 - 1880 | 103


CHAPTER 2

vag ; > '

tli,

— ae

1608 - 1802



wo

134 | 1880 - 1929

In May 1924 CFA Chairman Moore was called to testify at the hearing on HJ
Resolution 264, “authorizing the restoration of the Lee Mansion in the Arlington National
Cemetery, Virginia” before the Joint Committee on the Library of Congress. In his statement,
he proposed a compromise, suggesting that perhaps the house as a whole could be restored to
the “Custis Mansion or Arlington Mansion” and that the room in which Robert E. and Mary
Custis Lee were married could be restored to the condition that it was at the time of their mar-
riage. He also pointed out that Lee never occupied the house for any length of time.*3
Following this statement, he reminded the congressional committee that the plans for the
grounds surrounding Arlington House were already completed and accepted by the
Department of War.

Nonetheless, a joint resolution authorizing the restoration of the “Lee Mansion” to the
period of time directly prior to the Lee family’s departure was passed by Congress and
approved by President Calvin Coolidge on March 4, 1925.44 Shortly thereafter, a survey was
conducted by the Quartermaster General’s office to determine an estimate for the cost of the
restoration, including the price associated with the construction of new buildings to house the
employees currently living in the slave quarters and in a few rooms of the mansion. The find-

ings were published in the Evening Star:

It will cost about $225,000 to restore the ancestral home of the Custis family in the
Arlington National Cemetery to the condition it was in when Gen Robert E. Lee and his
wife, formerly Miss Mary Ann Randolph Custis, lived there at the outbreak of the Civil
War, in accordance with the legislation enacted by Congress in March . . . Under the act
the Secretary of War is “authorized and directed” to restore the old mansion “as nearly as
practicable to the condition in which it existed immediately prior to the Civil War and to
procure, if possible, articles of furniture and equipment which were then in the mansion
and in use by the occupants there and if the original furniture is not available to procure
reproductions of the same.”

The Quartermaster General’s report was quick to point out that “no allowance has been
made in the above estimates for roads, walks, special grading or planting, as these items have
been covered by previous estimates for the sections surrounding the Mansion as part of a gen-
eral scheme for progressive improvements to the National Cemetery submitted in October
1923."46 Yet the subject of restoration—of what to when—was far from decided.

In October 1925, Charles Moore visited President Calvin Coolidge to discuss the plans
for Arlington House. The New York Times reported soon after that the plan of “creating a
shrine to the memory of Robert E. Lee in the restoration of the Lee Mansion in Arlington
National Cemetery probably will be dropped.”



The old post road is now a modern automobile road. Four lines of telegraph poles are

strung with wires parallel to the road. On one side is an electric railway over which a shut-
tle car runs between Arlington Function on the Alexandria line and Rosslyn. To the east
are the fields of the experiment station, now prosperous in appearance but which a few years
ago presented a most discouraging outlook to one who would seek to make crops grow.
Along the west side of the road is a wall of red Seneca sandstone topped with slabs of blue-

stone. It runs straight but weaves up and down as it crosses the convolutions of the land...2°

By 1904 the total number of individuals buried in the cemetery reached 19,734.30
Though the burial of Union officers in the vicinity of Arlington House no longer occurred, a
few interments were made near the house. Captain John Williams, who had been killed almost
one hundred years previously in the East Florida campaign of 1812, was reinterred at
Arlington at the southern end of the flower garden. The stone slab which lay over his grave
in his original burial spot in the cemetery in St. Marys, Georgia was placed over the new grave.
In 1911 Pierre Charles U'Enfant, U.S. Engineer and brevet major in the army during the
Revolutionary War who had been commissioned to design the original plan for the City of
Washington, was reinterred just east of the front of Arlington House, regardless of the regu-
lations, to cease burial on the slope.}! The classically-styled monument of white marble was
placed to overlook Washington, D.C. with its gridded and radial streets laid out over two hun-
dred years prior by L’Enfant.32 The reinterment of the French artist and city planner on the
national mall had been considered previously. But the development of the downtown core and
mall had to conform to the 1902 McMillan plan of the Senate Park Commission and burial
did not fit within the scope of their design. The mall was not a grave yard, local newspapers
pointed out.33

The Senate Park Commission, or McMillan Commission, had been established in 1901
through the efforts of Senator James McMillan from Michigan. The plan created by the com-

82 The Government

Experimental Farm was
located where once were the
(fields of Arlington Farm, and
Jater those of the residents of
Freedmen’s Village. The
straight road lined with trees
is in the approximate location
of the Custis-era road from
that led from the farm to
Arlington Spring. The road
that runs across the center of
the photograph, right to left,
is Arlington Ridge Road—the
old Alexandria and
Georgetown Turnpike,
61925,

1880-1929 1129




etation grew. Instead the firm earth spread almost smoothly to the trunks of scattered trees
whose lower branches had been trimmed off to increase visibility and to provide for ease of
movement. Many of the largest trees around the mansion had been preserved during the war
for their valuable shade. One was the enormous weeping willow west of the north wing of the
house.? Five trees, locusts most likely, stood near what had been the storehouse and southern
slave quarters. Their trunks appeared whitewashed, perhaps to reflect lantern lights in the
dark. Or possibly the white appearance of the trunks was the effect of hungry livestock, teth-
ered to nearby hitching rails, chewing the bark for nourishment.!° Thin whips of deciduous
trees grew up unchecked around the foundation of the mansion. All the buildings were worn.
Dampness that siphoned up from the soil in the rain, and dust that blew in dry weather, alter-

WT oe
di
aN

B
a
a
i
2
5
3

nately clung to the foundations. The stucco of the walls was chipped revealing the brick
beneath. Weeds overran the perennials and roses in the flower garden. Yet the wooden arbor
remained in its center. The broken wooden lattice walls and roof were still draped with red
and pink honeysuckle. White-painted headboards, dwarfed by towering weeds, ran parallel to
the outside of the newly erected, white-washed, paling fence on the eastern and southern sides
of the garden. The kitchen garden, which was located to the north of the mansion and
remained enclosed by a wooden fence, may have fared better than the flower garden,!!
Though the shrubs which bordered the kitchen garden on the west were overgrown, at least
some of the fruit trees that lined its central path survived. The Park, with its grassy hill still
dotted with picturesque trees and shrubs, was crossed by worn paths: The once smooth slope
undulated with rough trenches and redoubts. Regrading of the slopes to the east and south of

the house, done in an effort to combat the erosion that occurred from intensive wartime use,

59 The neglect of Arlington
House during the war, and
through the years immediate-
ly following is clearly revealed
in this 1867 photograph.

1865 - 1880 | 99


25 The southern fagade of
the northern slave quarters,
which faced the utilitarian
yard in the early nineteenth-

century, reveals its plainness
in 2001.

as quarters for
the coachman.
The upper
story contained
three rooms,
each used as
slaves’ quarters.
At one time the
slaves who lived

here included

NCR Cultural Landscape Program

Ephriam, a gar-

dener; George, the cook; Eleanor Harris, the housekeeper and Judy, a nurse.8? Storage space
for garden tools was also located in this building.

In the insurance policy, the southern structure is identified as the storehouse, however,
it did serve additional purposes. The western third of the building provided a “sleeping room”
for the Gray family—Selina, her husband Thorton, and their six children.” The center por-
tion was identified by former Arlington slaves as a smoke house and by a relative of the Lee
family as a wash room. It most likely served a variety of purposes throughout the first half of
the nineteenth century. The eastern-most room in this building was used as a store house for
dry goods and slave rations, kept under lock by Mary Custis, and later Mary Lee, as man-
agers.?! The space between the two classically-styled outbuildings was a work area. The well,
hand-dug and approximately 48 feet deep, is still located within the yard between the main
house and the northern slave quarters. According to an 1850s drawing, it had a simple wood-
en post elevating a weighted lever. The yard was kept open in rough grass with a few high-
limbed, deciduous trees, such as locust, for shade. The west facade of the main house matched
the plainness of the facades of the outbuildings that faced the yard. The house facade was not

26 A drawing of south
facade of northern slave
quarters, ¢. 1855, was includ-
ed in the scrap book of a
member of the Lee family.

48 | 1802-1861

Arlington House Archives



214 | BIBLIOGRAPHY

McCormick, Charles, Historic Structures Report, Part I, Historical Data Section Custis Lee Mansion, Division of
History Studies Washington, D.C. July, 1968.

McGuire, Judith Diary of a Southern Refugee During the War, New York : Arno Press, 1972. Reprint edition from
New York, E. J. Hale & son, 1867.

McMillen, Jack R., “The Trees of Arlington National Cemetery,” Arlington Historical Magazine 1, no 4, 1960: 3-13.
McPherson, James, “When Memorial Day was no Picnic,” New York Times, May 26, 1996, Op-Ed page.

Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, Natural Features of Washington Metropolitan Area, January
1968.

Miller ‘T. Michael, Pen Portraits of Alexandria Virginia, Bowie, MD: Heritage Books, Inc., 1987.

Mooney, James, “Indian Tribes of the District of Columbia,” in vol. 2 of American Anthropologist, July 1889.
Montague, Luawell Lee, Historic Arlington 1608-1932, Arlington Historical Society, 1968.

National Park Service, Department of the Interior, The Lee Mansion National Memorial, Virginia,1941.

National Park Service, Department of the Interior, The Custis-Lee Mansion, The Robert E, Lee Memorial, 1950,
revised 1962.

Neligan, Murray, “Old Arlington: The Story of the Lee Mansion,” unpublished Dissertation, Columbia University
Ph.D., Department of Interior, National Park Service, 1950.

Netherton, Nan, Fairfax County Virginia: A History, Fairfax County, Virginia: Fairfax County Board of Supervisors,
1992,

Netherton, Nan and Ross, Arlington County in Virginia: A Pictorial History, Norfolk, Virginia: The Donning
Company, 1987.

Noclay, Helen, Our Capital on the Potomac, New York, London: The Century Co., 1924.

Nolan, Alan T., Lee Considered: General Robert E. Lee and Civil War History, Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press, 1991,

Norton, J.D. and Susanne A. Schrage-Norton, The Upper Garden at Mount Vernon Estate, Its Past, Present and Future:
A Reflection of 18th Century Gardening, Phase I: The Complete Report, September 1985.

Osborne, John, The Story of Arlington, A history and description of the state and National Cemetery .... Washington:
Press of J. E. Sheiry, 1899.

Park Guide Manual, Custis-Lee Mansion, Handbook for Park Guides, National Park Service, Department of the
Interior, no date.

Parsons Management Consultants, Phase II Archeological Study: Abingdon Plantation Site Washington National
Airport, (Arlington, Virginia]: Parsons Management Consultants, 1989.

Peirce, Paul Skeels, The Freedman’s Bureau: A Chapter in the History of Reconstruction Yowa City, lowa: University of
Towa, 1901.

Pictorial War Record: Battles of the Late Civil War, V.1, New York: Stearns & Co., 1882.


132 | 1880 - 1929

For over sixty years, much of Arlington House had been empty save for the few rooms
used by employees, namely Rhodes and the cemetery superintendent, and for display of var-
ious plaques and relics of the Union Army stored within its downstairs rooms. Views con-
cerning the historical value of the house varied, reflective of the many opinions about the
rights and wrongs, causes and effects of the Civil War. Perhaps these varied viewpoints were
also shaped by aesthetic taste. Nonetheless, many prominent individuals believed something
should be done quickly with the mansion. From at least as early as the late 1860s, Arlington
National Cemetery had been revered by those sympathetic to the Union cause. The section-
alism that had divided the country and prevented Arlington National Cemetery from attain-
ing complete national acceptance had been assuaged first by the Spanish-American War and
then fully diffused by the tremendous cost of World War I. For instance, southwest of
Arlington House, a Confederate Monument first proposed by Congress in 1900 had been ded-
icated in 1914. Arlington House was significant as a setting of the early history of the
Republic, as the property of the adopted grandson of George Washington. Homage was also
paid to the structure and grounds as the home of Robert E. Lee. For these two reasons,
according to commentators, Arlington House deserved better than to be left to slow deterio-
ration. But to what purpose? According to some, the proper action would be to restore the
house and grounds to the moment of Lee’s departure in 1861, as a revered monument to the
primary hero of the southern Confederacy. Others proposed that a museum should be creat-
ed within its walls—a museum to honor the Union Forces.37 Still others believed that, in fact,
the restoration of the house and grounds should reflect the days of Custis. As a local journal-

ist pointed out, some interested parties were taking action:

The southern colony in Washington has become greatly interested in the proposition made
by Mrs. Frances Parkinson Keyes, wife of the Senator from New Hampshire, and a group
of friends to form an association of women similar to the regents of Mount Vernon whose
purpose will be to restore the Lee mansion at Arlington National cemetery to its original

appearance.38

‘Though the wife of a northern senator, Frances Parkinson Keyes was a native of Virginia. She
submitted appeals to the American, primarily female, public through articles in Good
Housekeeping Magazine:

Whatever our opinions and traditions may be, moreover, we all realize now that Robert E.
Lee was one of the greatest generals and one of the noblest men who ever lived. ‘To every
American woman the abuse of bis home must seem a disgrace; to every Southern woman

it must seem a sacrilege.39


only time such a division of the Arlington estate was made, whether officially or not, also
reveals the complicated and sometimes conflicting relationships between the Lee and Custis
families and their slaves. These practices and beliefs are often hidden in the physical history
of the land. Illustrative of this is the flower garden, a symbol of the wealth and leisure of the
Custis and Lee families, but also an artistic endeavor and a discrete example of the promotion
of political and social principles by the women of the estate. The garden also served as a medi-
um by which certain enslaved people could earn their own freedom.

To the west of the flower garden was the area identified in family letters as the grove.
This was an area which, though a flower garden, was kept wilder than the more formal flower
garden to the east.!25 Enormous oak and elm trees formed a canopy above this fenced space,
providing shade for the understory vegetation. Mount Vernon also had landscape areas iden-
tified as groves. There the groves were located along the outside edges of the front curvilin-
ear drives leading to the mansion. The groves at both Arlington and Mount Vernon were
filled with many species of both native and non-native vegetation, informally arranged, there-
by bridging the territory between natural woods and formal gardens or lawn. Like the Park,
it is difficult to know when the grove was created, however it is clear that the grove was being
improved from the following excerpt of a letter from G.W.P. Custis to his granddaughter
Agnes Lee in 1853:

We are getting on with the Grove. Daniel hauled a good deal of manure with the cart and
the carriage horse and we are wheeling off the old roots and brush and spreading the
manure evenly over the surface. A part of the posts are ready for the fence but I wish to
get the cleaning up and spreading of the manure done before frost comes. 126

Mildred, the youngest daughter of the Lee’s remembered the grove with these words:

The grove was a place of mystery to me! It was the part of the Park enclosed in the gar-
den and was the special resort of squirrels, blue bells of Scotland and grape vines, where we
used to swing. Here too there was an arbour covered with a grape vine, with a big mossy
natural stone for a seat-a capital place to crack hickory-nuts . . . Fust on the edge of the
Grove, under a spreading tree, was my own little garden, a white lilac in one corner and
violets forming the borders of the beds. Harry Washington Gray [slave and son of Thorton
and Selina Gray] was my head gardiner [sic] and much fonder of play, than work. Here

were the graves of my cats. . 127

The forest, composed primarily of oak, chestnut and elm trees, was a dominant part of
the landscape. In fact, the forested sections of the property composed over half of the entire
estate. No evidence has been found to suggest that Custis or Lee harvested many of the trees.

1802 - 1861 | 59


EXHIBITS

Chapter 3

Exhibit 1 o..seeeseeees Historic Period Plan, 1802-1861, 800 scale
Exhibit 2 occ ‘Historic Period Plan, 1802-1861, 80 scale
Chapter 4

Exhibit 3 oo... Historic Period Plan, 1861-1865, 800 scale
Exhibit 4 ................++-Eistoric Period Plan, 1861-1865, 200 scale
Chapter 5

Exhibit 5 .Historic Period Plan, 1865-1880, 80 scale

Chapter 6

Exhibit 6 ............s00++Eistoric Period Plan, 1880-1929, 200 scale

Chapter 7

Exhibit 7 oer ‘Historic Period Plan, 1929-1945, 200 scale

EXHIBITS | xvit


nin |

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Abrahams, Roger D., Singing the Mater: The Emergence of African American Culture in the Plantation South, New
York: Pantheon Books, 1992.

Andrews, Marietta M., George Washington's Country, New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc. 1930,

Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington Virginia, ten page report published by government printing office (GPO), #
22211, no date.

Arlington National Cemetery, Department of the Army, no date.
Arnebeck, Bob, Through a Fiery Trial Building Washington 1790-1800, New York: Madison Books, 1991.

Arnest, Harry Lee and John D. Sligh, Arlington House Historic Structures Report, George Washington Memorial
Parkway, Virginia, National Park Service Department of Interior, August, 1985.

Authier, Nancy, “Restoration of Arlington House,” District of Cohumbia Edition-American Motorist, July 1930.

Bender, Rachel, Arlington House South Flower Garden Restoration Report and Plan, unpublished Study, National Park
Service, Summer, 1996.

Berlin, Ira, Slaves without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South, New York: New Press, 1992.

Bigler, Philip, Iv Honored Glory: Arlington National Cemetery the Final Post, Arlington, Virginia: Vandamere Press,
1986,

Bruce, Philip Alexander, Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century, New York, London: Macmillan and
Company, 1895.

Byrne, Karen, “Selina Gray”, Cultural Resource Magazine, No. 4, 1998.

Carson, Cary, Norman F, Barka, William M, Kelso, et al, “Notes on Impermanent Architecture in the Southern
American Colonies,” in Winterthur Portfolio, Volume 12, Summer/Autumn, 1981.

Carson, Jane, Bacon’s Rebellion, Jamestown Virginia: Jamestown Foundation, 1976.

Carter, Robert Goldthwiate, Four Brothers in Blue: or Sunshine and Shadows of the War of the Rebellion, Austin:
University of Texas Press, 1978,

Castleman, Alfred L, The Army of the Potomac: Behind the Scenes, Milwaukee: Strickland & Company, 1863.
Chase, Enoch Aquila, The History of Arlington, Where America’s Sons of Valor Sleep, National Park Service, 1929.

Cissna, Paul B, Historical and Archeological Study of the George Washington Memorial Parkway, Arlington County,
Virginia, Occasional Report #4 Regional Archeology Program, National Capital Region, National Park Service,
Washington D,C, 1990.

Collinson, Peter, Brothers of the Spade: Correspondence of Peter Collinson, of London and of John Custis of Williamsburg
Virginia, Worcester: E,G, Swem, 1949.

Conner, E. R., Watering Milling on Catharpin Run, Prince William County Virginia, Conner, 1975.

Cooke, John Esten, Robert E, Lee, reprint of 1871 edition, New York: G. W. Dillingham, 1899.


Alexandria (1846) and finally in 1920, Arlington. For further discussion of the evolution of laws and legal issues in
Fairfax County, later Arlington County in Virginia see, William Waller Henning’s. The Statutes at Large: Being a
Collection of all the Laws of Virginia from the First Session of the Legislature in the Year 1619, Second Edition, (New
York), 1823, and Stetson’s Four Mile Run Land Grants.

23 This law was known as the head-right legislation, designed to encourage iinmigration to the colonies. Under
existing law, Captain Howsing was entitled to receive a grant of 50 acres for each settler to whom he gave passage
to the new colony. Stetson, 1. See also, Philip Alexander Bruce, Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth
Century. . . (New York: Macmillian and Co., 1895).

24 The naine Doeg was a later seventeenth-century term for Tauxeuents. The name change sequence was thus,
Tauxenent, Taux, Toag, Doag and finally Doeg. The Nacotchtank name was eventually Anglicized to Anacostia.
Personal Communication, Stephen Potter, Regional Archcologist, National Capital Region, NPS to Jennifer
Hanna, Historical Landscape Architect, September 8, 2001.

25 Stetson, 1. The actual deed for this transaction has been lost, however, according to this and other secondary
sources, 6 hogsheads was the amount of consideration.

26 Ibid, 4. John Alexander's third son, John, died within his lifetime without issue.

27 Theodore Roosevelt Island has had many names including, Analostan Island, Mason’s Island, Barbados. For more
information about the development of Theodore Roosevelt Island see, Kay Fanning. National Register Nomination
for Theodore Roosevelt Island, (Washington, D.C.: Department of Interior, National Park Service, 2000). See also
Stetson, 9-11.

28 Philip had a son, also named Philip who inherited this 500 acres of land. This land was a portion of the original
land conveyance that formed the city of Alexandria in 1742. It is most likely that from this Philip Alexander,
Alexandria received its name. Stetson, 5.

29 Ibid, 11.

30 When a will declared a conveyance entailed, the inheritance was limited through lineal decent. If the family line
ran out, the fee ownership of the property reverted to the original grantor or his successors in interest.

31 This type of legal procedure is formally referred to as docking the entail. For further discussion of the chain of
title of Virginia land grants see, Stetson, Four Mile Land Grants.

32 Gerrard was a member of the prosperous and elite class of planters in eighteenth century Virginia. One of the
original trustees of the town of Alexandria and a burgess from Fairfax County, Gerrard Alexander lived in the house
subsequently called Abingdon. Stetson, 13. Walker, Mark et al. Phase II Archaeological Site, Washington National
Airport (Washington, D.C.: Parsons Management Consultants, 1989). 13-16.

33 Though some sources suggest that a house was built on this tract of land by John Alexander before his death in
1677, most likely the first substantial structure built on the property was Gerrard Alexander’s home circa 1740,
shortly after Gerrard inherited the land from his father John. See Stetson, 10.

34 Delos Smith, “The Abingdon of Fairfax County.” Daughters of the American Revolution Magazine Vol. LXII. No
2. Gune, 1929), 325-330. For further information about the estate of Abingdon see, Eleanor Lee Templeman.
Arlington Heritage, Vignettes of a Virginia County. (Arlington, Virginia: Self publication): 1959; Ruth Lincoln Kaye
“Lost Heritage: Early Homes that have Disappeared from Northern Virginia.” Northern Virginia Heritage.
February 1987, 11-20.

ENDNoTES | 177


constructed near Arlington House within the area that had been the woodland grove garden
of Mrs. Custis and Mrs. Lee. As described in the National Republican, a Washington
Newspaper,

Quartermaster General M.C. Meigs has had erected just to the southwest of the Arlington
mansion, a magnificent amphitheater with a capacity for seating five thousand. It is a per-
fect circle of considerable diameter, with raised seats of earth, covered with fresh green grass.

The roof is of canvas supported in the center and periphery by tall columns. . 48

By Decoration Day 1876, the tendrils of the wisteria that had been planted at each column of
the amphitheater covered the structure. Thousands of visitors came to Arlington, many driv-
ing up the carriage road on the northern edge of the cemetery. The western end of this road,
near Arlington House, had recently been realigned to lessen its steep grade.4? The former
road section was still visible, however, cutting through the forest west of the house. A visitor
to the cemetery that Decoration Day, or Memorial Day as it was later to be named, com-
mented on the beauty of the cemetery. He pointed out, perhaps unconsciously, the differences
between the northern lower cemetery and the southern upper portion, as he drove from the

northeastern corner of the grounds up to Arlington House.

65 Memorial Amphitheater,
1903

108 | 1865 - 1880

Here a beautiful sight was presented. A number of graves on both sides of the drive were

observed first, but few of which were decorated. These, Captain Smith said, were graves
of freedmen who were followers during the war and most of whom died in the hospitals.
Further along the graves assumed a neater appearance and upon each was placed a
diminutive United States flag, which denoted that we were passing over the ground
beneath which rested the remains of those brave souls who had fought and died for the sake
of their country. Rose bushes, which have been planted within the year, bordered most of
the lots and were in full bloom.5°

Aslington National Cemetery Archives


114 | 1865 - 1880


NCR Cultural Landscape Program, 2001

CONCLUSION

In 1928, with a legislative mandate to restore Arlington House to the moment of Lee’s
departure in 1861 and with the close guidance of educated, opinionated, and politicized mem-
bers of the Commission of Fine Arts, the Quartermaster General’s Office began their first
major structural restoration. ‘The landscape around Arlington House, dotted with the graves
of soldiers, became the central gathering place for the hundreds of thousands of people who
visited the national cemetery and the newly designated Lee Mansion annually. ‘The pragmat-
ic necessities of cemetery maintenance—the greenhouse, the water tower, and the administra-
tive offices—were gradually removed and replaced by a new comfort station, a museum, and a
tour bus stop. The grounds of the restored Arlington House, crossed with brick walks, lined
with boxwood hedges, with a kitchen garden full of flowers, reflected evolving public senti-
ment concerning the causes and effects of the Civil War (whom was to blame, whom deserved
glory and why) and simply the desires of visitors. In addition, the land revealed the design phi-
losophy of the professional landscape architects and architects overseeing the projects. As the
century progressed, as the vegetative screens planted to block the views of surrounding graves
and monuments slowly grew and separated the grounds around the house from the cemetery,

visions of the past were also transformed.

110 Arlington House over
the grave lined hills, 2001

1929-2001 | 169


99 The many buildings
of the South Post of
Fort Myer, in the

foreground of this image
(1950), were in the location
of the nineteenth-century
fields of Arlington farm.

158 |

1929 - 2001

WAR-TIME MAINTENANCE

By the late 1930s, the military was expanding their facilities on the grounds of the
Arlington reservation as elsewhere around Washington D.C., due to the advancing threat of
another World
War. Down the
slope from the
house, on the for-
mer fields of the
Government
Experimental
Farm, the Army
was constructing
the South Post of
Fort Myer. Even-
tually the South
Post would en-
compass the en-tire area between the Pentagon and Memorial Ave-nue, south of the newly-
named Arlington Ridge Road (formerly Alexandria~-Georgetown Turnpike). The enormous
expenditure necessitated by World War II delayed proposed projects and deferred mainte-
nance on many lands of the National Park Service. Only basic upkeep, such as lawn mowing
and pruning, occurred on the grounds immediately surrounding Arlington House. In addi-
tion, due to the need for emergency blackouts, the flood lights that had lit the east facade of
Arlington House on historically significant dates were shut off for the duration of the war.45
Yet despite the war, the need to balance the historical significance of the cemetery with the
desire to present a sympathetic view of Robert E. Lee and his home, never remained far from
the minds of National Park Service administrative staff. Sheridan’s tomb, once considered the
most “beautiful thing at Arlington” had been screened with a variety of shrubbery.4¢ Wright's
grave, however, remained prominent on the slope east of the house. Randle Truttet, the Chief
of the National Memorial and Historic Sites Division of the National Park Service, wrote of

the need to preserve the setting of the mansion in 1942:

If this monument [Wright] was screened the view towards the city would remind one of a
country park rather than a cemetery, and would add much to the atmosphere of the man-
sion setting. In addition, the presence of a Union Officer's grave in such plain view so close
to the old home of General Lee is unpleasant to say the least to many southern people not

wholly reconstructed.”


south of the mansion. The garden extended from immediately north of the northern slave
quarters, approximately 200 feet. ‘The area of the garden, which was cleared of large trees, was
almost rectangular; the eastern boundary was slightly bowed to conform to the terrain. The
topography afforded a slightly northerly aspect and a southern exposure. Tall trees, however,
screened the garden from storms and winds out of the northwest. No direct evidence of herbs

in the kitchen garden has been found thus far, though herbs may have been integrated into the

32. The lines of trees on
either side of the

central path in the kitchen
garden are shown in this

detail from the Environs of

Washington Prepared from
original Surveys of the
Engineer Department
1864-1866.

54 | 1802 - 1861

overall planting of vegetables.
‘The garden was surrounded with a
post and rail fence to keep animals
from destroying the vegetables and
fruits. According to a drawing
done by one of the Lee children
during the 1850s, a gate orna-
mented with pickets hung at the

National Archives

southern entrance to the vegetable
garden.!0 As revealed in the following quote from a friend and relative of the Custis family,
Elizabeth Randolph Calvert, the kitchen garden, like the yard, was located near the work and

living space of the slaves,

. . . appropriately back of the kitchen; reaching from here to where the plateau on which
the mansion stands begins to descend. .. Two large barberry bushes sentinel the gate and in
due season hang out their coral berries in bunches that make a mantle of color. From this
garden are gathered in the prime freshness and age what the vegetable world offers to the

needs and also enjoyment of man . . 105

The flower garden was south of the mansion and slave quarters in the space between the
house and the carriage drive. ‘Ihe carriage drive formed the southern and western boundaries
of the garden. A picket fence with wide palings painted white surrounded the garden on the
south, north and east sides. On the western side, the garden most likely was blended into a
more naturalistic or wild garden area called the “grove,” without separation by a fence. The
only gate known to have existed during the Custis and Lee era was located in the center of the
north end of the eastern section of the flower garden. The formal portion of the flower gar-
den was approximately one acre in size. In the Custis and Lee families, the female members
designed the flower garden (its original layout was by G.W.P. Custis) and oversaw its care by
slaves. Little specific information about the design of the space is known, for there are no
plans of the garden during the Custis and Lee family occupancy.!° The flower garden, like
the rest of the estate, was not static. The design was continually altered by the introduction

of new plants and the removal of others, by the seasons, and by the changing tastes of the



‘These large estates were illustrative of land holdings throughout the southern colonies.
During the eighteenth century, enormous land holdings of a relatively few prominent English
families in the colonial society, like the Custis’s and Alexander's, continued to grow. For in the
seventeenth and early eighteenth-century Virginia slave economy, a one thousand acre tract of
arable land was the smallest unit deemed suitable to profitable production, and each slave was
thought to require approximately fifty acres of land in order to be economically viable. Such
land ownership patterns were apparent within Fairfax County, which had been formed in 1742
out of what was then Prince William County. Gerrard Alexander had begun the construction
of his family home one year earlier on the southern section of his property, just north of Four
Mile Creek.”

‘The house itself (later known as Abingdon) was of frame construction with oak beams
and rafters, Examination of the site in 1929 indicated that the original colonial structure was
five bays wide, two bays deep, one-and-one-half stories high, with a chimney on each gable
end and a central hall extending through the middle.** Gerrard Alexander lived in this frame
structure for the last twenty years of his life.’ Such modest, timber-frame, residential archi-
tecture was common in northern Virginia during this time period, even for those of the
wealthier classes. During the seventeenth century, earthfast architecture, characterized by
posts and studs in the ground, and ground-laid sills, was widespread. “Though the buildings
erected with post-in-hole technology were relatively short-lived, due to the moist, warm envi-
ronment of the south, the building style allowed for basic comfort and protection with little
cost.’ By the time Gerrard Alexander constructed his home on the shores of the Potomac the
prominent construction style in the area had changed to incorporate the use of wooden blocks,
brick piers, and, in some cases, full stone or brick foundations. By setting the structure on

piers or a foundation, no framing timber was allowed to touch the ground where it might

8 Abingdon, showb here e.
1929, was the home of
Gerrard Alexander in the
mid-eighteenth century.
G.WP. Custis's father, John
Custis, lived in the house for
several years, It burned in
1930.

4

=
4
a

12 | 1608 - 1802



204 | ENDNoTES

CHAPTER SEVEN

1 CFA meeting minutes March 10, 1919. CFA Archives. National Building Museum. Washington, D.C.
2 Moore to Bash, Chief Construction Division, Office of the Quartermaster General. July 17, 1930. ARHO.
3 Draft of Report on Restoration of Lee Mansion. July 9, 1925. ARHO.

4 Arlington National Cemetery, VA Plan for Work to be Done at Lee Mansion War Department, Quartermaster Corps.
Construction Service. Aug 16, 1923. ARHO Map files. No plans for the landscape east of Arlington House from
this period have yet been found. General Scheme for the Progressive Improvements to the National Cemetery (1923)
recorded the proposed 1921 changes to the circulation around Arlington House, though the changes had not yet
been made. The plan also emphasized the view line between the proposed memorial bridge and the “Lee Mansion.”

5 Birnbaum and Karson, Editors, essay on James Greenleaf by Ania Bass. 146-149.

6 Gilbert L. Rodier, “Arlington House” Architectural Forum, March 1924.

7L.M Leisenring, The Restoration of Arlington Mansion. 1945. ARHO.

8 Charles Moore to General Cheatham. Nov. 14, 1928, ARHO.

9 Leisenring, 2. Even after the house passed to NPS in July of 1933, Mortimer remained in charge.

10 Corinne Frazier, “Arlington House will Be Restored.” Washington, D.C. Evening Star. Sept. 14, 1929.

11 “Arlington National Cemetery: Present Layout of Arlington Mansion showing approximate location of drives,
walks, plantings, etc.” Quartermaster General Department, ca. 1930. ARHO.

12 CFA meeting minutes 11/18/29. Moore to Colonel Bash, Nov 19, 1929, CFA Meeting Minutes 11/18/29,
Exhibit L, CFA Archives.

13 Restoration of Arlington Mansion to Quartermaster General Report, April 17, 1929. ARHO.

14 L, H. Bash to Quartermaster General, Chief Engineering Division. Memorandum for Chief, Engineering
Division, November 19, 1929. ARHO.

15 L. H. Bash to Louise P. Latimer. The Public Library of the District of Columbia 29, April 1929; and Louise P.
Latimer to L. H. Bash, April 24, 1929.

16 Interview, by L. M. Leisenring of Mrs. Annie Baker and Mrs, Ada Thompson daughters of Thornton and Selina
Grey, March 3, 1930. Transcript ARHO.

17 Elbert Cox, Assistant Historian, U.S. Department of the Interior. Memorandum for Mr. Chatelain. November
15, 1933.

18 CFA meeting minutes March 20, 1930. CFA archives

19J.L. DeWitt Maj General, Quarter Master General to Charles Moore, Committee of Fine Arts, March 19, 1930
CFA archives.

20 Bash to Leisenring, April 9 1930. CFA archives.


ings in the village were of permanent wood frame construction. Approximately 28 feet by 24
feet and one-and-one-half stories high, they were sheathed with rough weather boarding and

organized around a central street.*!

50 Residents of Freemen’s
Village, 1868

National Archives

Many of the individuals who made up the community were fugitive and former slaves
from Virginia, called “contraband” by officials, for they were considered property of the south
taken in war: Though most if not all slaves escaped their southern masters through their own

enterprise and not through the coercion of the northern soldiers. The “contraband” were |

51 Perspective drawing of
Freedmen’s Village in The
Child’s Paper. December 12, |
1864, page 1

1861-1865 | 83


upbringing.* Though Mount Vernon was not entirely typical of the farming enterprises in
northern Virginia in the late-eighteenth century, the estate provided G.W.P. Custis with a
clear example of the promise of agricultural pursuits. In addition, six of the plantations over-
seen by George Washington were owned outright by G.W.P. Custis or were to be inherited
by the boy when he came of age. In General George Washington he found a willing teacher.

As a young boy, G.W.P. Custis followed his adopted grandfather around the estate, lis-
tening to him talk with prominent visitors
about issues pertinent to both the estate and
the country as a whole. He listened as George
Washington spoke about the importance of
good roads in releasing the young American
country from its dependency on Europe.
Washington also believed that breeding
hardier agricultural stock would help guaran-
tee continuing economic and therefore politi-
cal freedom. As a grown man, G.W.P. Custis
would illustrate his adherence to these princi-
ples in his own experiments with farming and
animal breeding.” G.W.P. Custis also adopted
the agricultural model provided by George
Washington, which had been formed both by

Washington’s personal morals and his economic situation. General Washington was in a diffi-

Courtesy of the Mount Vernon Ladies Association

cult position, simultaneously an agriculturist in the slave economy of northern Virginia and a
leader of a new democracy. He realized that the soil of his land was very depleted and that his
slave populations were increasing through birth and inheritance. Because of his moral beliefs
and his position as President, he did not feel that he could sell his slaves, though they were in
some ways an economic drain. Neither, however, could he set them free in his lifetime, for this
too would have caused him political difficulty and economic hardship. In addition, he could not
move west, as did many of his prominent neighbors, due to his political ties. Therefore he
turned to “new husbandry” and the possibilities inherent in modern agricultural practices such
as soil conservation and deep plowing. George Washington was not simply interested in
abstract theory, but instead was fascinated by the details of agriculture, horticulture and gar-
dening. As Washington wrote from Mount Vernon in 1797, shortly after the completion of his

presidential terms,

I am once more seated under my own Vine and Fig-tree and hope to spend the remainder
of my days... in peaceful retirement, making political pursuits yield to the more rational
amusement of cultivating the earth.*

As a grown man, G.W.P Custis would promulgate these theories and values as well, though

12 George Washington
Parke Custis, 1795, by
Robert Edge Pine

1608 - 1802 | 19


NOTES

226 | NoTEs


144 |

1929 - 2001

Quartermaster General. Oversight of the finances and contracts was given to Charles G.
Mortimer. Mortimer was described by Major Leisenring, the Army architect supervising the
historical research preceding the restoration project, as a “Virginian with a flare for old furni-
ture and houses.”? Each of these men, with the members of the CFA, would become involved
in the restoration of the house and grounds, shaping the results through their personal beliefs,
loyalties and agendas.

THE LANDSCAPE OF ARLINGTON HOUSE
PRIOR TO THE RESTORATION

In 1929, Congress added ninety thousand dollars to the money previously allotted for
the Arlington House restoration. No money, however, was made available for the restoration
or redesign of the grounds. As the Washington D.C. Evening Star pointed out, in addition to
the restoration of the building fabric, the appropriations were needed to:

so far as possible . . . refurnish Arlington House in the Colonial Period, though little hope
is held out for obtaining many of the original pieces which graced its chambers .. . . It will
stand as a fitting memorial to two of America’s most distinguished families, as well as to
the memory of the South’s great military leader.\0

In 1929 a committee was formed to guide the restoration of Arlington House and
grounds. The committee was comprised of staff of the Quartermaster General’s Office, as well
as members of the Commission of Fine Arts. The committee members included General
William E. Horton, Major Luther M. Leisenring, Lieut. Colonel C. G, Mortimer, Charles
Moore, Mr. H. P. Caemmerer the Secretary of Commission of Fine Arts, and two privately
practicing architects, E. W. Bonn and Walter Peter, a relative of the Lee family. In April the
men met at Arlington to assess the existing condition of the property and to discuss the
restoration of the house, outbuildings and landscape. According to an account of the restora-
tion written years later by the Army architect, Leisenring, all participants agreed that the
house should not be made into a museum, filled with glass cases, stuffed with memorabilia.
According to Leisenring, all present felt that the restored mansion should seem to visitors as
if the “Lee family of 1860 had gone out for the afternoon and would soon return.” The inter-
pretation of the grounds, however, required much more layering of use and meaning, for the
land held not only the gardens of Custis and Lee, but hallowed graves and memorials to hon-
ored dead. The redesign of the landscape would reveal, perhaps more clearly than that of the
house, the balancing act between the preservation of the cemetery and the re-creation of the
historic scene of the “Lee Mansion.”

As the restoration committee walked the grounds around Arlington House in the spring

of 1929, the landscape they crossed contained the remnants of almost one hundred and fifty



44 | 1802 - 1861

were not permitted. Visitors to the spring often listened to Custis tell tales of his childhood
spent at Mount Vernon and remember stories of the Revolution once told to him by George
Washington. According to Morrison’s Stranger’s Guide to the City of Washington published
in 1852, Arlington Spring had,

... still, retired walks, inviting lawns, shaded by beautiful groves, and the finest view of
the river and the city imaginable. The fine manners and instructive conversation of the
venerable proprietor often add to the life and social enjoyment of those who seek from the
dust and crowds of the city a few hours’ relaxation and retirement amid the charms of this
cool and quiet spot.76

For those who wished to fish, tackle was available free of charge. Hunting was prohibited, as
was alcohol, though refreshments were sold.

While the precedent of Arlington Spring clearly lies in the eighteenth and early nine-
teenth-century medicinal and recreational development of mineral springs of western Virginia,
Custis’s spring differs from these earlier health spas and social gathering places.””7 Though the
site for Arlington Spring was in fact dictated by the location of the spring itself, little comment
as to the healthful benefit of the water was made by contemporary visitors. The setting did
provide a gathering place for socializing, yet unlike the major resort springs of early nine-
teenth-century Virginia, Arlington Spring was devoted primarily to a middle-class clientele.
Custis may have copied what he knew of the grand Virginia mineral springs, where his wife
and daughter would often “partake of the waters”, but more importantly he created an early
tourist stop on the Arlington House estate, where “all sorts” could meet to hear of the life of
George Washington.

It is interesting that Arlington Spring, a public resort, was located directly east of the
farm and slave quarters of the Arlington estate. Although visually separated from Arlington
farm by the Alexandria Canal beginning in 1843—approximately the time in which the
Arlington Spring structures were erected to promote increased visitation to the spring—the
private space of the farm and the public space of the spring were still intricately entwined. In
fact, to move from the spring to the main house on the Arlington estate, one had to pass under
the twenty-foot-high berm of the canal through a culvert, described as a “wet dripping tun-
nel” and travel through the heart of the farm and the slaves quarters.”8 The road then con-
tinued west through the farm and fields, across the Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike to
the main gate of the Arlington Estate.

During the nineteenth century, this arrangement of public and private space was not at
odds with the normal spatial organization of plantation landscapes. The wealth of the south-
ern elite was most often comprised of slaves and land. Custis was no exception. To reveal the
pragmatic elements of the farm landscape to the public—especially when the farm was sepa-
rated physically from the decorative, more elite portions of the estate—was not unusual.



11 Alexandria Gazette, November 16, 1803.

12 Kay Fanning, Theodore Roosevelt National Register of Historic Places Nomination. (Department of Interior:
Washington, D.C. 2000): 2.

13 Nelligan, Old Arlington: The Story of the Lee Mansion National Memorial. Unpublished study (U.S. Department of
Interior, National Park Service: Washington, D.C. 1953): 84.

14 During the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, which lasted from 1792 to 1815, much of Europe was
ina state of war and upheaval. At the time in which Custis first began to farm at Arlington, the property the British
Royal Navy had placed an extensive commercial blockade around France, and France was preparing to attack
England. As such, the demand for American grain products increased. For more information see, James Burbank.
“The French Revolt and Empire” in The War Times Journal, (March 2000) online at http://www.wtj.com/articles/.
See also, Nelligan 63.

15 Sharrer, 4. Tobacco adopts the flavor of the soil in which it grows. See also, John Brinckerhoff Jackson. Landscape
in Sight: Looking at America. (New Haven: Yale University Press 1997): 137.

16 The secondary forest growth characterized by the cedars was most likely a result of the much more extensive
agricultural cultivation undertaken by tenants of Gerrard Alexander during the seventeenth century.

17 National Intelligencer. November 24, 1809.
18 Boston Patriot, reprinted in the National Intelligencer, October 25, 1809.

19 Elizabeth Randolph Calvert. “Childhood Days at Arlington.” Undated handwritten manuscript (circa 1870).
Arlington House Archives (ARHO).

20 The configuration of the upper story rooms of the house is unknown. Archeological and architectural investiga-
tion, which revealed small rafter pockets in the east wall of the pantry and regularly spaced post holes found under
the brick floor of the cellar stairway hall, suggest the possibility of a makeshift wood porch on the west facade.
Harry Lee Amnest III and John D. Sligh. Historic Structure Report. Arlington House: The Robert E. Lee Memorial. (US
Department of the Interior: Denver Service Center Northeast Team 1985): 15-17.

21 Edward Chappell, “Menokin: Prospect, Orientation and Outside Finish,” Newsletter Chronicling the Preservation
of Menokin Plantation, (August 1999). For more information concerning the development of gardens in the eigh-
teenth century see Barbara Wells Sarudy’s Gardens and gardening in the Chesapeake, 1700-1805, (Baltimore : Johns
Hopkins University Press, 1998.)

22 The enclosure movement in England during the mid eighteenth century revolved around the practice of wealthy
landowners enclosing common fields for their own use, usually for the purpose of raising sheep. Thomas Jefferson
created a garden at his estate Monticello which had characteristics of the English Landscape style of gardening.
Andre Parmentier published essays about this “modern” style of gardening in the 1828 catalogue for his nursery
and botanic garden in what is now Brooklyn New York. In England, Humphry Repton, a horticulturist during the
eighteenth-century, promoted the ideals of the less formal gardening style, in his book Sketches and Hints on
Landscape Gardening published in 1795. According to Repton the landscape should display natural form and hide
natural defects; should be open; should be designed in a naturalistic style; and all aspects of the landscape should be
pleasing and if not they should be concealed—characteristics which correspond to the design at Arlington. For
more information about the development of the English School of landscape gardening in America see Brenda
Bullion, The Science and Art of Plants and Gardens in the Development of an American Landscape Aesthetic (1620-1850).
(Ithaca, New York: Cornell University 1990): 9-20.

ENDNoTES | 183


Porter, General Sheridan, and Admiral Wright. The grassy slope descended the hillside, spot-
ted with picturesque trees as it was when G.W.P. Custis created his Park seventy-five years ear-
lier. The view encompassed the enclosing stone wall running along the Alexandria and
Georgetown Road and beyond, through the scrubby woods and old fields to the Potomac
River. Washington D.C. lay in the distance. Standing at the newly-completed Washington

Monument, looking out

81 In this 1912 postcard, the
American flag takes promi-
nence over the former “D.C.

Residence of Robert E. Lee.”

128 | 1880 - 1929

towards Virginia, Arling-
ton House sat high on the
brow of the hill. Dark
forests formed a back-
ground for the temple-like
structure and white grave-
stones lay as if planted in
fields down the hillsides of
the cemetery.

Much of the land
which had been used as fields and homesites by residents of Freedmen’s Village between the

}
i

Potomac River and the Alexandria and Georgetown Road was lying fallow by the turn of the
twentieth century. The northern end of the area was used as an army post garden. In 1900
the United States government transferred approximately four hundred acres of what had been
the Arlington Estate, lying between the boundary of Arlington National Cemetery and the
Potomac River, to the Department of Agriculture.2° Subsequently, the land was used as an
experimental farm to improve plant hybridization and cultivation methods until military
necessity demanded its return to the Department of Army prior to World War II. This area
of the estate contained many natural springs, including the famous Arlington Spring of the
previous century. Drainage tiles were installed in many existing drainage ditches and to drain
large areas of low-lying lands. The trees, briars and underbrush that had grown up since the
removal of the Freedmen’s Village residents ten years prior, were removed and plowed under.
Crops such as cowpeas, crimson clover, rye and buckwheat were planted. Land was also put
into pasture. Lawn areas were created around the structures to show “rural people” what
could be done to landscape a home.?? The government’ experimental farm, where once the
fields of Arlington farm were located, linked the agricultural advancement proclivities of
Custis and his promotion of the need for a national agricultural improvement farm with the
eventual use of his estate. As such the contours of the old farm fields, though altered in prod-
uct, retained their form from Custis’s days.?® Modern use and technology were changing other

portions of the Arlington landscape as this quote from 1918 reveals:


expensive." Though, as in many colonial economies, the fluctuations in tobacco price were
cyclical, the continuing rise and fall of the agricultural economy was a factor in the relatively
slow settlement of the Northern Neck during the early eighteenth century. By the mid-eigh-
teenth century some farmers were beginning to discontinue their cultivation of tobacco, a crop
which was an enormous drain on soil nutrients. Some agriculturists in Virginia began to grow
indigo, while others cultivated hemp, flax or cotton. However, as they were tied to relatively
expensive industrial processes these crops were not grown in large quantities until the tech-
nology of the clothing mill and cotton gin became available at the turn of the century. Wheat
and corn cultivation gained popularity in the Potomac River region at this time, as grain prices
tended to fall less quickly during the recurring depressions and ready markets were found in
Philadelphia and Baltimore.” Milling activity was seen in the establishment of Cubbs Mill and
associated residence located west of Gerrard Alexander's plantation house at the intersection
of Long Branch and Four Mile Creek. Cubb was also a tenant of Robert Alexander. A mill
had been located in this spot as early as 1719.*

In the early eighteenth century in the Northern Neck area of Virginia, most flour mills
were relatively small custom mills averaging about three to four bushels of wheat per hour.
Such custom mills, as the name suggests, ground wheat to the specifications of individual farm-
ers. Custom mills, like the Cubb mill on Four Mile Run, were constructed on small tributary
streams and were fairly isolated from large markets due to relatively poor transportation sys-
tems. By the mid-eighteenth century, however, the flour milling industry around Baltimore,
Georgetown and Alexandria was flourishing. Expanding populations, improved milling tech-
nology and the construction of turnpikes at the beginning of the next century and later canals
generated a much larger export of flour to local, national, and international markets. Large
merchant mills developed to grind wheat to supply these increased market needs, in contrast
to the local focus and smaller infrastructure of the custom mills—already common in Virginia
and Maryland.” Grist mills were also part of plantation economies, supplying flour to the
large agricultural workforces.

While a large number of land grants made in the first three decades of the eighteenth
century in the Northern Neck were for small tracts of between 200 and 500 acres (for middle
class farms with two or three slaves), much land was also controlled through large land hold-
ings. The names Lee, Fitzhugh, Chapman, Carter, and Fairfax occurred in land grant books
repeatedly as these families attempted to acquire large tracts of land convenient to waterways
or established roads. In 1760, the largest land tract in Fairfax County belonged to the
Fitzhugh family. The 21,996 acres of this property was over three times as large as any other
property holding in the county.” This estate, called Ravensworth in the late eighteenth cen-
tury, would be one of the childhood homes of G.W.P. Custis’s wife, Mary Lee Fitzhugh.”

Gerrard Alexander died in 1761. Since he had previously succeeded in establishing his
ownership in fee simple his testator was able to divide his land as the will delineated. To his
son Robert he bequeathed his home near Four Mile Run and 904 acres. To his son and name-

1608 - 1802 | 15


The stable for the housing of horses and carriages was probably constructed around the
same time the house, between 1803 and 1818. The stable was located where the administra-
tive building (ca 1932) now stands, to the west of Arlington House across a wooded ravine.
Suggestive of a miniature Arlington House, the original stable had a two-story center section
with one-story wings to the east and west. Like the main house, the stable had a stucco finish
and arched windows. The center section, fronted by a portico with four Doric columns, was
used to store hay on the upper level and carriages and harnesses on the ground level. The
wings each held the horse stalls. This building may have also provided sleeping rooms for a
few slaves associated with the care of the horses.8” By the time of the tenancy of Robert E.
Lee, a wooden wagon shed and cattle shed were most likely located to the immediate south of
the stable.

In addition to the stable and associated structures, an ice house was located to the west

of the slave quarters, which was located immediately west of the northern wing of Arlington

House. Little is known about this building, ia eral
which was gone from the site by the 1890s.
According to archeological and cartograph-
ic evidence, the building was constructed by
digging a pit, perhaps as large as 25 x 25
feet, which was then lined with planks. A
structure of an unknown design was placed
on top of the pit.88

Most likely the two dependencies,
still located to the immediate west of the
main house, were constructed between
1803 and 1818. Like the house and stable,

these two structures are classical in appear-

Arlington House Archives

ance and of brick construction. The exteri-

or treatment is a relatively coarse pebble-dash stucco. The two buildings are formally aligned
with the two wings of the main house in an arrangement typical of early nineteenth-century
architecture. The facades of the buildings that face outward toward the formal spaces of the
gardens are highly ornamented, reflecting the design elements of the house. The facades fac-
ing the work yard are relatively plain. The northern outbuilding was identified by Robert E.
Lee in his insurance policy of 1859 as a kitchen. The northern facade of this two-story banked
brick structure is detailed with four Doric pilasters under a curving arch recessed into the
facade approximately a foot. Nine windows provide light. The one-story southern fagade has
three doors placed at even intervals, each with a painted panel of a hunt scene above the
entrance. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the summer kitchen was in the east-
ern half of the lower level of the building. According to oral history, the western half was used

24 Though this image dates

to the late 1890s, it shows the

portico and structure of the |

original stable, located to the

west of Arlington House.

|
|

1802 - 1861 | 47


170 |

1929 - 2001

The landscape of Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial, reflects two hundred
years of historic development. Over time people have manipulated the topography, the trees,
the roads, the paths, and the views to fit their needs. Through their alterations, the legacy of
George Washington and the power of agricultural advancement has been conveyed; an army
has prepared for war, one nation’s capital has been protected from invasion and another’s
destroyed. In one of the longest-lasting Freedmen’s Villages in America, the lives of newly-
freed slaves were supported and yet contained. Thousands of dead were buried on the ceme-
tery slopes around the trunks of trees, both those trees newly planted and those hundreds of
years old. Wars’ heroes have been honored with memorials and then, sometimes, the evidence
of these once sacred monuments has been hidden or removed.

In efforts to memorialize and in attempts to forget, from the Civil War to the Colonial
Revival, the landscape of Arlington has been imprinted with the beliefs of those who have
cared for the grounds, of those who have visited, and of those whose vision holds the land
sacred and meaningful. In adding to and subtracting from the landscape, each generation
has revealed as much about their own era as they have about the history of Arlington.
The present, in this respect, is no different than the past.


176 | ENDNOTES

10 Potter, 33. See also Susan Limbrey, Soil Science and Archaeology, (London: Academic Press, 1975): 124
11 Smith, 99,

12 Smith, 109.

13 Smith, 109.

'4 As profits from the fur trade dwindled more colonists sought their fortunes in tobacco rather than furs. For more
on the decline of the fur trade in this area see Potter, 188.

15 The first Falls Church, then called New Church or Upper Church, was built in 1734, As one of the main estab-
lishments of the Church of England in the area, the church and subsequent court house (circa 1742) became a cross
roads for the few settlers living in Virginia's northern neck. Though the court house was moved to Alexandria in
1754, Falls Church continued to be a gathering place throughout the eighteenth century. The structure of Falls
Church, first built by Richard Blackburn, was rebuilt on the same site in 1769 and designed by James Wren of Falls
Church. For more information about the history of Falls Church, Virginia see Melvin Lee Steadman, Jr,’s Falls
Church by Fence and Fireside (Falls Church Public Library: Falls Church Virginia, 1964) and Tony P Wrenn’s Falls
Church: History of a Virginia Village (Historical Commission of City of Falls Church, Virginia, 1972).

16 In addition, settlement suffered a temporary setback during the Susquehannock War of 1675-76 and Bacon's
Rebellion of 1676 when neighboring Indian tribes crossed the Potomac and began to attack the new settlers. Troops
led by Virginia and Maryland forces combated the attacking Indians, killing many of them. After this defeat the
Susquehannock tribes moved southward into the tidewater area and joined with other Indian tribes to take revenge
on the European settlers, thus setting the conditions which culminated in Bacon’s Rebellion. For more information
on the influence of Bacon’s Rebellion on the colony of Virginia see, Jane Carson’s Bacon's Rebellion 1676-1976

(Jamestown, VA: Jamestown Foundation, 1976).

17 Quitrent or quit rent was the rent paid by a freeholder in lieu of services which might otherwise have been
required of him. At this time, the approximate yearly quit rent on one hundred acres was two shillings. Charles W.
Stetson, Four Mile Run Land Grants, (Washington: Mimeoform Press, 1935): 7.

18 Although the first grant made north of the Occoquan River is difficult to determine with certainty, scholars have
identified the first patent in this area as "Doeggs Island”, 2,109 acres at the confluence of the Occoquan and
Potomac Rivers, made to Robert Turney on July 8, 1651. Netherton’s A History of Fairfax County. See also Robert
M. Moxham’s The Colonial Plantation of George Mason (Springfield ,Virginia: Colonial Press, 1974): 4.

19 This original charter, dated September 18, 1649, lists the patentees as Ralph Lord Hopton, Baron of Stratton;
Henry Lord Jermyn , Baron of St. Edmund’s Bury; John Lord Culpeper, Baron of Thoresway; Sir John Barkeley;
Sir William Morton, Sir Dudley Wyatt and Thomas Culpeper, Esq. -all subjects of Charles II. For a more detailed
analysis of early land grants in Virginia see Virginia Land Grants: A study of conveyancing in relation to Colonial politics,
Privately Printed, (Richmond: The Old Dominion Press 1925): 148-149,

20 When land is escheated, it means that the ownership of the property reverts to the state or sovereign—in this
case England—due to a lack of a defined inheritor, or by reason of a breach of condition.

21 Stetson, 4-5. See also Netherton et al., 15-17.

22 As an example of the discontinuity in governmental jurisdictions, the land that was to become Arlington County,
the county in which the Arlington Estate is currently located, was successively in the counties of Northumberland
(1645), Westmoreland (1653), Stafford (1666), Prince William (1730), Fairfax (1742), District of Columbia (1801),


84 | 1861 - 1865

joined by those slaves newly freed under the District of Columbia Emancipation Proclamation
which was passed in 1862. Within a year, over one thousand people lived within the bound-
aries of the Freedmen’s Village. While some individuals moved on as quickly as possible, oth-
ers stayed and improved their individual homes by planting trees and raising vegetables. Many
of the residents in the village, with its churches, school, and hospital, were women and chil-
dren since most of the able bodied men enlisted or served as military laborers outside the
Washington area.?? In addition, some Freedmen’s Villagers worked nearby on other portions
of the old Arlington estate, in the government's agricultural fields, raising hay and other crops
to pay the monthly rent of their homes.#3 Sojourner ‘Truth lived in the community for a year
and often served as a liaison between the former slaves and the federal officials. Though there
was much sickness and poverty, the death rate of two per day in Freedmen's Village compared
favorably with the five people per day rate in the District camps. Between May of 1863 and
May of 1864, a cemetery for deceased members of Freedmen's Village was established in the
northeast corner of the Arlington estate near the Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike. Later
this spot became the location of the first soldier burials made at Arlington by the federal gov-
ernment. By late 1865, with the end of the Civil War, a movement began to disband the con-
traband camps and disperse the residents into the countryside and to the north. Many of the
villages were broken up. At Freedmen's Village on Arlington estate, however, the former
slaves were allowed to stay. The irony of the slaves once managed by Robert E. Lee, farming
Arlington as free men and women did not go unnoticed by the officials of the Bureau of
Refugees, Freedman and Abandoned Lands. By the time the village was disbanded in the late
1880s, it was the oldest Freedmen's Village in the country.4

FIRST MILITARY BURIALS

Even as early in the war as 1862, questions began to arise as to the proper burial of the
Union soldiers. Articles and editorials in the papers in the northern cities commented on the
irreverent burials and inadequate sites of interment experienced by the fallen men. In response
to a clear need, on July 17, 1862 Congress enacted legislation authorizing the President to pur-
chase “cemetery grounds” to be used as national cemeteries for “soldiers who shall have died in
the service of the country” and gave authority of their oversight to the Quarter Master General
of the United States. 45 Locally, by late in 1863, the primary federal burial ground, the Soldiers
Home, was nearly full.46 Following the enormous loss of life in the Battle of Wilderness in early
May of 1864, Major Daniel H. Rucker and Captain James Monroe of the Quarter Master
General's Office were ordered to make a careful examination of all sites eligible for burial use
near the District.47_ They reported in favor of Arlington. Since January, the site had been
owned by the United States due to the purchase ordered by President Lincoln. In addition to
being convenient to the hospitals in Washington and Alexandria, the high elevation of the site

provided both pragmatic security from floods and the aesthetic beauty of the picturesque view


Arlington House Archives

In addition to culling through books and records from local repositories, oral history
played an considerable role in the analysis of the landscape of the Custis and Lee era.
Leisenring interviewed former slaves of Mary Lee and G.W.P. Custis, including the daughters
of Thorton and Selina Grey, Mrs. Annie Baker and Mrs. Ada Thompson, who would have been.
seven years old and three years old respectively at the time of the federal army occupation in
1861.!6 James Parks, born on the Arlington estate and an employee at the cemetery for his
entire life, also offered insight into the arrangement of farms, fields and gardens, as did D. H.
Rhodes, who retired as landscape gardener in 1930. Robert E. Lee, Jr., the son of General
Robert E. Lee was also interviewed by Leisenring. However, according to the comments of the

National Park Service historian on staff when the property was transferred in 1933:

no thorough or complete study of or search for full historical data on Arlington has been
made. Mr. Leisenring has studied the problem, has gathered what data he bas been able to,
and as a result of his studies and bis thoughts on the problem has drawn up the plans. In
my opinion before having had a chance to go into the matter with any degree of thorough-
ness, Mr. Leisenring has worked with considerable feeling and faithfulness toward an appro-
priate treatment of the problem. He very kindly gave me a copy of a study he made some
time ago and which contains his ideas on the general treatment of the grounds and build-
ings .. .. Fragmentary evidence only is basis for the restoration of the kitchen garden.'7

COLONIAL REVIVAL PLAN

In 1930 plans for the treatment of the grounds at Arlington House were created by the
Quartermaster General’s Office and submitted to the Commission of Fine Arts for review.
‘The Commission brought the plans to the attention of Ferruchio Vitale, a landscape architect

90 This map, created by the
Department of Army, illus-
trates many of the ideas
mulled over by the Committee
of Fine Arts when considering
the restoration of Arlington
House and grounds. Parking
is moved west of the flower
garden and the greenhouse is
removed entirely. Arlington
National Cemetery, Restor-
ation of Arlington Mansion,
Study for Drives, Walks and
Planting Around Mansion on
sites of old flower and
Vegetable Garden ¢.1930.

1929 - 2001 | 147



64. In order to grow the
flowers necessary to beautify
the grounds of the cemetery, a
small greenhouse was
constructed in the northeast
corner of the flower garden in
1870. Stereoscopic card

106 | 1865 - 1880

1875

vines growing on the arbor, there was very little in the way of permanent ornamental vegeta-
tion within the flower garden.3° By 1871 gravel walks in the garden were repaired and the
planting beds were prepared for the addition of annuals, thousands of “summer flowers” which
grew in “hot beds” until being placed into the garden.}” In 1872 roses were added.38 A hedge
of arborvitae was planted in an open border between the garden flower beds and the fence as
ascreen. Many years later, a landscape gardener was asked to describe the arrangement of the
garden paths when he arrived in 1873. Though not quite sure of the exact layout due to the
irregularity of the garden design and the lack of documentation, he described it in the follow-

ing manner:

One principal walk extended around the entire flower garden at a distance of about four
feet from the inclosing picket fence. That one walk extended from the entrance gate-
straight through the old arbor, or summer house, to the south end of flower garden and
there connected with the boundary walk. Also that curved walk passed either side of the
summer house and then connected with the main center walk at points north and south of
that structure, which resulted in the summer house and adjacent plot being enclosed in an
oblong-shaped—rather than circular-shaped plot—enclosed by walks. The result of this
plan was that the entire garden was comprised of flower beds and walks only—there being

practically no two beds alike in shape or size.39

In order to grow all of the flowers and plants required around the mansion and elsewhere in
the cemetery, a greenhouse was built in the northeast corner of the garden in 1870. With a
brick foundation and glass walls, the fairly small structure was able to contain over 800 flower
pots filled with plants in its first year of use.4°

In 1873 David H.
Rhodes, a trained landscape
gardener, was hired by the
Quartermaster Generals
Office to oversee the develop-
ment of Arlington. Rhodes
quickly took charge. By 1874,
the monthly report of the
cemetery superintendent listed
all the buildings in good con-
dition.4!_ “Neat houses” were
erected over the well and a
glass roof was installed on the

conservatory of the main

i
2
j


1) Stratford Hall-
Westmoreland County. in 1717,
‘Thomas Lee purchased the land for

Stratford Hall Plantation and, during
the period of 1730-1738, built the brick
Georgian Great House. Birthplace of
RE. Leoin 1807.

2) Roge's Creek

1732. He lived at this plantation for the
first three years of his life.

3) White House-

New Kent County. Colonel Danie!
mansion John Parke Custis managed
his fathers large New Keat County
plantation. Custis married Martha
Dandridge.

4) Abingdon

Arlington County, Originally granted
to Robert Howson in 1669 who sold it
to John Alexander for 6,000 pounds of
tobacco, The first house was built in
the 1740's by Gerard Alexander I,
John's great grandson. George
‘Washingtoa's adopted stepson, John
Parke Custis lived on the site for
several years. The house burned in
1930.

5) Meant Vernon-
Fairfax County Home of George
‘Washington from 1747 until his death
in 1799. The land was patented in
1674, and the house was built (1743)
by bibl ober Lawrence
George Washington
inbeitel ia 1754,

6) Arlington House-

Fairfax County. 1100 acre estate and
seat of the Custis and Lee families.
‘The manor house wes begun in 1802 by
George W. P. Custis. Arlington was
later lived in by RE. Lee and his
family until they fled in 1861 due to
advancing Union forces.

7) Ravensworth-

Fairfax County. Built in 1796 by
William Fitzhugh of Chatham, relative
of Mrs. RE. Lee, When Mrs. Lee fled
Arlington House during the Civil War,
she stayed at Ravensworth briefly, but
fearing that Union troops might harm
the home, she journeyed further south,
‘The mansion was burned in 1925.

8) Romancoke-
King William County. Custis family plantation located on the Pumunkey river.

9) Chatham-

Stafford couty. William Fitzhugh, built this large brick home, begun in 1768, completed by 1771. Mary Fitzhugh Custis born here (later she married GWP Custis)

10)

Northumberland County. John Custis Il acquired this property on the Northern Neck of Virginia in the mid seventeenth century. He began building the manor house,
named Arlington after his native locality in England around 1670.

ie

Lies

[National Capital Region Cultural Landscape Program

1608 - 1802 | 25


Forest

Arlington
House

Rlexandria-Georgetown Turnpike

fields and
market gardens

0 400 800 1600
Vw ——

SCALE | INCH= 800 FEET

fields and
market gardens
.

wens
a 7

7

io)
ay -
y see Farm and Spring Detail

LEGEND

— = Shoreline

smmeen Arlington Estate boundry
~——— Primary Roads

++ Secondary Roads /paths
Alexandria Canal (c1843)

Gardens

KK Tree Line

Syphax structure approx. location

Bl ice House

() Farm Buildings

LE) Spring Buildings

O Grove

4 Conifers

O Hardwoods

LT Custie Graves

iB Tomb of Mary Randolph
& Slave cemetery (approx.location)

feeding
barn

Overseers

pouty a \ voce

slaveny

cabin ~ “Carriage! Oslave
shop cabin

slave
cabin

tunnel

Farm and Spring Detail

slave

cabins .

OOo paomin
saddlery

wheelwright

buildings (3) spring

ci]

200 300 400 Feet ff

FA

SOURCES:

Besos oF Wasiane Yow PREPaneD FROM ORE RAL SURVEYS OF THE
EweNera DEPARTMENT 1886-1866. SMEBT 5 aN0 8. NARA I! RECORD

‘Grour 77. F99, CanrosRamiic Gnancn

AmceVGTON Pasy STAMLES NARA Il. RG 92. F-il0 SHEETS 1-0

Meies, Monrconery €. Parr oF ARuIveTON Views. USS. Coast
‘SURVEY. REGISTER NO. 1065. OW FILE, LIBRARY OF ConGRESS, CARTOSRAPWC Brann, WASH

ngrow D.C

Tonoseumicat Map oF THE Drstmcr OF CoLumu suRVEVED NI THE
YEARS 1886-59 OY A. BOSCORE PUBLISHED BY D. MECLELLAND, BLANCHARD AND HOW,

Wasnnisron D.C. 1841. Lineary oF Concness
CALL # G3BS0 186) G6 Vain ovensizE

Conesronomce oF CusTIS ano Lee FanLy Menoers, 18004861,
ARLINGTON HOUSE ARCHIVES, HISTORICAL SOCIETY oF ViRGMIA, LORARY OF ConsRESS, TUCO

Pace, Wasmnsron 0.C

P. TWe Lee Gia. (Weston Satan, NC. Low F

Comune, Hager
BualR PUDUSHER) 1987

‘CALVERT, EUZABETH RaNDOLA. "CWILOHOGD Davs ar ARLINGTON,”

Unoareo Manuscmrr, ¢. (870. ARLNSTOM HOUSE ARCH VES,

NOTE:

A map of existing conditions is
screened underneath the
historic period pian.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT

1802-1861
Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

553/207 | IS t rN




TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword

Acknowledgement ......sssssssssesssssssesssssseesssecssssccsssecssnscssnsceesssesssnesssnsscesssuessssnscssssescesncessvecssnesen® ii

Executive SUmmary....ssecsssssecssssessssneesssnecssnseccsnssesneessusecssneesssnecesssesssnsesssssssesssscessnecssneessnneesnsed
Tllustrations......sssseccsssssssssessssseecssssesssssscsssseesssessssnecssnsessssssssnscsssnvesssssessssseesssseessssvsesssesssevecssveesseeXT

EXHUDItS ......scseecssecsseesseesssesssessssecsseesssssssscsnecssscsscssecsseesnecsessssessneesssssssesssessnsessnesaneesneesonensesense xvii

Chapter One

Pre-1608
Chapter Two

1608-1802 oo. ceescsceseessesessesnessesseseseeseesessssssessesssessesesnssesnessssssssneseessensaeesseeseesaesnssnenssnsneessneseeeee 5
Chapter Three

Chapter Four

1861-1865
Chapter Five
Chapter Six

1880-1929 ..esecccsssssssecsesssnescscecssnsnnscccsssnescecssusescsssnssecesssnseccecssnnasceesssnunesseecesnnneceesenaneceesans 117

Chapter Seven

1929-2001
Emdnotes...sssccsseesssseeccsssesessneesssnsecessnscssssnsecssecsesssesssvecssucessucsssuccessvscessnvessssnsssesaveccssvesenneessansesss 173
Bibliography ......ssssssesssssssssseecsesssssnsesssccessuseecsssssseccensssesssssusscesssuusssessssnsussseesessnnneeeessssneneeeesanees 209
Map Bibliography .......sssssessssssessssseecsssseecssssssssescssecessneessnstssssscessnscessnstessnvessssnuscessnsessntenssesesnee 219

TABLE OF CONTENTS | 111


83 McMillian Commission
Plan, 1902 Unpublished
rendering, first published

with the title, General Plan

of the Mall System

130. | 1880 - 1929

mission reestablished the preeminence of L’Enfant’s design for Washington D.C., through
recommendations based both on primary research of LEnfant’s eighteenth-century documen-
tation and from inspiration gathered in the commission’s sojourns to various European capi-
tals. The commission members included Daniel Burnham, a well-known architect who had
overseen the creation of the “White City” for the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893; Charles
McKim of the architectural firm McKim, Mead and White known for their classically styled
works; Augustus St. Gaudens, a highly respected sculptor; and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., a
well-known landscape architect. The secretary was Charles Moore, the former political sec-
retary of Senator McMillan.3+ Moore would eventually influence the development of the
landscape of Arlington House through his role as chairman of the Commission of Fine Arts.
The McMillan Commission Plan, which included both a formal redesign for the mall area and
a plan for a regional park system, was to guide the development of Washington, D.C. far into
the future. One important component of the McMillan Commission Plan was the emphasis
placed on views between existing memorials and places of intense reverence, like Arlington,
and the sites of future memorials on or adjacent to the National Mall. The physical and sym-
bolic connection between Arlington House and the future site of the Lincoln Memorial played
a critical role in the plan. To the creators of the 1902 McMillan Commission Plan, Arlington
House was a potent symbol of the former Confederate cause and of the south in general. The
site of the future Lincoln Memorial was, in contrast, emblematic of the north. The plan rec-
ommended the construction of a classically-styled bridge to connect Arlington in Virginia with
the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.. Arlington Memorial Bridge was not completed,
however, for another thirty years.3>

Throughout the 1910s only limited changes were made in the immediate vicinity of
Arlington House. The granolithic pavement almost completely surrounding the mansion and
slaves quarters provided space for parking, increasingly needed as the number of personal cars
in surrounding communities multiplied. In 1921 with the end of World War I came the ded-
ication of the grand Tomb of the Unknown Soldier south of Arlington House in the location
of a mid-nineteenth-century gravel pit. This new amphitheater supplanted the “Old”

£
é
¢
5
§



22 | 1608 - 1802

3200 inhabitants, the houses principally of brick, the streets are not paved and being of clay
after rain they are so slippery it is almost impossible to walk in them. . . .”

Only a few years later, in 1795, a European emigrant described the port city in a slightly dif-

ferent manner,

Alexandria is one of the most wicked places I ever beheld in my life; cock-fighting, horse
racing, with every species of gambling and cheating . . .with no less than between forty and
Sifty billiard tables... I would not give one thousand pounds sterling for all the unculti-
vated land I have seen here.”

In addition to the bustling ports of Georgetown and Alexandria, across the Potomac from
Abingdon and from the land that would soon be the Arlington House estate, the capital city
was just beginning to form.

In November of 1799, Lawrence Lewis (G.W.P.’s brother-in-law) and G.W.P. Custis left
Mount Vernon to inspect the Custis’s White House plantation in New Kent County. G.W.P.
Custis, in learning from the older and well-established Lawrence Lewis, was preparing to take
over management of his lands. Very quickly the knowledge would be necessary for, shortly
after their arrival at White House, General George Washington passed away at Mount
Vernon.” At Washington’s death, in addition to the two thirds of the estate of his father John
Parke Custis, G.W.P. owned the property willed to him by his adopted grandfather, the Four
Mile Tract. The 1200 acre Four Mile Tract, was located north of Four Mile Run, an affluent
of the Potomac River. George Washington had purchased this property in 1774 from James
and George Mercer for 892 £, approximately seven dollars an acre. He believed the tract was
valuable both for its forest of primarily hardwoods and its proximity to Alexandria.” Though
George Washington he had always planned to construct a mill on the property, he never did.
G.W.P., who always referred to the property as the Washington Forest Tract, had a saw mill
in operation by 1807.”

With Martha Washington’s death in 1802, her portion of G.W.P. Custis’s inheritance
from his long deceased grandfather Daniel Parke Custis, was conveyed. John Parke Custis had
left no will. Therefore, except for Eleanor Calvert Custis Stewart’s dower rights as a widow to
John Parke Custis, G.W.P. Custis inherited all of John Parke Custis’ properties, including the
White House plantation, Romancock (later renamed Romancoke) and Arlington on the
Eastern Shore."' Through her will, Martha Custis Washington left household valuables to her
grandson, including all her silver plate, a set of Cincinnati china, all her books save the family
bible, an elaborate master bed and bedclothes, and other assorted furnishings. At the sale of her
estate, G.W.P. also purchased a large number of household goods from side boards to soap
jars—perhaps already thinking about the establishment of his own home at Arlington House.”


[General Garfield] disappear. He said that he did not know it was there, so he would not
feel badly... 2

EARLY TWENTIETH-CENTURY DESIGN
RECOMMENDATIONS

Arlington House Archives,

In 1921 the Quartermaster General’s Office presented a plan to the Commission of Fine
Arts addressing the “Remodeling of the Grounds about the Lee Mansion.” There were two
primary objectives guiding their plan. The first was to improve the safety of visitors through

the redesign of roads and paths. The second was to create a setting that properly represented
the solemn and patriotic essence of the National Cemetery and Arlington House. The
Commission agreed with the proposition that the visitor parking area be moved from the yard
between the two slave quarters to west of the Monument to the Unknown Civil War Soldier.
According to the landscape plan, a large roadway loop drive was to be located at the northern
end of the flower garden to provide access to this new parking area. As the Quartermaster
Generals Office suggested, the removal of the flag pole and the Enfant tomb was necessary
to restore the slope to its early nineteenth-century appearance. As in the days of Custis and
Lee, the vista from the portico to the future Arlington Memorial Bridge and beyond to the
national mall was considered extremely important. ‘To enhance the viewing area, the 1921
landscape design included a boxwood hedge paralleling the eastern facade of the house, out-
lining a brick terrace from which to view the city of Washington. Though the Commission
approved the landscape plan, there was no congressional appropriation to fund the project.
The 1921 plan, however, formed a basis for future development proposals and the eventual

alterations of the landscape.

87 Arlington National
Cemetery Arlington Virginia.
Preliminary Plan for
Improvement of Grounds pre-
pared under the direction of
the national Commission of
Fine Arts, September 1921.

1929-2001 | 141


pasture land, and additions and subtractions of ornamental and practical vegetation resulting
in the “highly cultivated meadow” that was described in the early 1860s writings and revealed
in Civil War era images. Regardless, the naturalistic landscape of the Park had precedent
throughout the east coast beginning in the first half of the eighteenth century and increasing
in popularity through the 1860s.!3 Credit for the popularization of this picturesque ideal in
America is often given to Andrew Jackson Downing, whose work, Treatise on the Theory and
Practice of Landscape Gardening as Adapted to North America (1849) promoted the theories of
English landscape designers Humphry Repton (1752-1843) and his editor John Claudius
Loudon (1783-1843), Downing was also involved in the design of landscape surrounding the
Capital in the early 1850s. So his work may have had an indirect influence on the develop-
ment of Arlington. Even with the local dissemination of Downing’s ideas, however, the natu-
ralistic garden, or “modern style”, as it was called in many nineteenth-century books and peri-
odicals, was not always recognized in the landscape by lay individuals as a designed space, espe-
cially when compared to more formal elements of the typical nineteenth-century, relatively
small-scale, flower garden. Certainly, at Arlington the flower and vegetable gardens were
often admired. These fenced gardens spread out from the end of each wing, in harmony with
the symmetry of the classical architecture and in stark contrast to the dark forest to the west.

‘The kitchen garden lay on the north side of the mansion. Hidden from view by hedges
from visitors who approached the estate from the southeast, this garden contained vegetables
and fruits to provide fresh and canned produce. A row of fruit trees lined both sides of the

central path, which was on an axis with the central path of the flower garden located to the

31 "Arlington from the
Great Oak", a photograph
taken in 1864 by Andrew
Russell, reveals the pictur-
esque nature of the Park of
Arlington, even during the
Civil War.

1802-1861 | 53


62. | 1802 - 1861

Though improvements to Arlington continued, both Custis and Robert E. Lee begin to real-
ize that Nelson’s management of the Pamunkey estates, especially at the White House planta-
tion, was not as capable as previously thought. Due to poor record-keeping by Nelson, and
inadequate communication by both Nelson and Custis, debts against the estate surfaced. The
relative distance between the Pamunkey estates and Arlington had proved a limitation to
Custis’s oversight throughout his life. Shortly before his death at age 76, Custis sent the fol-

lowing letter to his new White House manager:

I am greatly pained, disappointed and mortified to hear that you have found my affairs so
dilapidated and out of sorts, more especially in want of houses and other deprivations of my
unfortunate Negroes, it ought not to be so, my negroes have been heavier worked than
many slaves in Virginia, so much so, that neighbors of my estates have addressed to me
anonymous letters complaining of the subject.'37

Custis continues, stating that the new manager’s first duty would be to improve the health and
the living conditions of the slaves. However before the improvements could be accomplished,
Custis passed away in October of 1857. His complicated will outlined his bequests to his child
and his grandchildren. His daughter, Mary Custis Lee, was to have a life inheritance of
Arlington. At her death, the property was to go to his oldest grandson, George Washington
Custis Lee. The other two grandsons were to get White House and Romancock. The girls
were to receive ten thousand dollars each, payable from the sale of the other properties, includ-
ing the Smith and Monockin Islands. Finally, the slaves at Arlington were to receive their free-
dom within five years, all debts against the estate being paid.!38

The primary result of this will was that, for the first time, Arlington was to be separated
from the support of the plantations of White House and Romancock. Arlington would no
longer be simply a family seat. Instead the estate would have to function as a self-supporting
entity—a difficult prospect considering the limited availability of arable land. Though the
farm on the eastern boundary of the property had always contributed to the family wealth, it
was Romancock and White House, that made the grand design of Arlington even remotely
possible. Eager to see the terms of the will fulfilled, Lee set about improving the farm and
grounds with the help of his son who was to inherit the estate. He repaired farm buildings.
He attempted to determine the exact metes and bounds of Arlington, concerned that neigh-
bors were encroaching over the boundary. He augmented the soil of the farm fields by creat-
ing a lime kiln for shells in an outlying oat field, spreading the lime on the fields as far as it
would go and then supplementing the lime with guano and plaster. He also improved and
rented out Arlington Mill.!3? Though his army duties prevented him from constant oversight
of the farm, he wrote often to his son detailing necessary work:


AIRLINGTON MOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL

T | vip I

ee

HISTORY

VOLUME I, 2001

< SENTER

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

~~ NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION

rhs. 4 ~ f
Pa a “6 b 9s, QULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
XM ? 4 Fay Xt,

yi 2 Pie

hee! raed WASHINGTON, D.C.



'8 | 1861 - 1865

backdrop to Arlington House remained. In 1865, the graves were concentrated in two areas—
in the northeast corner of the property and to the southwest of the house. There below enor-
mous oaks and elms, the graves of thirteen thousand soldiers were marked with simple wood
headboards painted white.58 Black lettering revealed their names, where known, and for the
Confederates buried, a simple word was printed, “Rebel.”5? Yet, even acknowledging the
veracity of Smith Lee's observation, the National Cemetery at Arlington would never again be
a home to the Lee family.

Did Montgomery C. Meigs, Quarter Master General of the Army, create Arlington
National Cemetery in spite? Were the soldiers interred to ensure that the land would be held
in perpetuity by the people of the United States, and never again be the personal property of
the Lee family or their descendants? Only his words written ten years after the cemetery

establishment, suggest his reasoning:

In establishing the cemetery . . . it was my intention to have begun the interments nearer
the mansion, but opposition on the part of officers stationed at Arlington, some of whom
used the mansion and who did not like to have the dead buried near them caused the inter-
ments to be begun in the Northeastern quarter of the grounds. On discovering this... I
gave special instructions to make the burials near the mansion. They were then driven off
by the same influence to the western portion of the grounds . . . and on discovering this sec-

ond error I caused the officers to be buried around the garden. . .°!

The officers graves were placed around the flower garden at a time when the paling fence
did not exist to hide the white headboards from those who would admire the roses in the beds.
Yet Meigs did not act alone. Arlington, unlike many southern estates seized during the Civil
War, was bought by the United States outright under an order given by the President of the
United States. The creation of the cemetery at Arlington was sanctioned by the head of the
Department of War, Edwin Stanton after it was chosen by General Rucker. At the time, opin-
ions on the creation of the cemetery at Arlington were varied. Many who had fought for the
Union, whose words were echoed in the northern newspapers, believed that the estate could
be put to no finer use than the burial of those who had lost their lives fighting in the war. In
contrast, many sympathetic to the Confederate cause felt that the confiscation of Robert and
Mary Lee's home amounted to stealing and desecration—a vicious act of the north against the
southern people.

In placing the graves around Mary Lee's garden, the same space which held the flowers
once sold by slaves to raise funds for their own freedom, insurance against the return of the
estate to the Lees was created. The federal officials realized that the disinterment of the offi-
cers around the garden would not be allowed in the political climate following the war.
Instead, the graves would remain forever a reminder of the enormous cost of the conflict.

Robert E. Lee, who became the president of Washington College (later renamed Washington


—s
104 The first grave

marker of President John F.
Kennedy was quite simple.
photograph 1963

162 | 1929-2001

In 1955 the Lee Mansion was officially designated the Custis-Lee Mansion. According
to the statement of Joel Broyhill, the representative from Virginia who introduced the legisla-
tion, the change was requested to avoid confusion with Stratford Hall. At this time the Custis-
Lee Mansion was designated as a permanent memorial to Robert E. Lee.57

In the spring of 1959 a bill was introduced to extend the grounds of the Custis-Lee
Mansion to allow for the “completion of the physical layout of the mansion. . . . . representing
a continuation of the plans of the Quartermaster General,” in essence to restore the flower
garden. On August 18,1959, the land of Mary Custis and Mary Lee’s flower garden was trans-
ferred from the Department of War to the National Park Service.>* Plans for the restoration

of the flower garden went forward, slowly.

J. F. KENNEDY GRAVESITE

tery Archives

Astington Nati


in the extreme political climate immediately following the Civil War. Yet she always deeply
regretted the federal government's use of Arlington during wartime and felt the sharp sting
inflicted by the burial of Union soldiers in the soil of her home. Mary Lee wrote shortly after
the war:

... the small enclosure allotted to bis and my mother's remains [are] surrounded closely by

the graves of those who aided to bring all this ruin on the children and country. They are

even planted up to the very door without any regard to common decency.56

The belongings of her father, the precious Washington relics from Mount Vernon, that Mary
Lee had been forced to leave behind in her quick departure from Arlington had been removed
by government officials to the Patent Office. She was able to get permission from President
Johnson to recover her belongings. Yet the President's judgement was overruled by Congress
ina resolution passed on Johnson's last day in office. It would be another thirty years before
the belongings of George Washington were returned to the descendents of Mary Lee.°” In
1870, Robert E. Lee passed away without ever returning to Arlington. Mary returned only

once for a brief moment three years later. She wrote of her visit sadly:

I rode out to my dear home but so changed it seemed but as a dream of the past. I could
not have realized it was Arlington but for the few old oaks they had spared and the trees
planted on the lawn by the General and myself. . . 58

She died shortly thereafter. The year of her death, her son George Washington Custis Lee
began his suit against the federal government for the return of the Arlington property. Bills
were introduced in Congress both for and against restitution. Finally, in 1882 the case was
decided in the Supreme Court. The federal acquisition of the property during the Civil War
was deemed a taking without just compensation and therefore illegal. Custis Lee was paid a
sum of $150,000.00 to settle the debt.5? On March 10, 1883 the United States was given a
clear title to the Arlington property.

THE END OF FREEDMEN'S VILLAGE

With the Arlington Estate firmly in federal hands, the breakup of Freedmen’s Village,
which had been attempted before, was now inevitable. According to the Regulations of the
Army, “No civilian will be permitted to reside upon a Military reservation unless he be in the
employ of the government . . . no permission will be given any one to cultivate any portion of
a Military reservation.”6! In the years immediately following the Supreme Court decision,
attempts were made to remove the freedmen from the village and surrounding farms. After
much resistance by the residents, the displacement efforts were stopped and an inventory of

the village and the surrounding agricultural properties was made detailing the existing struc-

1865-1880 | 111


PTER /

CHAI

2001

1929 -



NATIONAL
PARK
SERVICE

Cover Illustrations: Sketch of Arlington House by John Farley, 1824. (Virginia Historical Society);
Arlington House, 2001. (Photo by Warren Miller, Visual History Project, Arlington National
Cemetery)

Publication Credits: Information in this publication may be copied and used, with the condition that full
credit is given to the authors and the National Park Service. Appropriate citations and bibliographic
credits should be made for each use.

United States Department of the Interior Mission Statement: As the Nation’s principal conservation
agency, the Department of the Interior has responsibility for most of our nationally-owned public lands
and natural resources. This includes fostering sound use of our land and water resources; protecting our
fish, wildlife and biological diversity: preserving the environmental and cultural values of our national
parks and historical places; and providing for the enjoyment of life through outdoor recreation. The
Department assesses our energy and mineral resources and works to ensure that their development is in
the best interests of all our people by encouraging stewardship and citizen participation in their care. The
Department also has a major responsibility for the American Indian reservation communities and for

people who live in island territories under U.S. administration,


HUMPREYS ROAD

BOUNDARY WALL

N\

Iw —— SUPERINTENDENT'S RESIDENCE

SS CONSTRUCTED 1935

OPEN MARBLE DRAIN
MADE WITH DISCARDED TOMBSTONES

Kc. 1935

SS CINDER WALK c. 1935

PAVING AROUND. HOUSE AND
GARDEN DETAIL LF.

SHED AND
STOREHOUSE FOOT
©1896-1935 ~BRIDGES
€. 1935
STABLE ¢. 1805-1904,
STABLE 1906-1935 oN

STABLE REHAB. 1935

CEMETERY MAINTENANCE FACILITY
1935

CHAFFEE PLACE
PUBLIC PARKING

hes

NHOUSE
CONSTRUCTED €.1955,

co

BRICK PATH

G. 1933 (BRICK PAVEMENT) <t
6.1896 (ALIGNMENT) ‘ gE

oe
SOURCES:

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-OTTING BUILDING

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©. 1932

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BRICK WALKS
1931

FLOWER’ BEDS
REMOVED, C. 1952

CUSTIS WALK

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| INCH=200 FEET

ROAD TRACE
‘— CONSTRUCTED C. 1861, REMOVED 1874

400

1 INCH=I50 FEET

LEGEND
GRAVEL

SANDSTONE PAVING
INSTALLED ¢.1935

GQ suoincs
c NOTE:

VEGETATION NOT SHOWN (ALL ROADS
N&XCEPT LEE DRIVE ASPHALTED)

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT

1929-1945
Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J, HANNA, A. DYMEK, E, HENDERSON, N. PARASH

B55/3090S"


125 Interestingly, the use of the word "grove” in American history has a religious connotation as well, for grove often
identified the spot as a location of a religious camp meeting. No evidence has yet surfaced suggesting that the
grove” at Arlington House was used for religious purposes, however. See John Brinckerhoff Jackson. Landscape in
Sight: Looking at America. (New Haven: Yale University Press 1997).

126 GW. Custis to Agnes Lee, 1853, Custis Papers, Virginia Historical Society.

127 Mildred Lee, Recollections. Lexington July 20, 1890. As reprinted in Agnes Lee’s Growing up in the 1850s: The
Journal of Agnes Lee. (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press 1984): 117-118.

128 Interview. June 28, 1999. Dan Sealy, Natural Resources Specialist, George Washington Memorial Parkway,
Virginia. National Capital Region, National Park Service. The soil profile, a relatively porous upper strata with
marine clay sub-strata, prevents water infiltration into the lower stratum and leads to a condition known as rota-
tional slip. In this situation, the increased water build up eventually causes “slipping” of the soil layer, resulting in
terrace-like stepping of the topography, unsuitable for building or farming.

129 Mary Lee to Mary Custis, May 1, 1844, Virginia Historical Society.

130 G. W, Lafayette to G.W.P. Custis, January 3, 1825. See also statement of G. W. P. Custis to Benjamin Perley
Poore, quoted in Poore’s “Waifs From Washington,” Gleason’s Pictorial Drawing Room Companion, Volume IV
(Boston: F, Gleason March 19, 1853): 190.

131 Mrs, William N. Fitzhugh of Ravensworth to Mrs. Abby Nelson, 1853, excerpt as copied by Murray Nelligan
in ARHO

132 Mary Lee Custis to George Washington Custis Lee, October 15, 1851. ARHO.
133 G.W.P. Custis to Francis Nelson, June 17, 1854. ARHO.

134 G.W.P. Custis to F. Nelson, December 11, 1850 and April 3, 1851, Custis Papers. William and Mary College.
ARHO.

135 Dec 5, [18562] Mary Lee to Custis Lee, Mss1 L51 606, Custis Papers, Virginia Historical Society.
136 Mary Lee to Robert E. Lee, October 2, 1857. ARHO.
137 G.W.P, Custis to William O. Winston, January 28, 1857. ARHO.

138 G.W.P. Custis’s will, probated on December 7, 1857, is located in the Manuscript records of Alexandria County,
VA. Copy in ARHO.

139 Robert E. Lee to George Washington Custis Lee, May 17, 1858. ARHO.
149 Robert E, Lee to George Washington Custis Lee, May 1860. R.E, Lee Papers, Library of Congress.

141 The slaves rented in 1859/60 were: Leanthe Bingham, Jim Bingham, Mary Norris, Julieanne Check, Catherine
Check, Henry Check, Catherine Burke, Marion Burke, Agnes Burke, and Robert Parks in addition to “several
negroes” unidentified in the accounts as rented. “Transcript of R.E. Lee’s Return to the Court as Executor of
G.WP. Custis’ Estate for Period June 1859 to June 1860 Confirmed and ordered to be recorded August 1861.
Alexandria Will Book 8, page 92. ARHO.

ENDNoTES | 191


NCR Cultural Landscape Program

and Lee University) never returned to Arlington. Mary Lee came back only once. Neither

seriously attempted to regain the property, though throughout their lives they sadly lamented
its loss. But here too, as in other facets of their lives, the Lees understood the enormous
importance of reconciliation in the restoration of the country.

In May of 1868, on the first official Memorial Day held in this country, under the por-
tico of Arlington the following address was given by Brigadier General James Garfield, future
President of the United States. In honoring the deceased soldiers he read,

What other spot so fitting for their last resting place as this, under the shadow of the
Capitol saved by their valor; Here where the grim edge of battle joined; Here where all
the hope and fear and agony of their country centered; here let them rest, asleep in the

nation's heart

Seven years ago, this was home of one who lifted his sword against that of his country and
who became the Emperor of the rebellion. The soil beneath our feet once watered by the
tears of slaves, in whose hearts the sight of yonder proud capital awakened no pride and
inspired no hope. The face of the goddess that crowns it, was turned toward the sea and not
toward them. But thanks be to God, this arena of rebellion and slavery is a scene of vio-

lence and crime no longer!

This will be forever the sacred mountain of our Capital. Here is our temple, its sacrament
is the sarcophagus of the heroic hearts; its dome the bending of heavens; its alter candles the
watching stars. Hither our children’s children shall come to pay their tribute of grateful

homage.©2

54 The graves of the officers
buried in the 1860s remain
ining the flower garden
today, 2001.

1861-1865 | 89


’ acorn age ner =
uit ;

10 | 1608 - 1802

ability of the grantee to pay the annual quitrent.” To meet the requirements of a colonial land
patent, the grantee had to prove that the land was “seated and planted” within three years of
the grant’s creation. As most of the mid-seventeenth century land grants in this area were
speculative ventures, such “seating” often entailed the clearing of only a small portion of the
overall land grant and the building of a modest structure. For wealthy landowners, their slaves
or indentured servants often fulfilled the requirement of land occupation. Between the years
of 1651 and 1655, the land from the northwest shore of the Occoquan to the falls of the
Potomac was claimed by such grants."* For the next forty years, however, the legality of such
land grants and the exact ownership of the resulting property holdings was ambiguous. For
instance, though a 1649 patent from Charles II to a group of English proprietors had previ-
ously granted the land along the Potomac River, the colonial government in Jamestown con-
tinued to issue patents for the same lands and for other locations in the Northern Neck of
Virginia.” In addition, boundaries of land grants often overlapped or were ambiguous due to
poor marking, inadequate surveying, or illegal activity. Finally, because of the speculative
nature of the land grants, many were lost or escheated for want of seating, or abandoned due
to the difficulties imposed by the frequently harsh environment and the land owner’s manage-
rial distance.” In fact, for the majority of the seventeenth century, most of the land in the
Northern Neck was farmed by slaves or tenant farmers—primarily indentured servants—
resulting in a relatively limited agricultural economy." The development of colonial govern-
mental administration over this land area was complicated by owner absenteeism and the need
to consult distant English courts for arbitration.” The original grant of land that would one
day incorporate the lands of Arlington, fit this pattern of large, non-owner occupied agricul-

tural enterprises.

THE LAND GRANTS

The land which comprised the estate of Arlington House was originally a portion of a
6000-acre land grant from Sir William Berkeley, Royal Governor of Virginia, awarded to
English ship Captain Robert Howsing, on October 21 1669.” Made by the authority of King
Charles II, the grant was in recognition of Captain Howsing bringing 120 English, Irish and
Scottish settlers to live in this region of Virginia. Extending along the Potomac River from
Hunting Creek on the south to a small tributary of the Potomac, just west of My Lord’s (now
Theodore Roosevelt Island) on the north, the Howsing tract was dominated by woodland tree
species such as chestnut, oak and hickory. It served as home and hunting grounds to both kin-
based and political groups of the Algonquians, Doeg and Nacotchtanks tribes, whose settle-
ments were scattered throughout the area.” Less than a month after obtaining the land,
Howsing sold the tract for 6 hogsheads ( approximately 6,000 pounds weight) of tobacco to
John Alexander, a surveyor and planter, who had surveyed the tract the previous year.”


14 McDowell to Mary Lee, May 30, 1861. McDowell took over the command of General Sandford before Sandford
had the opportunity to answer the letter written by Mary Lee. McDowell, therefore, addressed the issues she raised.
Local and northern newspapers commented on the odd location of the headquarters, outside of the mansion instead
of in it. Most gave the rationale that by not living a tent and not in the mansion, the General endeared himself to
the soldiers, who were living in tents on the heights. New York Daily News July 9, 1861. Washington Republican July
12, 1861: 3. William Howard Russell. My Diary North and South (Boston: T.O.H.P. Burnham 1863): 395.

15 Samuel P. Heintzelman, MS Diary, Thursday June 20, 1861; June 8, 1861 Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper NY.

16 U.S. Coast Survey Map of the Ground of Occupation and Defense of the Division of the U.S. Army in Virginia in
Command of Brigadier General Irvin McDowell. 1861. See also, William Howard Russell’s My Diary North and South.
(Boston: T.O.H.P. Burnham 1863): 195.

17 A lunette is a military fortification with two projecting faces and two parallel flanks.

18 U, S. War Department, The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate
Armies, 70 Volumes (Washington, D.C.: The Government Printing Office, 1880-1901): Volume 5, 11, 678-84.;
Pictorial War Record. January 28, 1882; Rose, C.B. Jr. “Civil War Forts in Arlington.” (October 1960). Arlington
Historical Magazine.

9 Thid.
20 Frank Leslie's Iustrated Newspaper. “Our Camps and Strongholds.” (New York) June 15, 1861.

21 Diary entry July 8, 1861 in William Howard Russell’s My Diary North and South. (Boston: ‘T.O.H.P. Burnham
1863): 394.

22 November 14, 1861. Alfred L. Castleman, The Army of the Potomac: Behind the Scenes: (Milwaukee, Strickland &
Company 1863): 53. See also, Markie Williams to Mary Lee, July 25, 1862. Virginia Historical Society, Custis
Letters.

23 For more information about Selina Grey and the Washington relics see, Karen Byrne. “Selina Gray.” Cultural
Resource Magazine. No 4. 1998. Most of the Washington relics that were left in the house at the time of the Lee
family’s departure were taken by the Federal authorities and placed in the Patent Office for the duration of the War.
After the war, Mary Lee sued the federal government unsuccessfully for their return, Ruth Preston Rose. “Mrs.
General Lee’s attempts to regain her possessions after the Civil War.” In American History Magazine. October 1978.

24R.E. Lee to Mary Custis (Daughter), December 25, 1861. ARHO

25 Alan T. Nolan, Lee Considered: General Robert FE. Lee and Civil War History. (Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press 1991).

26 As the Arlington estate was located on Virginia state land occupied by the Union forces, the slaves did not fall
into the narrow category of those freed through the Emancipation Proclamation of September 1862.

27 The former Arlington slaves who were heads of household at Freedmen’s Village during the first years of its
establishment, included, Margaret Taylor, Austin Brannen, Lawrence Parks, William Parks, Martha Smith, James
Parks, Daniel Richardson, and members of the Syphax family. Bettie Taylor, Sallie Norris, and Lousia Bingham.
Valuation of Property Holdings of Freedmen’s Villagers, Heads of Family and Owner of Improvement, From Records of the
Assistant Commissioner for the District of Columbia for Bureau of Refugees, Freedman and Abandoned Lands
1865-1869, in Arlington House Archives. See also, National Archives. Microfilm Publication. M1055 Roll 21.
Miscellaneous Reports and Lists,

ENDNoTES | 193


House

Arlington |__

Ravine/ Forest.

9

40
SCALE | INCH= 80 FEET

LEGEND

exes Roads

== Fence post and rail or eplit rail
se Wood paling fence

eee Fost and rail fence

AA Tree Line
OOS Hedge of large ehrubs
© Barberry shrubs
© Deciduous trees of unkown type

© nit trees

Evergreen Trees
@ well

Jf Gate

ae Dump Site
ERE Tomb of Mary Randolph

© Arbor, location approximate

NOTE:

This historic period plan portrays the landscape of
Arlington House, as it may have appeared circa 1859,
based on analysis of primary materials related to the
site and the Custic and Lee families. The historic
vegetation illustrated represents only the approximate
location of vegetation. A map of existing conditions is
screend underneath the historic period plan. For
sources see previous historic period plan.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT
1802-1861
Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
160 PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

5 55/3040 dof Rw



49 Susan Winter Frye. The Evolution of Mill Settlement Patterns in Antietam Drainage. (Unpublished Thesis, College
of William and Mary, Virginia 1984):22-26. See also, Louis C. Hunter. A History of Industrial Power in the United
States, 1780-1930, (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia 1979).

50This property, listed in the Northern Neck grant book as being granted to William Fitzhugh on October 1, 1694
was originally granted to John Matthew in April of 1684. As with many large land tracts of the time period, such
an isolated land holding was difficult to seat. Fitzhugh was still actively seeking tenants in 1690. Unable to seat the
property, Fitzhugh took another grant on the land in 1694. Ravensworth, as it was called, stretched from what is
currently Shirley Highway, to south of the Little River Turnpike. The plantation was subsequently divided through
inheritance. Mary Lee Custis, wife of G.W.P. Custis and daughter of William Fitzhugh, received 800 acres of the
Ravensworth Tract in 1809. Ravensworth was located just south of modern Annandale.

51 The other homes of Mary Lee Fitzhugh were Chatham, near Fredericksburg, Virginia and a house in Alexandria,
Virginia. Shortly after her marriage in 1803, she would inherit a portion of the Ravensworth tract.

52 Peter Martin, The Pleasure Gardens of Virginia from Jamestown to Jefferson, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1991) 54-64. See also Ralph ‘T. Whitelaw Virginia's Eastern Shore A History of Northampton and Accomack
Counties, (Camden, Me. : Picton Press, 1989), 114-117; Paul Wilstach. Tidewater Virginia. (New York City: Blue
Ribbon Books, Inc, 1929): 175, 194; Collinson, Peter. Brothers of the Spade: Correspondence of Peter Collinson, of
London and of Jobn Custis of Williamsburg, Virginia, 1734-1746. (Worcester, 1949).

53 There are at least three lists of books which document the holdings of Daniel Parke Custis and John Parke Custis.
Most of John Parke Custis’ library was inherited by G.W.P. Custis at the death of this father in 1781, though held
by George Washington and Martha Washington as official guardians of G.W-P. Custis. The first book inventory
was made in 1759-61 by George Washington. The second was made in 1764 by George Washington. The third list
was made in 1782 by Lund Washington. See W.W. Abbot, Ed. The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, vol-
ume 6, (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983-1995): 283-301.

54 White House was located in New Kent County, about twenty-five miles east of Richmond. The property is list-
ed, though not by the name White House, in the Assignment of the Widow's [Martha Custis Washington's} Dower
in October 1759. W.W. Abbot, ed. The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, volume 6, (Charlottesville:
University Press of Virginia, 1983-1995): 217-219. Further research is necessary to deterinine when the White
House plantation received its name. See Records of Alexandria County, D.C. Deed Book E, 127-132.

55 The children of Martha Dandridge Custis (1731-1802) and Daniel Parke Custis (1711-1757) were: Daniel Parke
Custis (1751-1757), Francis Parke Custis (1753-1757), Martha Parke Custis (1755-1773) and John Parke Custis
(1754-1781)

56 At the death of Daniel Parke Custis in 1757, three appraisers were appointed to inventory and value his hold-
ings. The list detailing the holdings and value of Daniel Parke Custis’s estate are found in The Papers of George
Washington, Colonial Series. WW. Abbott, Editor. (Charlottesville, University Press of Virginia, 1983-1995), Volume
6: 201-265; “Worthy Partner”: The Papers of Martha Washington compiled by Joseph E. Fields (Westport CN:
Greenwood Press, 1994): 60-76.

57 George Washington became legal guardian of John Parke Custis and Martha Parke Custis in October of 1761.
At this point, Washington had unquestionable rights to oversee the property belonging to the infant John Parke
Custis. Martha Washington surrendered her dower rights to George Washington as well. Abbott, 206

58 Mount Airy, located in Upper Marlboro, in southern Prince Georges County, was built in 1725. The estate was
home to the Calvert family until 1903.

ENDNoTES | 179


37 "View from the City of
Washington ... Taken from
Arlington House, the
Residence of George
Washington Parke Custis,
Esq." 1838

64 | 1802 - 1861

Less than one year later, the situation of the Lee family and that of their slaves would
change drastically.146 On April 12, 1861, South Carolina shore batteries opened fire on Fort
Sumter in Charleston harbor signaling the beginning of the Civil War. The North, or Union,
had 22 million citizens, with a strong economy supported by an established industrial base and
transportation system. In contrast, the South or Confederacy, which eventually included
eleven states with nine million people, was based on an agricultural economy defined by a
loose infrastructure and a relatively weak transportation network. Nevertheless, on April 17,
1861 Virginia seceded from the Union. Surrounded by friends and family anxiously waiting
at Arlington, Robert E. Lee was faced with a choice—whether to join forces with the south or
the north—his state or his country. Earlier in the year he had expressed his feelings on the
matter to his son, now master of Arlington.

The South in my opinion, has been aggrieved by the acts of the North, as you say. I feel
the aggression and am willing to take every proper step for redress... As an American cit-
izen I take great pride in my country, her property and institutions, and would defend any
State, if her rights were invaded. But I can anticipate no greater calamity for the country

than the dissolution of the Union.'47

oS prsw pr ran cower int, OF WASELE n § : F
. Ss scianenen. were Torrey: verwe: a aaman ; ;

PARA PRIN AALIRETI HOR, PAR MOLI CNR AAMT CERT HN a

Now he paced under the trees that grew in the Park at the east edge of the flower garden, back
and forth-and into his room where he remained until after midnight. Then Robert E. Lee, a
United States army officer for over thirty years, wrote a letter resigning his federal post. ‘Two
days later he accepted the command of the Virginia forces, never again to return to Arlington.

che Mariner’ Museum, Newport News,

Courtesy


xiv | ILLUSTRATIONS

60....eMap of lands of Freedmen’s Village, c.1868, portion only, Arlington House Archives

61 ...uueuField of the dead in Arlington National Cemetery, stereoscopic card, 1868, Prints and Photographs,
Library of Congress

62...aePlan of Sylvan Hall, c.1870, National Archives

63 vsesseUnited States National Cemetery Arlington, Virginia. 1869, Arlington House Archives

...Greenhouse in the northeast corner of the flower garden, stereoscopic card, c.1875, Arlington House
Archives

65...

Memorial Amphitheater, Maine Memorial, in Levin C. Handy’s United States National Military Cemetery,
Arlington, Virginia, Washington: L.C. Handy, 1903

...Map of the Arlington Estate, Virginia, 1888, Cartographic Division, RG 92, National Archives I

-Arlington House, pen drawing by Richard Lovett, 1891, in U.S. Pictures Drawn with Pen and Pencil, New
York: Excalibur Books, Arlington House Archives

68...

Area west of Arlington House showing water tower, c. 1890, Arlington House Archives

.Children at well near the northern slave quarters, 1904, as published in “Country Life in America," New
York: Doubleday, 432-434, Arlington House Archives

...Arlington Va. Military Reservation Fort Myer and the National Cemetery with Annex Showing the Roud to
Aqueduct Bridge, 1894 Depot Quartermaster’s Office, Washington D.C. January 10, 1894, RG 92,
National Archives TI

71 .s10South end of flower garden with ‘Temple of Fame, in Levin C. Handy’s United States National Military
Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia, Washington: L.C. Handy, 1903

72 .sereenFlower garden, detail from National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, Quartermaster General's Office, 1901,
RG 92, National Archives II, also Arlington House Archives

73 vseneueFlower garden, c.1920, photograph by Charles Martin, Arlington House Archives

74 .ssssss0sGeneral Sheridan monument to east of Arlington House, postcard c.1895, Arlington House Archives

75 sssssseeeeeArlington Va. Military Reservation Fort Myer and the National Cemetery with Annex Showing the Road to
Aqueduct Bridge, 1894, Depot Quartermaster’ Office, Washington D.C. January 10, 1894, RG 92,
National Archives II, also George Washington Memorial Parkway Archives

76 .sseeeeeeeeGranolithic Pavement around Mansion at Arlington National Cemetery. November 8, 1893. Depot
Quartermaster Generals Office, RG 92, National Archives H, also Arlington House Archives

77 ssssssssFort McPherson, detail from National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, Quartermaster General’s Office, 1901,
RG 92, National Archives II, also Arlington House Archives

78.......0-Arlington House, east fagade with flower boxes and foundation plantings, c.1890, Arlington House
Archives

79... ... Tourists at Arlington, southwest fagade, postcard ¢.1910


34 G. W. Walden, farm manager to G.W.P. Custis, July 5, 1818. ARHO.

35 For instance in 1818, the year that Custis finished construction on Arlington House, the two estates together
yielded about six thousand dollars in income The expenditures on Romancock and White House amounted to
approximately one thousand two hundred and thirty two dollars-including the $350 dollars paid to a Mr. Walden
as manager. White House/Old Quarter and Romancock/Lower Quarter also had separate overseers. In 1832 there
were about 150 sheep, over a hundred head of cattle and approximately 175 hogs and pigs. In addition, James
Anderson designed a distillery at Roinancock similar to the one at Mount Vernon. “Statements of Accounts of
Expenditures of Estates in 1818” Custis Family Papers. Virginia Historical Society. Richmond, Virginia.

36 According to an inventory of slaves on the Romancoke property made in 1825, Custis owned 26 males and 26
females which included sixteen children under the age of ten . ”List of Names and Ages of Negroes at Romancock
and Lower Quarter, 1 January 1825. In Virginia Historical Society Manuscript Division. Richmond, Virginia. By
G.WE. Custis’s death in 1857, there were only 43 slaves at the estate. Inventory of G.W.P. Custis estate taken I
January 1858. ARHO,

37 The White House plantation had been inherited by G.W.P. through his father John Custis who had inherited
the property with the death of his father, Daniel Custis, in 1759. Papers of George Washington Volume 6: 230-233.

38 "Return from July Ist to October Ist 1832 of stocks and crops on the estates White House and Roman Cock
[sic].” Custis Family Papers. Virginia Historical Society.

39 Undated letter from W.P. Walden, farm manager of the White House and Romancock estates, to G.W.P. Custis.
Most likely this letter dates to circa 1820. Virginia Historical Society.

4 Nelligan, 64.

41 Harry Lee Arnest and Cornelia Lee to Mrs. Richard Bland Lee. April 13, 1804. As quoted in Nelligan, 76, pho-
tocopy in Lee Family Papers. Library of Congress.

42 Harry Lee Amnest Arnest and Julia King. “George Hadfield” in New American National Biography. John A. Gatraty
editor. (New York: Oxford University Press 1999).

+8 Obituary of Hadfield. Duily National Inteligencer (February 13, 1826). No plans of Arlington House as drawn by
George Hadfield have been discovered yet.

44 Hadfield’s designs were disseminated by a group of architects who admired his work, including his pupil, William
Parker Elliot. Hadfield-influenced, temple-and-wings houses can be found from Massachusetts to New York and
in the eastern Midwestern states of Ohio, Michigan and Illinois Public structures derived from Arlington include
Long's Church of St. Peter the Apostle in Baltimore and several statchouses. See Julia King’s. “Honour'’s Temple:
George Hadfield’s Arlington House, The Most Conspicuous Residence in America.” Department of Art Birkback
College. University of London, England. http/Awww.let.uu.nl/CTHA/posurs/097.htm

45 Thid.

46 Harry Lee Arnest, 10; and Jonathan Elliot, History of the Ten Miles Square, The permanent Seat of the General
Government of the United States. 1830, 290.

47 Pousson, “Archeological excavations at Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial, Arlington County,
Virginia” (Washington, D.C. : U.S. Dept. of the Interior, National Park Service 1983 ): 16

48 James D. Kornwolf, "The Picturesque in the American Garden and Landscape before 1800,” British und American

ENDNoTES | 185


34 | 1802 - 1861

Mount Vernon Spence had been responsible for the addition of boxwood to the gardens, and
had also participated in the implementation of Washington’s design ideas.2? What role Spence
played in the layout of the grounds of Arlington is unknown, however he was most probably
involved.

Custis first concerns were practical. Existing correspondence suggests that from 1802 to
1803, Custis was focused primarily on organizing his many properties into a profitable enter-
prise, concerned with the growing of crops, the construction of agricultural structures, and the
work of his slaves. By November 1803 he hired John Ball to assist him in running the large
estate.28 Ball, whose grandfather had worked for Washington at Mount Vernon, was knowl-
edgeable and freed Custis, somewhat, to concentrate on his other plantations.

The two primary estates from which family income was generated were Romancock and
White House, located about ten miles apart on the Pamunkey River in the central tidewater
of Virginia. By 1804 Custis had hired James Anderson, a former farm manager at Mount
Vernon, to run them.2? Anderson had been employed at Mount Vernon from approximately
August of 1796 to December of 1799. Like Spence, Anderson was Scottish and learned agri-
culture through apprenticeship. In assuring George Washington of his suitability to the tasks
of a farm manager he had stated,

. .. 1 was bred to from my Youth the management of Stock We say is an Essential part of
the Farmers business, the knowledge of a Dairy, Ditching and Hedging with Thorns are
I think things Familiar to me, as well as the practical parts of Farming in Britain, con-
joined with six Years experience in this county where soil and climate make some alleva-

tions necessary.30

Though Washington found Anderson slightly defensive and cantankerous when he
offered suggestions for improvement in the farm manager’s agricultural work, he proved to be
an able overseer.}!_ A farm manager had to be able to keep accurate income and expenditure
accounts. He also had to understand all aspects of agriculture, milling, and fishing, in addition
to such skills as carpentry, distilling, and pomology (the horticulture of apples.) Finally he had
to ensure that the primary equity of the plantation, the human slaves, remained financially
sound—that they worked to their capacity and that they remained healthy enough to do so.
The farm manager, in the case of the Custis properties, almost always had an overseer at each
property to whom the slaves responded directly. It was the manager, however, who deter-
mined the capabilities of the overseer. Anderson worked for a number of years managing the
outlying plantations. The job was often transitional, a step in the quest for land ownership.
For instance, in 1804 James Anderson became a tenant farmer of Custis when he was able to
lease Mockin Island, one of Custis’s inherited properties. Custis often hired immigrants,

Scottish and Irish individuals, newly arrived in America as overseers and farm managers.


cy of the landscape as he was with the safe access of visitors to the site and of the proper land-
scape aesthetics. He suggested reducing the slope of the grade west of the house and remov-
ing the circular drive to ease the conflict between the pedestrians and the vehicles. General
Bash and Colonel Mortimer had other ideas, however. Greenleaf wrote to Moore shortly after

his visit:

Iam just back from a very pleasant morning at the Arlington Mansion with General Bash
and Colonel Mortimer. I feel I made a very pleasant acquaintance. Beyond that I might
just as well go to my room and smoke my pipe. The fact is, as General Bash described it,
he got an appropriation from Congress on the basis of restoring as far as possible the old
conditions, including the entrance drive between the two wings that were the slave's quar-
ters and workshops. He has already resurfaced the driveway very nicely with gravel and
that’s that.25

Revealed in this statement is a fundamental difference between the two treatment
approaches, that of the professional landscape architects and designers of the Commission of
Fine Arts and that of some members of the Quartermaster General’s Office. The South did
not need another shrine to Lee, Moore had written four years earlier. According to the
Commission, Arlington House was “one of the famous buildings of the early days of the
Republic in Washington” and the furnishings, the architecture and the landscape were to
reflect this ideology.26 In the architectural restoration, their doctrine was revealed in the CFA’s
request to change the mantels in some of the interior rooms from those present in the time
of Lee, to the original. Their rationale was that the existing Victorian mantels were not part
of the “original fabric” and that their replacement with colonial examples would “preserve the
old lines of the fireplaces.”2”7 Though it was known that a circular drive existed behind the
mansion in the era of Lee, it was difficult to manage visitors on the site with such an arrange-
ment and so its removal was recommended.

Changes were progressing
slowly, however, according to the
approved 1930 grounds plan,
which did include the circular
drive. Plantings of evergreen
shrubs were installed around the
Porter and Sherman graves to hide
the memorials from visitors at
Arlington House.28 ‘The old

drinking fountain was removed

E
i
:

and a new field stone well head

93 The new stone well cover,
located just north of the
northern slave quarters, as
well as the brick paths and
neatly trimmed boxwood
hedges, are all characteristic
of the Colonial Revival style.
photograph 1933

1929-2001 | 151


For the first time in history, the American flag flew from the pediment of Arlington House.
Yet even with the needs and deprivations of war, the house and the gardens near it remained
unmolested. A New York Times reporter wrote in the fall of 1861 that, though the home was
that of the “rebel leader,” it was also “hallowed grounds as once being the estate of the Custis
family from whence sprang the wife of Washington.” The garden he described as a “mass of
flowers.” Another visitor commented that “after the vandalism I have witnessed in the
destruction of property in and about the houses of rebels and elsewhere, it was a pleasurable
relief to find here . . . enforced respect for the property and furniture . . . the garden, with its
fences is preserved . . . the garden is fine . . .”?? Though General McClellan had replaced
General McDowell as the Commander of the Army of the Potomac soon after the First Battle
of Manasas, McClellan lived in Washington D.C., so McDowell remained at Arlington trying
to preserve the estate from damage. One reason the estate remained in relatively good condi-
tion that first year, at least in the vicinity of the main house, was the care given by the slaves.
Selina Gray, identified by Mary Lee in the letter to General Sandford as “the woman in the
yard,” had lived in the western third of the southern slave quarters with her husband and chil-
dren during the residency of the Custis and Lee families. During the federal occupation, she
played an important role in the protection of the Washington relics, some of which were, out
of necessity, left behind in the departure of the Lees. Though a few relics were eventually
stolen from the house, she ensured for at least the first year of occupation they were locked

and secure.?3

41 Selina and Thorton Gray,
no date

76 | 1861 - 1865

‘Arlington House Archives

Regardless of the protection afforded by his former elite position in Washington society and
the care of the slaves remaining at Arlington, Robert E. Lee predicted the loss of his home as
early as Christmas 1861. He wrote sadly to his daughter,


Arlington House Archives

g
3
3
=
A
z
:

106 Plan for the Restoration
of the Flower Garden, 1964

107 The shrubs west of
Arlington House were kept
tightly pruned along the brick
paths installed in the 1930s.
photograph 1969

Arlington House with gravel paths and irregular curvilinear beds. In 1964 a plan had been cre-
ated by the National Capital Office of Design and Construction of the National Park Service
to restore the flower garden. Based on the oral history recorded during the 1930s, a few trees
were planted at the southern end of the garden, including Norway spruce, magnolia, apricot,
pear and white poplar.62 A fence was put up around the garden, but quickly taken down when

disapproved by the Commission of Fine Arts. Unfortunately, the large elm that had stood near

1929-2001 | 165


separate the garden from the outer world.” Garden structures lay within beds regularly edged
with boxwood and bounded by walks. At Arlington, tightly trimmed hedges would line the beds
of the restored kitchen garden. A bird bath would grace the juncture of the walks. “It is typ-

92 Mount Vernon Flower

garden in 1933 as

photographed for the History
of the George Washington
Bicentennial Celebration.
The Arlington House grounds
design was based, in part,

on the restoration

occurring simultaneously at

150 |

Mount Vernon.

1929 - 2001

ically colonial” Steele
wrote, his words in the
present tense, “to run these
paths through, around and
across the vegetable gar-
dens, cutting them into
plots. The paths them-
selves are frequently bor-
dered by flower beds and
small fruit trees.” At this

time according to Steele,

PY 4 e
Courtesy of the Mount Vernon Ladies Society

the gardens of Mount Vernon were undergoing “exemplary restorations,” with intricate beds of
boxwood crossed with brick paths. For as he explained of the building materials, “Washington
used brick and wood, which were common materials for houses and gardens in Virginia. . . .
Usually it is best to continue garden objects . . . of the same stuff that the house is built.”22 Such
would be true in the garden restorations at Arlington as well.

That a Colonial Revival-style landscape was eventually installed at Arlington—around a
house that was dedicated by Congress to interpreting General Lee and the 1860s—is not sur-
prising. The close connection between Arlington’s restoration and the 1930s landscape
restoration of Gcorge Washington’s Mount Vernon was intentional, for the early nineteenth-
century gardens of Arlington had been reflective with the early Republic landscape of Mount
Vernon. As Leisenring explained to the Commission of Fine Arts in 1932, “the whole scheme
of the garden [is] something like that of Mount Vernon because G.W.P. Custis had brought it
[the design] from Mount Vernon.”23 So when the gardens of Mount Vernon were planted
with boxwood beds and lined with brick paths, so too was the landscape of Arlington House
(though much more simply), revealing a 1930s vision of the “early Republic” just as Chairman
Moore had recommended.

The Commission of Fine Arts and their associates continued to comment on the grad-
ual changes around Arlington House. Greenleaf, aged 72 and retired, a man who had always
been deeply interested in development of the grounds, according to Moore, was called back to
Arlington House in the spring of 1931. He recommended that the post and chain fencing
around the Sheridan and Porter gravesites be removed immediately, hinting that perhaps the
monuments could be screened with cedar trees, flanking the mansion to the north and south.24

To the west of the house, the steep grade of the land was making the 1930 plan difficult

to follow. As a designer, Greenleaf was not as concerned with the supposed historical accura-


1864 U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, showing the ground occupation of the army under the command of McDowell
showing roads, camps and fortifications in the vicinities of Alexandria and Arlington, Washington, D.C. Division of
Charts. An annotated photo-processed copy of an original Topographic Sheet No 942, Arlington House Archives.

1864 — Meigs, Montgomery C. Part of Arlington, Virginia, U.S. Coast Survey, Register No. 1065, on file,
Cartographic Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

1865 Arlington Park Stables, Cartographic Division, NARA II, RG 92, F-110 sheets 1-9,

1866 Environs of Washington Prepared from original Surveys of the Engineer Department 1864-1866, sheet 5 and 8,
Cartographic Division, NARA II, RG 77, F99.

[1866] Plan of Monument to the Unknown Civil War Dead, Architect, Smithmyer and Co. Washington, D.C.,
approved M.C. Meigs, map files Arlington House Archives, original NARA I.

1868 [Map of Arlington National Cemetery] illustrating location of Freedmen’s Village land division—approxi-
mately 10 acre plots, partial copy in map files, Arlington House Archives.

1869 U.S. National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, scale 100 feet to 1 inch, Arlington House Archives, original
NARAL

1878 Alexandria County, Virginia, in G.W. Hopkins’ Atlas of Fifteen Miles Around Washington, D.C., 1878, copy
map files, Virginiana Room, Arlington County Library, Virginia.

1885 Map showing the boundaries and area of the Arlington Estate with location of National Cemetery and Fort Myer,
made under direction of Major Peter C.Hains, U.S. Corp of Engineers, Technical Information Center (TIC) files,
National Capital Region (NCR) Archives, 855/81000.

1888 Map of Arlington Estate, Virginia January, 1888 Showing All Buildings Occupied by Citizens Outside of Fort
Meyer (sic) and the National Cemetery, U.S. Congress, Washington, D.C., Arlington House Archives, also
Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

1891 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

1892 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

1893 Granolithic Pavement around Mansion at Arlington National Cemetery, November 8, 1893, Quartermaster
General’s Office, Arlington House Archives, also RG 92, NARA II.

1894 Arlington Va. Military Reservation Fort Myer and the National Cemetery with Annex Showing the Road to
Aqueduct Bridge, Depot Quartermaster’s Office, Washington, D.C. January 10, 1894, GWMP Archives, Turkey
Run, Virginia, also RG 92, NARA II.

1894 Map of Fort Myer and part of Arlington, Quartermaster General’s Office, RG 92, NARA II.
1894 Proposed Asphalt Road, Arlington National Cemetery, March 1894, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1896 Plat of Survey of Arlington National Cemetery by T-H. Humphreys, Quartermaster General's Office, map
files Arlington House Archives.

1895 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY | 221


Custis and Lee women. Each of the Lee girls had a space, either in the flower garden or in
the grove, in which to grow their own plants.!07

As Annie Lee wrote to her good friend in September of 1858, “I am devoted to my flow-
ers... and have 24 little geraniums of my own raising, plenty of Parmese violets, heliotropes
and callas.”!08 The flowers which Annie lists are all annual species, requiring over-wintering
in the conservatory located on the western facade of the southern wing of the main house, or
purchasing anew each spring. The form of this flower garden, a mixed herbaceous garden
containing
perennials,
annuals and

some shrubby

6
vegetation, was %
reflective of 3
the style of &
=
=

garden _ pro-
moted in some mid-nineteenth-century books and periodicals. Most of these publications
were directed towards women, for as Thomas Fessenden wrote in The New American

Gardener in defense of his inclusion of ornamental gardening information:

should the agriculturist have no taste for ornamental gardening, yet such is the laudable
taste of the fair daughters of America at the present day that there are comparatively few
that do not take an interest in the flower garden,\0°

Such garden literature divided the discussion of ornamental garden design into two sec-
tions; that on “modern” or landscape gardening, a style reflected in the Park, and that of the
formal or “ancient” garden style illustrated by the paling-fenced flower garden at Arlington.!!0
For instance, in The American Flower Garden Directory published in 1832, growing require-
ments are included for both the shrubbery, which was typical of the Park or the Grove at
Arlington, and the boxwood hedge, which was most likely incorporated into the Custis and
Lee flower garden. During the early nineteenth century, many formal flower gardens were
divided into geometric beds with a variety of plantings including shrubs, annuals and perenni-
als. This was the type of flower garden planted at Arlington. Monographs on particularly
popular plants, reflecting Victorian fads, began to be widely published in the 1830s. Two of
the most popular monographs were about flowers planted at Arlington, roses and dahlias.!!!
Another book published at the time, Thomas Bridgeman’s The Forist’s Guide (1836), suggests
elements of the formal flower garden at Arlington when describing the shapes of the
flower beds.

33 Watercolor painting
“Arlington House, The Seat
of G.WP. Custis, Esq." in
Harper’s New Monthly
Magazine, October 1853

1802 - 1861 | SS



Walker, Mark, Francine Bromberg, et al., Phase II Archaeological Study: Abingdon Plantation Site, Washington
National Airport, Parsons Management Consultants, August, 1989.

Washington, George, edited by Donald Jackson, Dorothy Twohig, Associate editor, The Diaries of George
Washington, 6 volumes, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1976-1979.

Washington, George, edited by Dorothy Twohig, associate editor Philander D. Chase, et, al., The Papers of George
Washington, Colonial Series, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983-1995.

Washington, George, edited by John C, Fitzpatrick, The Last Will and Testament of George Washington and Schedule
of bis property to which is appended the last will and testament of Martha Washington, Mount Vernon: Mount Vernon
Ladies Association of the Union, 1960.

Washington, Martha, “Worthy Partner”: The Papers of Martha Washington, complied by Joseph E. Fields, Westport,
Conn: Greenwood Press, 1994.

Webber, Thomas L., Deep like the Rivers: Education in the slave quarter community 1831-1865, New York: Norton,
1978.

Wells, Camille, “The Planter’s Prospect: Houses, Outbuildings and Rural Landscapes in Eighteenth-Century
Virginia,” Winterthur Portfolio, 1993.

Wharton, Anne Hollingsworth, Martha Washington, Spartanburg, S,C,: 1897: Reprint 1967.

Whielaw, Ralph T., Virginia's Eastern Shore: A History of Northampton and Acomack Counties, Gloucester, MA: P.
Smith, 1968.

Wilstach, Paul, Tidewater Virginia, New York: Blue Ribbon Books Inc.,1929.

Wittkofski, J. Marh and Theodore R. Reinhart, editors, Paleo-Indian Research in Virginia: A Synthesis, Richmond,
VA: Archeological Society of Virginia, 1989.

Wrenn, Tony P, Falls Church: History of a Virginia Village, Falls Church, Virginia: Historical Commission of the
City of Falls Church, 1972,

Vlach, John Michael, Back of the Big House, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993.

Vlach, John Michael, “Not Mansions . . .But Good Enough: Slave Quarters as Bi-Cultural Expression”, In Black
and White Cultural Interaction in the Ante-bellum South edited by Ted Ownby, 1993.

BIBLIOGRAPHY | 217


198 | ENDNOTES

included under the 1873 cemetery appropriation, replacement had not yet begun by November of 1874. Monthly
Report of the Condition of National Cemetery Arlington Virginia. November 1874. NARA I, ARHO. For further infor-
mation about 1873 and 1879 Acts see website for Department of Veterans Affairs. Office of Facility Management
at hetp://www.va.gov/

24 For more information on William Saunders see Charles Birnbaum and Robin Karson. Editors. Pioneers of
American Landscape Design. (McGraw-Hill: New York City 2000): 327-330. Determination of the exact recommen-
dations and work of William Saunders at Arlington National Cemetery requires further study.

25 Report of the Secretary of War, Nov 30, 1870. Congressional Serial No. 1446-41st Congress. 3rd Session. 1870-
1871 House Executive Documents. See also, Quartermaster General Montgomery C. Meigs to (2]; Washington,
D.C. August 10, 1870. ARHO.

26’The two names of the separate sections of the cemetery were defined by the Quartermaster General’s Office dur-
ing the late 1860s. See [unnamed Employee of Arlington Cemetery] to Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War.
Washington, D.C. June 10, 1867. National Archives I. RG 92. Series NM81E225. Title: Consolidated
Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

27 Monthly Report of on the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington for the month of April 1869. NARA 1. RG
92. Box 132. Copy in date files, ARHO. For road arrangement see maps: U.S. National Cemetery, Arlington, Va.
1869. Quartermaster Generals Office, copy ARHO Map files. Original unknown location; Part of Arlington,
Virginia Surveyed for Gen. M.C. Meigs, Quartermaster General, U.S. Coast Survey. A.D. Bache Supdt., 1864.
Copy in Library of Congress, Cartographic Division. Copy ARHO Map Files.

28 “Arlington.” November 14, 1874: 620. ARHO.

29 The exact location of the flag pole during the subsequent restorations of Arlington House and grounds has been
a subject of interest and contention for the past eighty years. No flag pole is illustrated in any documentation prior
to the Civil War, The flag pole is first mentioned by William Howard Russell in his diary entry for July 8, 1861,
printed in My Diary North and South (Boston : ‘T-O.1LP. Burnham, 1863): 394. The collection of photographs taken
by Andrews Russell 1864, however, does not show a flag pole. Yet, the map created to inventory the site prior to
the formal formation of the cemetery (1864) does show a flag staff located to the immediate east of the portico,
approximately twenty feet from the portico steps. See endnote 26. The first official mention of the flagpole is in the
Monthly Report of the Cemetery Superintendent August 1874. NARA | RG 92. Copy Date files, ARHO. See
Memorandum, Report on Flagpole at Lee Mansion National Memorial, by Murray H. Nelligan. Randle B. ‘Truett,
Chief National Memorials and Historic Sites Division to the Superintendent. February 16, 1951. ARHO.

30 Monthly Report for the Arlington National Cemetery, August 1867. NARA I . RG 92. Box 132. Copy in date files,
ARHO.

31 Rhodes, “Historic Memories of Arlington National Cemetery by David H. Rhodes, Landscape Gardener at
Arlington from April 14, 1873 to March 1930.” Unpublished manuscript [1930]. ARHO.

32 Ibid. See also Benjamin Marchus, Ed. Washington during War Time; a series of papers showing the military, political,
and social phases during 1861 to 1865. Official souvenir of the Thirty-sixth annual encampment of the Grand army of the
republic; collected and ed. by Marcus Benjamin under the direction of the Committee on literature for the encampment,
(Washington, D.C.: The National Tribune co. 1902): 83.

88 Monthly Report of on the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington for the month of April 1869; Monthly report
for March 1871, NARA I, RG 92, Entry No. 576, Box No. 132.

34 Monthly Report, April 30, 1869, NARA. I, RG 92, Consolidated Correspondence File.



16 | 1608 - 1802

sake, Gerrard, he gave 900 acres of the upper part of the tract—the land that was to become
the Arlington Estate. Because Gerrard and Robert owned this land in fee simple, they were
able to sell it twenty years later, to John Parke Custis, father of the master of Arlington House.

THE CUSTIS AND WASHINGTON FAMILIES

In 1778, John Parke Custis, son of Martha Dandridge Washington and her first husband
Daniel Custis, and stepson of George Washington, entered into negotiations with Gerrard and
Robert Alexander hoping to buy their property along the Potomac for what he believed would
be the future site of his family seat. His enthusiasm for purchasing the land was founded on
several factors, including proximity to his stepfather’s estate at Mount Vernon and to his wife’s
childhood home at Mount Airy in Upper Marlborough County. The magnificent hilltop set-
ting offered spectacular views along the Potomac, as well as the prospect of cultivating the
site’s rich alluvial soils near the river and turning it into a profitable working estate.

The Custis family, like the Fitzhughs mentioned previously, were large land holders in
eighteenth-century Virginia. John Custis IV (1678-1749), John Parke Custis’ paternal grand-
father, owned three main residences. Arlington, the origin of the name Arlington House, was
located on the Eastern Shore overlooking the waters of Old Plantation Creek. He also owned
a plantation named Queen’s Creek about one mile north of Williamsburg. In 1717, after the
death of his wife Francis in 1715, he moved with his two children, Francis Parke and Daniel
Parke Custis to a large home within the city of Williamsburg. Here he developed extensive
picturesque ornamental, fruit and vegetable gardens, famous throughout the country. He
imported a large number of plants from Europe and was actively involved in the design of the
garden landscape. He also owned books on horticulture and landscape design.” These books
were inherited by his son, Daniel, who in turn passed them on to his son John—G.W.P.
Custis’s father.’ Such books as Sa/mon’s History of Plants (1710), A Dictionary of Husbandry,
Gardening &ca. (1717), Compleat Housewife (1734), The Flower Garden, (ca. 1730), The Florists
Vade-Mecum (1682) were included in the book inventory, illustrating at least some written
authority on gardening and husbandry. Daniel Custis (1712-1757), the future father of John
Parke Custis, educated in England, was a scholar of both horticulture and botany. In 1749,
when Daniel was thirty-seven, he began to court eighteen-year old Martha Dandridge of New
Kent County. Daniel and Martha married in the spring of 1750 and established their home at
White House on the Pamunkey River." They had four children, two of whom died young.”
In 1757, shortly after the death of his two young children, Daniel passed away leaving the
management of his extensive land holdings to Martha. She was now one of the wealthiest
women in the colony—owning over 17,000 acres of land in plantations in six different coun-
ties, about 4049 £ worth of material goods, and 285 slaves worth approximately 8958 £.°
Along with the land that would become the Arlington Estate, many of the descendants of the
285 slaves would be inherited by her grandson, G.W. P. Custis.


the installation of prickly shrubs such as Japanese Barberry.5+ In the northeast corner of the
kitchen garden Payne designed a planting of roses. “Io the north of the roses were the veg-
etables, separated by a bird bath. A “fruit garden” took up the western half of the kitchen gar-
den area. Around the entire space he installed a hedge of American Holly. ‘Then the boxwood
that previously formed the outside hedge of the kitchen garden may have been replanted to
screen the Monument to the Unknown Civil War Soldier from the flower garden area, block-
ing the view to Washington, D.C. once declared so important by veteran’s groups and the
Commission of Fine Arts. Some boxwood was also moved to the edge of the woods to the
north and east of the kitchen garden to form a transition between the woods and the turf area
near the potting house.

By 1948
the magnolias
in the eastern
foundation
plantings had
grown enor-
mous, blocking
the view of the

house wings

$
3
3

from the slope
below entirely.
In 1953 plans
were drawn up and studies were made to justify cutting down the magnolias. In January of
1954 the magnolias were removed from in front of the wings.

By the early 1950s the National Park Service staff had implemented the planting plan of
Payne. As at other National Park Service sites around the country, visitation was increasing.
In order to improve interpretation of Robert E. Lee’s story, Murray Nelligan, one of the first
historians employed at Arlington House, wrote a comprehensive social history of the Custis
and Lee families at Arlington from the eighteenth century to their departure from the estate
at the beginning of the Civil War. ‘To more fully express the significance of these two fami-
lies, a museum was created in the early 1950s to display artifacts associated with their lives at
Arlington.>> ‘he museum was placed in the potting building in the north east corner of the
old kitchen garden. With the new research being conducted on the life of Robert E. Lee and
his family, additional elements were added to the landscape of Arlington House most likely to
assist in the interpretation of the site. For instance, in 1954 a large bed of camellias was plant-
ed near the northern wing of the house (where there was room) because oral history had
revealed that Mary Lee sometimes referred to the conservatory, on the southern wing of the

house, as the camellia house.5®

103. The wings of Arlington
House are almost completely
hidden by the magnolia trees,
planted eighty years before by
D. H. Rhodes. They were
removed one year after this
image was taken in 1954.
L'Enfant’s Memorial is in the
foreground.

1929-2001 | 161


200 | ENDNoTES

54 Homer Gage. A Boy in Washington in 1878. Worcester, Mass., Priv. print. [The Davis Press] 1938.
55 “Arlington.” November 14, 1874. From Photostate Negative Files, ARHO Archives

56 Mary Lee to “friend” 1866. As quoted in Philip Bigler’s In Honored Glory: Arlington National Cemetery, The Final
Post, (Arlington, Va.: Vandamere Press: 1986), 30.

57 Ruth P. Rose, “Mrs. Robert E. Lee vs, the U.S. Congress.” Northern Virginia Heritage,Vol III, #2 June 1981.

58 Mary Lee to Mrs. Cocke, June 20, 1873, John Hartwelle Cocke Collection, #5680, University of Virginia Library
as quoted in Mary P. Coulling’s The Lee Girls, John F. Blair: Wiston -Salem NC 1994, 3rd Printing): 179.

59 The case was argued in the Supreme Court on the 18th and 19th of October 1882. Opinion of the Court was
rendered by Mr. Justice Miller on December 4, 1882. General George Washington Custis Lee agreed to sell the
property to the United States for $150,000.00 and signed the deed on March 31, 1883.

6 Copy of deed in Photostat Files, ARHO. May 14, 1883. ‘Teste, Benjamin Austin. G.W.C. Lee. Original in
Arlington County Court House.

61 Regulations of the Army. (Par. 138, as amended by G.O. 26, of 1883.) As cited in letter, March 27, 1888 to
Quartermaster General, ARHO.

82 §.B Holabird, Quartermaster General to Lt. Col. B.D. Card, Deputy Quarter Master General. War Department,
Washington, D.C. December 23, 1887; C. [?]. Dawn, Deputy Quartermaster General to Quartermaster General,
Washington, D.C. March 27, 1888. This latter letter included an account of the history of Freedmen’s Village as
well as an inventory of properties associated with agricultural lands of the Freedmen’s Village residents. The inven-
tory was accompanied by a map. Map of the Arlington Estate, Va. January 1888. LC Cartographic Division G388 A64
185. US. ARHO.

CHAPTER SIX

! Quartermaster General, U.S. Army to Depot Quartermaster. Washington, D.C. August 14, 1885; ARHO Historie
Structure Report: Architectural Data Section, (Phase II): (Denver Service Center, Northeast Team, National Park
Service, Department of Interior 1985): 61.

2 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden south of Arlington Mansion by D. H. Rhodes. Landscape
Gardener at Arlington. Where he has been employed since 1873.” Office of the Quartermaster Supply Officer.
Washington, D.C. [1930]. See also, “Expenditures on Arlington House, 1874-1895,” as compiled from Annual
Reports of the Cemetery Superintendent in Charles Snell’s Historic Structure Report, Historical Data Section. (Denver
Service Center, National Park Service, Department of Interior 1985): 61.

3 Report of the Cemetery Superintendent. January 8, 1889. RG 92 Entry $76 Box 133. Arlington National Cemetery
Va.

4 “Arlington National Cemetery” in Historical Records of the Cemetery Division. 1894, ARHO; Rhodes, 10.
Monthly Report of the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington Virginia, Jan 1889. NARA I RG 92. Entry 576
Box 132.

3 One of Peter Henderson’s most famous horticultural books was Gardening for Pleasure: A guide to the Amateur in
the Fruit Vegetable and Flower Garden (New York : O. Judd Company, 1875); The Olmsted Quotes are cited in Henry
Hope Reed and Sophia Duckworth’s Central Park: A History and Guide. (New York, C. N. Potter, 1967): 2 and 46.



ne | oaoan

FIRST YEARS AT ARLINGTON

George Washington Parke Custis did not remain long in the simple four room house on
the pocosin of the Potomac River, surrounded by the rough fields of the former plots of
Alexander's and later John Custis’s land tenants.! The hot humid air of July that gathered in
the low swales near the river was not healthy and the damp was destroying the belongings he
had purchased from the estate of his guardians, George and Martha Washington. In 1802,
high on the brow of the most prominent hill of the 1100 acre property, he began construction
of what was to eventually become the northern wing of Arlington House.? With this endeav-
or, the four room cottage east of the Alexandria Georgetown ‘lurnpike became the residence
of his Arlington fartti'manager and overseer, as it continued to be in later decades.}_In honor
of the first president and to reinforce his own claim as the “Child of Mount Vernon,” Custis
named his new estate, Mount Washington.

George Washington Parke Custis, like many large landowners in Virginia during the
early nineteenth century, was rich in land and slaves but cash poor. Inheritances from his
father John Custis, his grandmother Martha Custis Washington, and his guardian George
Washington, provided G.W.P. Custis with over 18,000 acres of land and approximately two
hundred slaves.+ ‘This put the young man in the top one percent of all slave holding individ-
uals in the south, for most who owned slaves held fewer than twenty.> Yet Custis was not with-
out debt or financial obligations. In addition to the annual payment of $1750 he made to his
mother, Eleanor Calvert Custis Stewart, to settle her dower rights in the estate of John Custis,
his expensive purchases from the estates of George and Martha Washington had diminished
his cash supply.°

Custis had attended the public sales of the estate of George Washington in November
1801, and one year later that of Martha Washington. Many of the purchases he made were
practical, for he needed supplies to develop the relatively raw land of Mount Washington.
Though fairly heavy with clay, the fertile soil of the flat plain near the Potomac would be suit-
able for a working farm, while the sloping hills to the west would provide a beautiful prospect
and setting for his home and gardens. What he needed, as a newly independent, landed farmer
were the tools with which to work the soil and harvest the crops. Custis wanted to create a
landscape that would convey to those in the port towns of Georgetown, Alexandria and the
infant national capital, that he was the bearer of the legacy of Washington. In paying tribute
to his adopted grandfather, Custis played the role of gentlemen farmer, attempting to emulate
both Washington's aesthetic design sensibilities and his agricultural improvement proclivities.
He acquired stock from Mount Vernon, including one mare and her young foal, one horse,
one ram, five cows, thirteen mules and one jennet (a female donkey).” ‘The mules would prove
especially valuable to Custis in the establishment of his estate, for not only were mules gener-
ally healthier, longer-lived and cheaper to feed than horses, stud fees from the Arlington mules


was made around the base of the tomb. A circular walk was then constructed forty-five feet
from the center of the monument. These two were connected by a perpendicular path which
ran east to west and bisected the circle. The space between the paths was sodded and a few
planting beds were sown, most likely with annual flowers.’ As the first unknown soldiers’
memorial in Arlington cemetery, this monument came to symbolize the sacrifices of tens of
thousands of men, for almost half of all the soldiers who died in the Civil War were unknown.®

For at least
twenty-five years
following the end of
the war, the physical
development of the
National Cemetery
at Arlington related
directly to the politi-
cal, social, and eco-
nomic views of the
majority in Congress
and of the officials of

the United States

National Archives

Quartermaster
General's Office. The challenges of Reconstruction confronted in the chasm between the
north and the south, the rampant racial inequities endemic in both northern and southern
societies, the monuments of reconciliation in the shadow of the Lost Cause, all became etched
into the landscape of Arlington. Often in commemorating an ideal or person on the grounds
of the cemetery, the evidence of a conflicting ideal or individual was destroyed—whether con-
sciously or unconsciously. Memorials to Union Civil War generals took the place of the gar-
dens, arbors, fields and buildings that previously revealed the aesthetic, social and economic
characteristics of the Lee's antebellum estate. The relatively small size of these
monuments,the Temple of Fame, the Memorial Amphitheater, the Unknown Civil War
Soldiers Memorial-was due to the enormous cost of the Civil War; a cost measured for some
not only in lives lost and millions spent, but in the disintegration of the southern slavery econ-
omy. Restricted funding limited the immediate adornment of the cemetery grounds; physical
changes corresponded directly with the money allocated by the frequently polarized Congress
of the late Reconstruction period. Yet the once private estate of Arlington,in 1865 a military
installation battered from the privations and demands of warfare,would be gradually trans-
formed into a national burial ground embellished with hundreds of ornate decorations and
solemn tributes to honored dead. By the end of the nineteenth century, Arlington House
would also emerge, in the midst of the graves of Union soldiers, as one of the most revered

icons of the southern Confederacy.

57 Though undated, due to
the presence of the Rodman
guns on top of the monument
and the picket fence sur-
rounding the flower garden,
this photograph was probably
taken shortly after the cre-
ation of the Tomb, c. 1866.

1865 - 1880 | 97



In the early 1780s, shortly after young Custis came to live with his guardian, Washington
had embarked on a design and building campaign at Mount Vernon that would last until his
death in 1799. Washington remodeled the driveway into a curvilinear alignment and estab-
lished “groves” of trees on either side of the drive. He attempted to cloak the working elements
of the farm in a picturesque veil—moving the rectangular walls and houses that enclosed the

upper and lower

flower and veg-
etable gardens, to
hide the pragmatic
necessities.23 In
the landscape of
Arlington, such
control of access
and views would
play a prominent
role in the eventu-
al organization
and design of the

land. Custis may

have had images
of Mount Vernon
in mind when he

sited his humble

house high on the
hill and in creating
his pastoral park
which descended

down the slope

Courtesy of the Mount Vernon Ladies Association

from Arlington

House. In the
now vanished woodland garden grove once located to the southwest of Arlington House were
elements similar to the groves created by George Washington at Mount Vernon years earlier.
Like Washington, Custis had professional help for he hired William Spence, the head gar-
dener from Mount Vernon.?+

Spence had been employed by George Washington in November of 1797 as an inden-
tured servant from Scotland with a term of three to four years.?5 Little is known of his spe-

cific training, but Scottish gardeners were common in early nineteenth-century America.?6 At

16 The Vaughan Plan, pre-

sented to George Washington

in 1787 by his friend Samuel
Vaughan, illustrates the land-
scape of Mount Vernon. Map
annotated for clarity, 2001.

1802 - 1861 | 33


184 | ENDNOTES

23 Mac Griswold, Washington's Gardens at Mount Vernon: Landscape of the Inner Man, (Houghton Mifflin Company:
Boston 1999): 84-85.

24 Alexandria Gazette. Nov 4, 1802. This is an announcement stating that a dog was lost from Mount Washington.
William Spence is listed as the contact. ARHO.

25 James Anderson to George Washington August 1797 and George Washington to James Anderson (of Scotland)
November 4, 1797 in Dorothy Twohig, Ed. The Papers of George Washington: Retirement Series. March-December
1797 (Charlottesville and London: University Press of Virginia: 1998).

26 This would hold true throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. According to A. J. Downing, author the
famous mid-nineteenth century landscape design book, A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening,
Adapted to North America, only 3% of working gardeners were native born Americans in 1852. A.J. Downing. The
Horticulturist June 1852). The countries most known for their gardening skills were the Irish, Scottish, English
and German, See Patricia M. Tice Gardening in American 1830-1910. (Rochester, New York: The Strong Museum
1984): 57.

27 Interview, Dean Norton, chief-horticulturist at Mount Vernon. January 2000. Correspondence, Lisa Odum,
Associate Librarian Mount Vernon, to Jennifer Hanna, Historical Landscape Architect, National Park Service,
January 27, 2000.

28 On July 20, 1803 Custis placed an advertisement in the Alexandria Gazette, for an overseer to "take charge of the
‘Mount Washington Estate.” In November of the same year, John Ball was listed as manager of Mt. Washington
and placed an advertisement for a gardener or "person qualified to undertake the management of a large market
garden, Alevandria Guzette, November 16, 1803. ARHO

29 Tn 1800, James Anderson was still at Mount Vernon, for a letter is exists from Anderson to Martha Washington,
dated July 21, 1800 stating that he should quit because “he’s a bad manager.” His self deprecating remark should
not necessarily be taken as fact, for such statements seem to be endemic to Anderson's personality regardless of their
truth. For more information concerning the character of Anderson sce Joseph E. Fields, Ed. Worthy Parmer, the
Papers of Martha Washington. (Westport, CN : Greenwood Press 1994). By no later than June of 1804, Anderson
has been hired as manager of the Pamunkey estates. G. W.P. Custis to James Anderson, June 3, 1804, ARHO.

30Dorothy ‘Twohig, Editor. The Papers of George Washington, Retirement Series March-December 1797.
(Charlottesville, VI: University Press of Virginia. 1998): 21. James Anderson to George Washington August 28,
1796.

31 George Washington to James Anderson, December 21, 1797; February 1 and 6, May 22, June 11, 1798; See
George Washington's Mount Vernon, At Home in Revolutionary America by Robert F. Dalzell, Jr. and Lee Baldwin
Dalzell for more general information concerning the relationship between George Washington and his farm man-
agers.

32 Romancock, also spelled Romancoke (by the late nineteenth century) was called the Claiborne’s when Daniel
Park Custis purchased it from the estate of William Claiborne (d, 1746) in 1750. This property was 2880 acres in
1759. John Custis purchased an addition 1776 acres in 1774. The Papers of George Washington Volume 6, Colonial
Series. W.W. Abbot, editor “Schedule A: Assignment of the Widow’s Dower.” (Charlottesville : University Press of
Virginia, 1983-1995): 217-220. The property is described as containing 4821 acres of land, however, according to
a land grant dated 1799, Record Book 37, Page 34. Historical Society of Virginia. Manuscript Division.

33 Papers of George Washington Volume 8. June 1767-December 1771 “Crops Made of the Custis Plantations by Joseph
Valentine, 1760-1770. Dated 1770.” (Charlottesville : University Press of Virginia, 1983-1995.): 421-425.


67 Arlington House, as
drawn by Richard Lovett,
1891

s decades went by, aging veterans of the Civil War were passing away in greater and

greater numbers. Organizations of widows and elderly soldiers around the country

gathered to raise money to erect monuments to past military glories. Even those that

did not mourn at the graves visited the cemetery to view the memorials. Through the late

nineteenth-century the use of cemeteries as public parks, for picnicking and contemplating

nature, gained social acceptance and heightened popularity. Moreover, the construction of the

electric rail lines during the early
1890s, coupled with cessation of
tolls on the bridge from
Georgetown across the Potomac,
allowed more people to come to
Arlington. Expanded facilities
were required, not only to main-
tain the cemetery grounds, but to
provide for the needs of these
new visitors.

Water was needed for irriga-

tion and drinking. During the early 1880s, when new water lines were being installed at Fort

Myer and Arlington Cemetery, a brick water tower was built to the west of Arlington House,

within the planting bed created by Rhodes in 1874. The water was pumped by steam from nat-

ural springs within the cemetery and then redistributed throughout the grounds. By the late

1880s, a force pump, within a wooden encasement, had been installed in the Custis-Lee era

well to provide drinking water. The pump was removed shortly thereafter, however, due to

the accumulation of a disagreeable odor when the top of the well platform was closed. The

simple hipped-roof over the well was replaced with a more ornate version in the 1880s. The

new four-sided roof was slightly concave and extended to a finial at the top, much like the pro-

file of the roof of the original flower garden arbor. Public lavatories were also constructed at

68 The water tower, visible
in the center of the photo-
graph, behind Arlington
House, was removed by 1916.
photograph c1890

112 | i2e2an- 190990

E
i
Fa
§
E
zs
2

this time, to the immediate north
of the northern slave quarters,
blocking the original entrance to
the summer kitchen on the lower
story of the north facade. The
vine-covered, former slave quar-
ters were used for storage and for

housing.


provided a source of income.’ He also purchased many farm implements and tools, such as a
corn drilling machine, a flax break, a potato tiddle, wool and flax spinning wheels, a boat, an
ox cart, six harrows and a set of blacksmith’s tools.’ In total he spent approximately forty-five
hundred dollars on his purchases.!0 Meanwhile in the flat, rich plains down by the river
approximately fifty-seven slaves were improving the remnants of the previous tenant farm—
most likely by fixing and building enclosures, clearing land of scrub growth and the river of
snags. Slave cabins were constructed as were agricultural buildings to support the grain crops
and market garden he planned for the area. In November of 1803 John Ball, the manager of
Mount Washington, placed an advertisement in the Alexandria Gazette for a single man qual-
ified to undertake the management of a large market garden."!

That Custis chose to cultivate a market garden is not surprising. Market gardens were
large plots of land on which crops were grown to provide fresh vegetables and fruits to more
urban centers. Though such gardens required intensive cultivation, Custis had inexpensive
labor available in his slaves. In addition, at 1100 acres Mount Washington was one of the
largest properties in the vicinity of the port towns. This proximity was a definite advantage,
for the less time the vegetables took in transport, the fresher the produce and the greater
return on investment due to the cheaper transportation costs. Transportation routes were
slowly improving in the area. The same year of Custis’s arrival, 1802, a skirting canal had been
completed by the Patowmack Canal Company around Great Falls and also one at Little Falls,
on the Virginia side. Though the Alexandria Canal would not be extended over Custis’s prop-
erty from Georgetown to Alexandria for another forty years, the Potomac River was partially
navigable. Although Long Bridge, south of the Arlington estate, was not constructed until
1809, Mason’s ferry, which went from Georgetown to Analostan Island, had begun its route in
the 1740s.!2 The island was connected to the Virginia shore through a causeway. Finally, the
potential return from a market garden was high, for the portion of Fairfax County in which
Custis’s property was located had been incorporated into the new District of Columbia in 1801
and many felt that the new government center would be a boon to local economics.
Georgetown, Alexandria and Washington were growing and the market for agricultural prod-
ucts was expanding. Three years later, when the topic of retrocession of the western shore of
the Potomac to Virginia was discussed, Custis was firmly against it.!3

In addition to the market garden, Custis grew wheat and corn on the flat plains down by
the river. Mount Washington's proximity to Alexandria, which was an important port for the
shipment of grain to Europe because of the French Revolution and Napoleon’s Wars, gave
Custis an advantage over farmers further inland.!4 Tobacco, though possibly grown on the
property in the previous century, no longer made economic sense. As Custis knew well from
his youth spent accompanying his adopted grandfather on his walks around Mount Vernon,
tobacco was an enormous drain on soil fertility. Though marl, a type of lime which was begin-

ning to be used as a fertilizer, did improve the harvest of most crops, it did little for tobacco.

1802-1861 | 29



46The Old Soldiers Home, which held approximately 6000 graves, was officially closed the same day that Arlington
Cemetery opened. Congressional Serial No 1230-38th Congress, 2nd Session. House Executive Document for Quarter
Master General.; M.C. Meig’s Report to Secretary of War dated November 8, 1864 by Capt. James M. Moore.
NARA I RG 92.

47 The Battle of the Wilderness was a tactical Confederate victory. General Grant lost more than twice as many sol-
diers (about 18,000 to 8,000) as did Lee.

48 Meigs to Brig General D, H. Rucker Chief Quarter Master General, June 15, 1864. NARA I RG 92,
Consolidated Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

494 member of Company G of the 67 Penn Infantry became the first soldier to be buried at Arlington. Private
William Christman died on May 11, 1864. L. Reinhart, Rebel, N.C. is listed as Running No 1. in a later register.
He died on May 17, 1864.

50 Meigs to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, August 5, 1871; M.C. Meigs to Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War.
April 14, 1873. NARA I. RG 92, Consolidated Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

51 General Meigs to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, June 15, 1864. NARA I RG 92 Consolidated
Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

52 Report by Cemetery Official to Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, June 10, 1867. NARA I. RG 92. Box 6. NW-
81E.576

53 Meigs to Secretary of War F. G. Barbadoes, August 3, 1871. NARA I. RG 92, Consolidated Correspondence
File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

54 Letter to Brigadier General D. H. Ruckers from officer at Arlington (name illegible), December 17, 1865. NARA
I. RG 92. Box 132, Entry 576.

55 Ibid.
56Thomas, T. Status report on the condition of Arlington National Cemetery, Aug 31, 1867. NARA I, RG 92.

57 Fort McPherson was begun south of Arlington House in 1864. The military fort was never finished, nor did it
see military action.

58 Report on the Condition of Arlington Cemetery to General Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War, June 10, 1867.
National Archives. RG 92. Box 6. NM-81 E.576,

59 George T. Borrett, Letter dated Oct 6, 1864 in Letters from Canada and the United States. (London: 1865): 235.

60 Letter to Brigadier General D. H. Ruckers from officer at Arlington (name illegible). December 17, 1865. NARA
I, RG 92. Box 132, Entry 576. For the beginnings of the court case brought by the Lee family to regain their prop-
erty after the Civil War see, “Memorial of George Washington Custis Lee of Virginia.” April 6, 1874. 43rd
Congress. Ist Session.

61 M.C. Meigs, Quarter Master General to Edwin Stanton, Secretary of War, April 14, 1873. NARA I, RG 92.

© This speech, delivered by General Garfield, later the president of the United States, was quoted in a letter writ-
ten by Benjamin Austin, County Clerk, Alexandria to General Whitiaker, December 10, 1882. National Achives.
RG 92. Memorial Day was first proclaimed an official holiday on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan. Report of
the Arlington Memorial Amphitheater Commission (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office 1923): 8.

ENDNotES | 195


98 Custis to Nelson, c. 1850. ARHO.
99 Calvert, “Childhood Days . . .” Undated manuscript (circa 1870). ARHO.

100 Karl Decker and Angus McSween. Historie Arlington. (Washington, D.C.: Decker and McSween Publishing
Company 1892), 87.

101 For more information about contemporary descriptions and advice concerning American gardens see, Robert
Buist. The American Flower Gurden Directory: Containing Practical Directions for the Culture of Plants in the Flower
Garden, Hot House, Green-House, Rooms or Parlour Windows &. (Philadelphia: E.L. Carey & A. Hart 1839): vii.

102 George Washington Parke Custis Obituary. Harper's Weekly. (New York, New York October 24, 1857).

103 One of the first documented gardens designed in the picturesque and pastoral English Landscape School was
Middleton Place, Henry Middleton's estate in Charleston S.C. (circa 1741). Drayton Hall, also outside of
Charleston incorporated elements of this design style. Latter but more local, Spring Garden, a plantation on the
Pamunkey River owned by Thomas Jones, had a garden “laid out in the English style” by the late eighteenth cen-
tury. So too did Willian Hamilton at Woodlands near Philadelphia (1787-89). For more information on the devel-
opment of the English Landscape School in America see British and American Gardens in the Eighteenth Century,
edited by Robert P. Maccubbin and Peter Martin, (Colonial Williamsburg Foundation: Williamsburg Virginia
1984),

104 This drawing, circa 1857, was done by a member of the Lee family. Original, ARHO.
105 Calvert, “Childhood Days. ...” ARHO.

106 [),H. Rhodes, the landscape gardener who was hired in 1873 to manage the horticultural aspects of the rela-
tively new Arlington National Cemetery, wrote a description of the garden around 1930. In it he related his recol-
lections of the garden as he remembered it in 1874-after the Civil War and nine years of Army oversight. The
changes made in the garden design between the Lee ownership and the Army occupation will be discussed in the
next chapter. D. H. Rhodes. “Notes pertaining to the old flower garden south of Arlington Mansion by Mr. D. H.
Rhodes. Landscape Gardener at Arlington where he has been employed since 1873.” (War Department, Office of
the Quartermaster Supply Officer, Washington, D.C), circa 1930, ARHO, original transcript, Arlington National
Cemetery Archives,

107 Growing Up in the 1850s: The Journal of Agnes Lee, edited by Mary Custis Lee deButts, (Chapel Hill, NC: The
University of North Carolina Press 1984), 10-11.

108 bid. Annie Lee to Helen Bratt. September 16, 1858.

109 Thomas Fessenden. The New American Gardener: containing Practical Directions on the Culture of fruits and
Vegetables; Including Landscape and Ornamental Gardening, Grape-Vines, Silk, Strawberries, &c, Fourth edition (Boston:
Carter and Hendec) 1830, as quoted in Jennifer Hanna’s Ornamental Garden Design: The Rise of Floricultural
Publications and the Role of James Vick, Rochester Seed House Owner (Master's Thesis Ithaca, New York: Cornell
University 1997): 36-38,

110 Among the early nineteenth-century books that addressed ornamental garden design through a two part dis-
cussion of modern/landscape gardening and ancient/formal gardening were: Bernard M’Mahon, The American
Gardener’ Calendar Adapted to the Climates and Seasons of the United States, éc. (Philadelphia: B. Graves, 1806);
Thomas Fessenden. The New American Gardener dc. (Boston: Carter and Hendee 1830); Robert Buist. The
American Flower Garden Directory éc. (Philadelphia: E.L. Carey & A. Hart, 1839). William Cobbet, The American
Gardener é&c, (London: C. Clement 1821) and (Frederick, Maryland: J. Robinson, Circulating Library and J.
Robinson & Company 1823).

ENDNoTES | 189 |


196 | NDNOTES

63 Charles Russell Lowell to Mrs. Lowell, May 25, 1861. Letter as cited in Edward W. Emerson. Life and Letters of
Charles Russell Lowell. (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Company 1907):209. Charles was the brother of the famous
American poet, James Russell Lowell. Charles would die as a result of battle wounds in October of 1864.

CHAPTER FIVE

| Report on the Inspection of the National Cemeteries in the Department of Virginia to Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of
War. Washington, D.C. June 10, 1867. Records of the Quartermaster General’s Office [RG 92]. Box 6. NM-81 E.
576 National Archives I; Quartermaster General M.C. Meigs to Secretary of War. Edwin Stanon. April 14, 1873.
RG 92. Box 6. The memorial was created under the superintendence of Colonel Ludington. Report to the Secretary
of War for the year 1866. RG92, Box 6. Congressional Serial No 1285 39th Congress. Second Session House Executive
Documents. 1866-1867. NARA I.

2 Thompson R. East, Superintendent of Arlington National Cemetery to L. Thomas, Adj. General Orf. A,
Washington, D.C., August 31, 1867. National Archives I. RG 92.

3 National Intelligencer (1866) as quoted in In Honored Glory: Arlington National Cemetery the Final Post. by Philip
Bigler. (Arlington, Va.: Vandamere Press 1986): 30. A golgotha means a place of great suffering.

4 “Decoration Day.” Washington Chronicle. May 30, 1874; “Notes on Research for South Garden.” ARHO.

5 Also in this report are listed the numbers of individuals buried at Arlington as follows: “8191 White Soldiers, 3720
Colored Soldiers and Contrabands” Thompson R. East, Superintendent, Arlington Cemetery, VA. “A Report and
Conditions and Requirements of the Cemetery under his Charge. Aug. 24, 1867.” NARA I. RG 92, Series
NMB81E225. Title: Consolidated Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records.

6 According to the “Secretary of War's Report for November 20, 1868” in Congressional Serial No. 1367 40th
Congress, 3rd Session 1868-69, House Executive Documents the total number of graves of Civil War soldiers
reported was 316, 233. Only the occupants of 175, 764 were identified. Seventy-two national cemeteries were
reported, NARA I.

7 According to the Report of the Secretary of War for the year 1866, the dead were disinterred from all parts of
Maryland and Virginia within a circuit of thirty-five miles from Washington and “removed to the national ceme-
tery at Arlington to the number” of approximately 2000. See Congressional Serial No. 1285 - 39th Congress, Second
Session House Executive Documents 1866-1867. This was over three times as many as the next largest of the nine
national cemeteries within the District of Washington in 1869, This included 15, 585 Union soldiers and 347
Confederate soldiers. Congressional Serial No 1412. 41st Congress. Second Session. House Executive Documents
1869-70. October 1869. NARA I. ARHO.

8 Report to the Secretary of War. “Statement showing the number of national cemeteries completed in the fiscal
year ending June 30, 1867.” November 1867. Congressional Serial No 1324. 40th Congress. 2nd Session. 1867-68
House Executive Documents. Library of Congress.

9 Though the Washington Chronicle “Decoration Day.” May 30, 1876, states that this willow was the same tree that
(according to a legend repeated by Union soldiers) was planted by G.W-P. Custis from a twig of Alexander Pope’s
willow at Twigham, and therefore was the origin of all weeping willows in the United States, this is most likely
incorrect. The afore described weeping willow was planted by John Custis at Abingdon in the late eighteenth cen-
tury. See Scribner's Monthly: An Illustrated Magazine for the People, “The Weeping Willow”, V2 Issue 4, August
1871:386, See also Eleanor Lee Templeman. “Abingdon, Alexander-Custis Plantation,” in Arlington Heritage.


58 | 1802 - 1861

ied the typical profile of the American Colonization society member, integrating their social
and religious beliefs into their theories of slavery, individual rights and education. Legitimized
by the American Colonization Society, Mary Custis and Mary Lee taught at least some of the
Arlington slaves reading and writing, perhaps to enable them to be better equipped to survive
as colonists in Liberia. The Colonization Society recommended educating future African
American/ Liberian colonists, especially the women who were to make the long arduous
journey.

Mary Custis and Mary Lee contributed monetarily to the Colonization society through-
out their married lives. In the nineteenth century there were few approved ways for women
of the gentry class to raise money. During the summer months, early in the morning when
the flowers in the garden were at their peak, a few designated slaves would gather together
bunches of blossoms and form them into nosegays to sell at the markets in Georgetown and
Washington. Nosegays with their natural perfume were extremely popular during the nine-
teenth century as a method of covering up the harsh smells of both the city and other individ-
uals. As such, the flowers usually made into these bouquets needed to be both long lasting
once cut, and to have a strong pleasant perfume. Roses, lily of the valley, and chrysanthemums,
all documented as growing in the Arlington flower garden, were all popular nineteenth-cen-
tury nosegay flowers. The young Lee girls would also contribute their efforts to the cause by
weaving garlands of jasmine blooms—thought to keep linens fresh. These would be sold as
well, and the money saved to pay passages to Liberia.!2! The Lee family funded, through the
efforts of their slaves, the passage to Liberia for members of one family of Arlington slaves,
William and Rosabella Burke and their four young children. Shortly after the family’s arrival
in Liberia, Rosabella Burke wrote to Mary Custis Lee of their happiness and success in Liberia.
At the end of the letter she asked Mary Lee to give their love to their relatives, Catherine,
Agnes and Marianne Burke, who remained at Arlington.!2? Most likely permanent separation
from their family members was the price that the Burkes paid for freedom. Mary Lee so firm-
ly supported the society that, at her death, she left her inheritance from her uncle, William
Fitzhugh of Ravensworth, not to her children but to the American Colonization Fund.!23

The members of the Burke family were not the only Arlington slaves to be manumitted.
George Washington Parke Custis gave freedom to a number of women and children in the
early nineteenth century.!24 In addition, he allowed Maria Syphax, her husband Charles
Syphax, and her children to use a seventeen-acre parcel of land on the southern boundary of
the Arlington estate as their home beginning in 1826. Most likely he gave to Maria Syphax,
who had been manumitted along with her children, an unwritten life lease as there was never
a deed to accompany the transaction. It was on this property that the “old school house” or
church of the Arlington slaves was located. Quite often the Custis and Lee family members
also attended this church, walking or riding along the path that led about a mile through the
woods south of the mansion house. The release of a parcel of land to the Syphax family, the




Eleanor Calvert Custis Stewart, G.W.P.’s mother, who was living with her large family at Hope
Park agreed to settle her dower rights in Martha Washington's estate—worth one-third of all
of the property of John Custis at his death—for an annual payment of $1750 in silver for as long
as she lived. She had six more children and lived until 1811. ®

G.W-P. Custis moved into a small four room house located on the muddy flats of the
Potomac River, on the land that was to become part of the Arlington estate. The house, once
the home of a tenant of Gerrard Alexander, was primitive by Mount Vernon, or even White
House plantation, standards. There Custis stored the belongings of his adopted grandfather,
George Washington, items which he had purchased at the General’s estate auction. On the
damp ground of the flood plain, the material of the tents and flags used by the General
during the Revolutionary War quickly began to mold." Custis realized that in order to protect
the relics, he would need to move into a more substantial residence soon. Like the plantations
of Mount Vernon and Mount Airy, he desired a location that would command an extensive
vista and yet be on land flat enough for accompanying dependencies and gardens. Here, at the
top of the forested slope that ascended beyond the rutted Alexandria Turnpike, the land
was relatively level and the crest of the hill fairly broad—ample enough for a substantial resi-
dence. From the heights he could see the beginnings of Washington D.C. and the wide

Potomac River.

Geography and Maps, Library of Congress

13 A Map of the City of
Washington in the District of
Columbia established as the
permanent Seat of the
Government of the United
States of America taken from
actual survey as laid out on
the ground. Robert King,
Surveyor of the City of
Washington, 1818.

1608 - 1802 | 23


Though some portions of Arlington Cemetery were being developed for burial, much of
the federal reservation defined as the cemetery remained in woodland, as during the Custis and
Lee period. By the 1870s there were indications that a few large trees had been taken out of
the area to the north and west of Arlington House, probably by military troops; but there was
no evidence of any general removal of trees, according to the accounts of D.H. Rhodes.5! The
majority of the forest trees in this area were red, white and chestnut oaks, interspersed with
various types of elms. A few American beech trees were located immediately north of the
kitchen garden. According to Rhodes these were seedlings which originated from one or two
old trees located in this particular portion of the grounds. As the only collection of beech in
the cemetery at that time, he felt they deserved special preservation. Though much of the
property was forested, only very limited funding was devoted to the management of the trees,
much to Rhode's dismay. Regardless of the limited resources devoted to them, the trees of
Arlington would continue to influence the visitors' experience of the cemetery, for the dark
forests embodied nineteenth-century picturesque sentiment. Such an aesthetic was captured

perfectly in these words from Historic Arlington published in 1890:

The everlasting hills, the groves of oak and elm will stand for centuries, nature's vast
memorial cathedral, amid whose leafy aisles the errant wind shall murmur eternally a sad

requiem or in fiercer blast, a jubilant paean of martial glory.52

All aspects of the forest environment, the trees, the flowers, even the dappled sunlight
contributed to the sanctimony of mourning. In the spring of 1870, only five years after the

end of the war, an unknown visitor wrote,

the violets were making purple the graves of “unknown soldiers” and down in the woods, I
found the anemone, the dog-tooth violet, the lady's-slipper, the fringed polygala, the hepat-
ica, Nature was repeating herself with immortal precision and beauty... . I stooped and
dropped my gathered violets and anemones on the sod which covered the soldier who had
died that I might live... and I thought of legends, old and new, sacred and profane; and
of the experiences past and present, national and individual, which teach us that there are
some truths, that there is some knowledge and some revelation, which only come to us over

4 grave.

The peaceful reassurance of the forested glade and sodded graves was deceiving, however, for
the physical evidence of dissention, as well as healing, clearly inscribed the cemetery grounds.
The former home of General Robert E. Lee, a hero of the south and a man esteemed by many
in the north, was almost empty. Its once grand rooms used for storage and to house cemetery

workers. Monuments to the dead stood nearby in the garden bordered on two sides with the

1865 - 1880 | 109


HARDWOOD
FOREST

Moodland : ¥
Grove |

Civil War Era Roads

YyokkEvergreen hedge
€} Uentified treo
mo Hedge
ang Durrp cite
O Anny buildings
—— Minor road/path
A Anny barracke (temp.)
@® weit
FP Flagpole
& Tomb of Mary Randolph
mM L._Z Soldier’o graves
SS Icehouse
~~ Dl Outbuildings

\_ | Mar = f
a 4

Rough turf

Rye Forest treeline (approx. location)

SOURCES:

ExnnROns OF Waste lod PREPARED FROM ORIG HAL SURVEYS OF THE
ENGMEER DEPARTMENT 1862-1866, SHEET 5 AND 8. NARA I RECORD
‘Grou 77. F99, Canrosnaric BeaNcy,

Anceveron Pan STABLES. NARA. RG 92. FallO SHEET 1-9

Heiss MouTcOneRy C. Parr oF Ama TON Viriaad. USS. Coast
Sumver. REGISTER NO, 1085. ON FRE, LIBRARY OF ComeRESS, CanTOgRAPWIC BRANCH,
Wasnnicton D.C.

Toroseamacat Mab OF IE DISTRICT OF COLUMBA SURVEYED DH IME

Yeats 1856-59 ov A. Bosciné. PusLisven By D. HCCLELLANO, BLANCHARD ANO MomIN
WasunecTon D.C. 1861, Lipa oF Consness

‘Cane # C3850 186! G6 Vaucr oversize

CommesroNOetCe OF CUSTIS AND LEE FAMILY MENOERS, 1861-65,
‘ARLNGGION HOUSE ARCMVES, HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF Vinewda, LIBRARY OF CONGRESS,
Tuto PLace, WasieeTON 0.C.

‘Map OF TE GROUNO OF OCCUPATION ano DEFBISE OF THE DINSON OF THE US. Aiy a4 V1
(Rema, 1 Connano oF Bass. Gen. law McDomet. 1861 US. Coast SumvEY A.D. Bacnt
‘SueT. FLELO WORK EXECUTED CURING PARTS OF JUNE avO JULY I86I, NARA I

Mur oF Easremy Vievea sno Vico TY OF Wasuneron. 1862 US. Aro, Cones oF EG!

NeeRS. NARA Il, RECORD GaOUP 77, CARTOSRAMWC BRANCH UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT

1861-1865
Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA.
PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

(tar of Anus row Nariowat Cenerenr] niv3tea
AMD DIMSON—APPRORMATELY 10 ACRE PLOTS. 1868

CATION OF FRECONEN'S VILLAGE
IAL COPY iv MAP FILES, ARHO.

CConsesreMceNCE OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ARey, QuAATESBASTER GavERat's OFNCE,
NARA, RG 92 so ARHO ARCHWES

0 100 200 400
_

SCALE | INCH= 200 FEET

355/2090% Jo R


61 A field of the dead in
Arlington National
Cemetery, 1868

102 | 1865 - 1880

gift by G.W.P. Custis to Maria Syphax at her manumission in 1826. In 1865 her son, William
Syphax, wrote to President Johnson requesting compensation for his parents. He asked that

they be allowed to purchase from the federal government the:

small parcel of ground on which they live and to which they claim to be equitably entitled,
at the rate at which the United States purchased the Arlington Estate, and to receive a
legal title for the same, so that for the few remaining days of their earthly existence, and
their children after them, they may enjoy the security and benefits which Mr. Custis benev-
olently designed they should possess... . !9

President Johnson forwarded the letter to the House of Representatives and a bill was passed,
legally and permanently separating the Syphax property from the Arlington military
reservation.20

PRAGMATIC IMPROVEMENTS
AND MONUMENTS TO MOURNING

Arlington was not the only national cemetery influenced by the mandates of Congress.
In February of 1867, the “Act to Fstablish and to Protect National Cemeteries” was passed by
Congress, directing Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to “have every national cemetery
enclosed with a good and substantial stone or iron fence; to cause each grave to be marked with
a small headstone or block; to direct the appointment of reliable veterans as cemetery super-

intendents; and to erect adequate quarters to house cemetery superintendents.”?

! Tn compli-
ance, the construction of a Seneca sandstone wall was begun at Arlington. Eventually the wall
replaced the white-washed paling fence that had formerly enclosed the cemetery's 230 acres

and divided the grounds from the agricultural land of Freedmen’s village residents. The final

section of the wall was constructed in 1897 when the last portions of the former Arlington



190 | ENDNOTES

111 For examples, see Robert Buist. The Rose Manual &c. (Philadelphia: for the author by Messr. Carey & Hart
1844); Edward Sayers. Treatise on the Culture of the Dablia and Cactus (Boston: Weeks, Jordan and Company 1839).

112 Thomas Bridgeman, The Florist’s Guide vc, (New York: Mitchell & Turner 1839), 11.
113 Thid, 28.
114 D.H. Rhodes to Major F. E. Matteson. June 19, 1930. ARHO.

115 ‘Transcript of interview titled, “Notes made in 1929 by Mrs. Mary Pagen from conversations with four old col-
ored women-former slaves at Arlington.” ARHO.

116 Calvert, “Childhood Days. . . .”

117 Mildred Lee, Recollections. Lexington July 20, 1890. As reprinted in Agnes Lee's Growing up in the 1850s: The
Journal of Agnes Lee. (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press 1984): 116.

118 Calvert, “Childhood Days at Arlington . ..”

119 Tn order not to “disrupt the labor force,” the emigration of the individual colonist had to be accepted by both
the free black colonist, and the individuals “who have an interest in their labor.”American Colonization Society,
Annual Report. Volume 7 (1824): 7-8.

120 For a discussion of George Washington Parke Custis’s role in the American Colonization Society see, Douglas
Eugene Pielmeier. Arlington House: The Evolution of a Nineteenth Century Virginia Plantation. (Unpublished thesis,
1996), ARHO,

121 Calvert, “Childhood Days at Arlington . . .” Diary of Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee. June 9, 1853. Virginia
Historical Society, Mss5: 1L5114:1; Mary Fitzhugh Custis to Mary Custis Lee, Fortress Monroe, Old Point Va.
October 8, 1831. Virginia Historical Society, Mss2 C9695.

122 According to the list of slaves emancipated in will of G.W.P. Custis December 29, 1862 included Catherine
Burke and child; Marianne and Agnes Burke. Copy in ARHO. William and Rosabella Burke emigrated with their
four children Granderson, Cornelia, Alexander and Martha. A 1855 letter between Rosabella Burke and Mary Lee
was published in African Repository und Colonial Journal. Volume 35, No. 7, (February 20, 1859): 216.

123 Mary Custis’s brother, William Henry Fitzhugh who passed away in 1828 firmly supported the American
Colonization Society, and therefore may have been an early influence on Mary, or visa versa. William H. Fitzhugh,
quoted in “American Colonization Society,” National Intelligencer. January 13, 1826, Will of Mary Lec dated
November 3, 1857. Lec, George Bolling Papers 1813-1924. Library of Congress.

124 The paternity of these children, and Custis’s relationship with their mothers been brought into question many
times, At Custis’s death in 1857, northern newspapers published articles pertaining to the subject of the possible
paternity of his “mulatto slaves.” For an interesting study of the American Colonization Society in the southern
United States highlighting additional rational for the Custis and Lee women’s interest in the American
Colonization Society please see, Marie Tyler McGraw’s , “My Old Mistress Promise Me . . .” Draft. 3/19/00. For
more information on the identity of the manumitted women and children of Arlington see, Pielmier, Douglas
Eugene. “Arlington House: The Evolution of a Ninetcenth Century Virginia Plantation” Unpublished study.
Arlington House: The Robert E. Lee Memorial, 1996. ARHO.



house to provide better growing conditions.#? The neat house consisted of a simple hipped-
roof, four post structure that prevented leaves and other debris fron contaminating the well
water. Pumps replaced the rope and buckets.43 In the spring of 1874 benches with curving
cast iron frames and simple wooden slat seats were purchased.+ Iron urns painted white and
filled with annuals were placed in various locations around the building. Behind the house in
a circular planting beds Rhodes planted two Cedrus deodara, or Deodar Cedars.*5 In addition,
he believed that the house, standing starkly on the crest of the hill, needed foundation plant-
ings to blend the architecture gracefully with its surroundings. Therefore in 1878 he planted
magnolia trees in front of each wing of the main house with plantings of specimen evergreens
at the foundation, including “boxwood, yews and arbor vitae.” Quartermaster General
Montgomery Meigs continued to make suggestions for increasing the beauty of the landscape
at Arlington. “Please give orders that clumps of caladium esculentum and of canna [annual
flowers] be planted next season in front of the mansion at Arlington,” he wrote. The planting
beds were created next to the base of the flag pole along the drive immediately east of
Arlington House.*

Many factors contributed to these rapid improvements of Arlington National Cemetery
and Arlington House during the 1870s. By the late 1860s most of the soldiers who had died
during the Civil War years had been permanently interred. Virginia reentered the Union in
1870 and Reconstruction formally ended. In the early 1870s, Alexander R. Shepard, as gov-
ernor of the District of Columbia, lobbied legislators and pushed projects through to clean up
and improve the national capital, perhaps spurring the Arlington improvements. Shepard
oversaw the construction of numerous buildings, the paving of roads, and the creation of parks
in the District of Columbia. One such landscape project was Frederick Law Olmsted's
redesign of the Capitol grounds in 1872. Finally and most importantly, Congress appropri-
ated money to fund cemetery improvement. With the increasing institutional reverence paid
to Civil War soldiers of both sides, the preparations for the coming United States centennial
celebration, and the gradual economic recovery, funds were dedicated to the task of fulfilling
the agenda of the 1867 Cemetery Act. Arlington National Cemetery, as a prominent and local
example, benefited from these new allocations. In 1873, as a result of the new funding,
Secretary of War William W. Belknap adopted the first design for grave stones erected in
national cemeteries. For the known dead, the War Department adopted a slab design of mar-
ble or other durable stone four inches thick, ten inches wide and twelve inches in height above
the ground. The part above the ground was to be polished and the top slightly curved.” The
headstone for Confederate soldiers was slightly different in shape and the use of the word rebel
was discontinued. Slowly these came to replace all the wooden headboards at Arlington.

In response to the increasing number of visitors to Arlington who were motivated in part
by the recent improvements, Quartermaster General Montgomery Meigs felt a more formal

and larger venue for memorial services was necessary. In 1874, a Memorial Amphitheater was

1865-1880 | 107


Lee, Dorothy Ellis, History of Arlington County, Virginia, Richmond, Virginia: ‘he Deitz Press, 1946.

Lee, Robert E., “To Markie: The Letters of Robert E, Lee to Martha Custis Williams from the originals in the Huntington
Library, edited and with an introduction by Avery Craven, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1933.

Lee, Washington Custis, Arlington House and Its Associations, Department of Army, 1932.

Lewis, Nelly Custis, George Washington's Beautiful Nelly: The letters of Eleanor Parke Custis Lewis to Elizabeth Bordley
Gibson, 1794-1851, Edited by Patricia Brady, Columbia, .C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1991.

Lowther, Minnie Kendall, Mount Vernon, Arlington and Woodlawn: History of these National Shrines from the earliest
titles of ownership to the present... , Washington, D.C.: Ben Franklin Press, 1922.

Martin, Peter, The Pleasure Gardens of Virginia: From Jamestown to Jefferson, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
Press, 1991.

Moore, Joseph West, Picturesque Washington: Pen and Pencil Sketches of its Scenery, History, Traditions, Public and
Social Life, Providence, Rhode Island: J.A. & R.A. Reid, 1883.

Moxham, R. M., The Great Hunting Creek Land Grants, North Springfield, VA: Colonial Press, 1974.

Mullins, Agnes, Historic Grounds Report, The Custis-Lee Mansion Flower Garden, National Park Service, National
Capital Region, March,1964.

Lanier, Gabrielle M. and Bernard L. Herman, Everyday Architecture of the Mid-Atlantic: Looking at Buildings and
Landscapes, Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Lemay, J. A. Leo, The American Dream of Captain Jobn Smith, Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991.

Lesko, Kathleen M. general editor, Black Georgetown Remembered: A History of its Black Community from the
Founding of “The Town of George” in 1875 to the Present Day, Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press,1991.

Little, Barbara J., National Capital Area Archeological Overview and Survey Plan, Washington, D.C.: US Department
of the Interior, National Park Service, National Capital Area, 1995.

Longstreth, Richard editor, The Mall in Washington 1791-1991, Hanover, NH: The University Press of London,
1991,

MacCloskey, Monro, Hallowed Ground: Our National Cemeteries, New York: R. Rosen Press, 1968.

Maccubbin, Robert P., British and American Gardens in the Eighteen Century, Williamsburg, Va: Colonial
Williamsburg Foundation, 1984.

MacDonald, Rose Mortimer Ellzey, Mrs, Robert E, Lee, Boston: Ginn and Co., 1973.

Martin, Peter, The Pleasure Gardens of Virginia From Jamestown to Jefferson, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton
University Press, 1991.

McCormick, Charles, Custis Lee Mansion Furnishings Study, National Park Service, Division of History, Office of
Archeology and Historic Preservation, July 20, 1968.

McCormick, Charles, Custis-Lee Mansion: Historical Data for Grounds, Division of History Office of Archeology
and Historic Preservation, June 1, 1968.

BIBLIOGRAPHY | 213


202 | ENDNOTES

23 Iza Duffus Hardy, Historic Buildings of America as Seen and Described by Famous Writers. Esther Singlton, Ed, (New
York, Dodd, Mead & company, 1906): 15.

24 Arlington National Cemetery was segregated from its beginning. However, segregation was not formally mapped
and organized until the early twentieth century. As described in newspapers and historical accounts, “The portion
of the Cemetery lying west of the house is devoted to the white soldiers, that on the northern side is allotted to the
black soldiers. George C. Evans, Editor. Visitors’ Companion at Our Nation’s Capital: A Complete Guide for Washington
and its Environs et al. (Gcorge G. Evans: Philadelphia 1892): 153. See also, Thornpson R. East, Arlington Super. To
MC. Meigs. August 31, 1868. NARA I. RG 92. Office of the Quartermaster General 1800-1914 Document file.,
M.C. Meigs to Secretary of War Edwin Staton. April 14, 1873. NARA I, RG 92. Office of the Quartermaster
General 1800-1914 Document file.

25 John B. Osborne, The Story of Arlington. A history and description of the estate and national cemetery, containing a com-
plete list of officers of the army and navy interred there, with biographical sketches of heroes of the Civil and Spanish wars,
and notable memorial addresses and poems Washington, D.C. ( Press of J.F. Sheiry 1899): 4.

26 U, S, Military Reservations, National Cemeteries and Military Parks, etc. Revised Edition, 1916. 411, (Act of
April 18, 1900 as amended June 3, 1902; 32 Stat. 293).

27 Nan Netherton, Arlington County in Virginia: A Pictorial History, (Norfolk: Donning Co. 1987), 98-102.

28 Wayne D. Rasmussen, “Arlington - An Agricultural Experiment farm in a changing Era.” January 14, 1966.
Lecture transcript. Arlington County Library Vertical Files. Agricultural Farm.

29 The Rambler, December 8, 1918. ARHO
30 Tbid, April 28, 1904.

31 L’Enfant was born in Paris, France August 2, 1754 and died June 14, 1825. He was buried at Green Hill in Prince
George County, Maryland. ‘The site of the burial in Arlington was selected by the board of Commissioners with
the assistance of the Army Captain A. B. Shattuck, in charge of National Cemeteries. www.arlingtoncemetery.org.

32 Enfant. Plan of the City Intended for the Permanent Seat of the Government of the United States. Facsimile of a man-
uscript by Peter Charles LEnfant in the Library of Congress. Published in Washington by the U.S. Coast and
Geodetic Survey, 1887.

33 “[’Enfant’s Remains: Suggestions that they be placed in Congressional Cemetery.”: Washington, D.C. Evening
Star: (July 7, 1904); 1. See also, Helen Noclay. Our Capital on the Potomac, (New York, London, ‘The Century co.
1924). Enfant was reinterred because his grave at Green Hill was considered to be neglected.

34 Charles Moore (1855-1942), who was educated and had experience in journalism, was also from Michigan.
Kohler, Sue A. The Commission of Fine Arts: 1910-1995. (Washington, D.C.: The Commission of Fine Arts 1995):
SL.

35 The concept of connecting the Virginia shore with the Washington D. C. side of the Potomac was first consid-
ered in the 1880s. For in-depth discussion of the development of Arlington Memorial Bridge see Sue A. Kohler.
‘The Commission of Fine Arts: A Brief History 1910-1984. Washington: Commission of Fine Arts, 1984; KressCox
Associates. Historic Structures Report, Arlington Memorial Bridge. Washington: prepared for the National Park
Service, 1986; Fisher, Perry G. Historical and Design Issues: Memorial Avenue and the Great Entrance to
Arlington National Cemetery. In Reports prepared for Women in Military Service for America Memorial
Foundation, Inc. May 21, 1991.


a
2
3
Z
&
3
2

Memorial Amphitheater constructed in the 1870s. The publicity surrounding the dedication
of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier contained within the new Memorial Amphitheater gen-
erated increased scrutiny of the grounds surrounding Arlington House. Though D.H. Rhodes
remained the head gardener in charge of cemetery upkeep, others would begin to exert influ-
ence over the design and management of this landscape, which was growing more significant

with each war America fought.

POLITICS AND IDEOLOGY BEHIND
THE RESTORATION OF ARLINGTON HOUSE

Charles Moore, the former secretary of the McMillan Commission and now chairman
of the Commission of Fine Arts, was very vocal in his review of the design and care of the
grounds of Arlington. The Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) had been created in 1910 by
President Taft to review the proposed developments in the city of Washington D.C., assuring
that new designs and changes to existing conditions conformed with the McMillan
Commission Plan, The landscape of Arlington House, visible from Washington and a focal
point within Arlington National Cemetery, was within their purview. For instance, as revealed
in this letter to the Quarter Master General’s office, Moore clearly did not approve of the urns

and annual flower beds so conspicuous in the landscape surrounding the house.

When the frosts come the Commission would like to see the flower bed in front of the
Arlington Mansion cleared and grassed over and all the iron vases around the mansion
taken out and lost . . . the flower beds on the square south of the Mansion also should be put
into grass. This will mean some pretty serious heart burns but it is in the interests of econ-

omy and efficiency.36

Though Colonel Penrose, the officer in charge of the cemetery, responded that yes, the urns
would be “lost”, the removal of the flower garden must have proved a bit too politically diffi-
cult for the annual beds remained through at least 1930. But Moore, as representative of the
Commission of Fine Arts, was not the only party interested in the development of the

Arlington.

84 Arlington House, ¢.1910

postcard

1880-1929 | 131


Following a visit of Charles C. Moore, Chairman of the Fine Arts Commission, paid to
President Coolidge today, it became known that an entire change of base with regard to the
project virtually has been determined upon. The mansion will be restored, not in the dec-
orative style it bad as occupied by General Lee, but in the period style of the earlier years
in which it was occupied by members of the Custis Family. There is no real demand from
the South that a Lee shrine be established in Arlington Cemetery, Mr. Moore declared.*”

Following his visit with the President, Moore was asked by acting Secretary of War, Dwight
FE. Davis, to oversee the acquisition of furniture as the mansion was undergoing restoration.
Moore accepted.#8

After refusing to allocate money to fund the restoration, Congress appropriated ten
thousand dollars, at the prodding of Moore to fund a “thorough investigation and survey” to
determine the condition of the Arlington House and cemetery buildings in March of 1928.49
Others commented publicly on the sorry condition of the mansion and condemned the pro-
posed restoration. Marietta M. Andrews, a local author, wrote of Arlington House in her book
George Washington’s Country:

The house is inexpressibly desolate in its present conditions, amid all the natural beauty of
its surroundings . . . .Its denuded rooms speak louder than words in subtle reproach of this
that was done .. . little temples and summer-houses that do not bang together at all with
the architectural plan of the main building .. . flower beds in studied forms that are sup-
posedly ornamental. Arlington now is the last word in bad taste and inelegance; and the
crowning mistake to my mind, would be to furnish it in imitation of the home of the
Custises and the Lees.50

Nevertheless, eventually plans for the restoration went forward. The restoration of
Arlington House and surrounding grounds was placed under the jurisdiction of the
Quartermaster General of the War Department, with immediate supervision by Colonel
Charles G. Mortimer. All facets of the project were subject to the approval of the Commission
of Fine Arts, for according to local papers, it was the first project of its kind ever undertaken
by the Federal Government, Department of Army. In 1929 Congress appropriated $90,000
to fund the “continuing restoration of the Lee mansion and the procurement of furnishings...”
subject to the approval of the Commission of Fine Arts.>!_ This was done with the hope that
“when the present work was completed funds would be made available for the complete
restoration of the gardens and walks.”52_ ‘The construction of Arlington Memorial Bridge
between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, whose completion aligned
with the bicentennial celebration of George Washington’s birth, most likely spurred the fund-
ing of the Arlington House restoration project.53 As the Evening Star stated in 1929,

1880 - 1929 | 135



ARLINGTON IHIOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL

=

—

Pr tas} ml [ Il,

a ARLINGTON...
es * WHERE MY AFFECTIONS AND
ATTACHMENTS ARE MORE
STRONGLY PLACED THAN ANY
OTHER PLACE IN THE WORLD.”

‘Robert E. Lee to Martha Custis. Williams,
» | March-l$, 1854

U: S. Wenaatient of the Interior

| National Park Service

National Capital Region

| |__| Cultural-Landscape Program
Washington, D.C.

wv


Fort Myer to accom-
modate pedestrian visi-
tors who came to the
cemetery via electric
trolley lines from
Rosslyn and D.C.!8
Another draw to

the cemetery was the

restoration of Fort
McPherson. In 1894,
D. H. Rhodes oversaw
the “restoration” of Fort McPherson, a fort south of Arlington House that had never seen duty

George Washington Memorial Parkway Archives

since it was not finished before the Civil War ended. Yet, newly covered with soft turf and dec-
orated with flower beds and iron ramparts, Fort McPherson represented the many Civil War
earthworks that were quickly being lost to development. These included Fort Whipple (where
much of the original earthwork was destroyed in the construction of Fort Myer adjacent to
the National Cemetery), Forts Cass and Corcoran, and Fort Woodbury, which was cut up into
the street system of

77 The restored Fort
McPherson, a Civil War fort
that never saw action, was
located within the cemetery
grounds, south of Arlington
House. Arlington Va.
Military Reservation Fort
Myer and the National
Cemetery with Annex
Showing the Road to
Aqueduct Bridge, 1894

Fort Myer Heights.!9
In the

garden and

flower
around
Arlington House,
planting continued.
The annual beds in the
flower garden were
filled with
ornamental grasses and

annuals. By the 1890s,

cannas,

the trees and shrubs in

Arlington House Archives,

the foundation plant-

ing installed in the

1870s by Rhodes were growing large, especially the Magnolia trees in front of both wings.
Window boxes on the east and south facades were overflowing with flowers. Like the foun-
dation plantings, the window boxes attempted to soften the abrupt contrast between the Greek
revival architecture and the surrounding land—a contrast considered by many to be unattrac-
tive. Yet not all changes made were additions. In 1896 a hurricane struck, toppling over three
hundred trees on the grounds of Arlington. One of the trees damaged was the remaining large

deodor cedar (the other tree had died previously), located next to the water tower in the plant-

78 Arlington House with
flower boxes and foundation
‘plantings, ¢.1890

1880-1929 | 125



86 | 1861 - 1865

Yet the first burial had occurred one month earlier on May 13, 1864 when Private
William Henry Christman, a farmer from Pennsylvania, was interred at Arlington.4? He was
buried near the cemetery of Freedmen's Village, at the northeast corner of the old Arlington
estate near the Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike. When Meigs made a subsequent visit,
he discovered the graves of inore soldiers in the northeast corner near the “contraband ceme-
tery.” He was angry and reiterated the importance of burying the soldiers nearer to the man-
sions? On June 15, 1864, General Meigs wrote to Secretary of War General Stanton, who
had jurisdiction over Arlington as a military installation, to affirm that the burials of soldiers
in the northeast corner would end. He went so far as to suggest that after the cemetery was
“property enclosed, laid out and carefully preserved”, the soldiers recently interred in the
lower northeastern section of the property [should] be removed to an area closer to the house,
for “the grounds about the Mansion are admirably adapted to such a use.”5!

His directions were followed to some extent, as revealed by this official War Department
1865 report on the beginnings of the cemetery:

Interments were commenced May 13, 1864 first at the northeast angle of the enclosure, by
no means the most suitable place but desired by General DeRussy who then occupied the
dwelling house, who gave as a reason that he wished the bodies buried as far from the res-
idence as possible. This limited spot-bordering on a little swale and marsh is nearly filled
up, but it is still being used for the interment of colored soldiers. It also contains the remains

of some contrabands, so called.5?

This northeast portion of the cemetery was referred to as the “lower cemetery” or “con-
traband cemetery” for a number of years after the establishment of the National Cemetery at
Arlington. The burial of soldiers near the “contraband cemetery” was discontinued soon after
Meigs made his visit. ‘The officers living in Arlington House, however, then ordered that the
interments be made in the western portion of the grounds, not wishing to live near the dead.
At this point, over sixty burials were occurring daily. When Meigs returned once again and
found the graves lying to the far west of the house near the military grounds of Fort Whipple,
he was satisfied. The burials there continued.’

Federal army officers, in contrast to enlisted men, were buried in a line along the flower
garden. In all, forty-five officers were interred around the outside of the rectangular flower
garden to the south of the mansion. Most likely, Meigs determined the location. ‘The first,
Captain Albert Packard, was buried four days after Private Christman. By the end of the
month, over 2600 individuals had been buried in the cemetery. Soon a substantial, wooden
paling fence fronting the Alexandria and Georgetown ‘Turnpike was erected around the ceme-

tery grounds.


23. The first known public
illustration of Arlington
House was included in a

tourist handbook,
Washington Guide, by
William P. Elliot in 1826,

46 | 1802 - 1861

and plays was to convey the original patriotic nature of the earliest days of the United States,
to reinforce George Washington as the vortex of that American history, and to augment his
own role as the keeper of the Washington relics and the inheritor of the Washington legacy.
Though never considered extremely accomplished in the arts by his contemporary critics,
G.W.P. continued to paint and write throughout his life. These three goals shaped the devel-
opment of the Arlington landscape as well. The architecture and placement of Arlington
House is exemplary of this focus.

Classical in style and designed to appear impressively large from a great distance, the
completed mansion reinforced the hierarchy of the estate and the Custis and Lee families’
place in society. Though the exact evolution of the grounds immediately around Arlington
House is not known, the house itself was finished by 1818.83 The final phase of construction
was done by Cornelius McLean at a cost of fifteen hundred and fifty dollars.84 The light col-
ored, cement stucco on the building, invented by the firm of David Meade Randolph of
Richmond, was installed on the east, north and south facades of Arlington. David Randolph’s
wife, Mary Randolph, was a distant cousin to both Mary Randolph Custis Lee and her hus-
band, Robert E. Lee. Author of the well-known cookbook The Virginia Housewife, she was
buried on the slope to the east of Arlington House within the park in 1828.85 By the time of
the Civil War, at least the east facade of the wings and main portico section had been scored
and streaked with paint to suggest marble blocks. The west facade was ornamented with
a one-story,
open arcade,
reinforcing
the significant
relationship
between the
original
architectural

design of the

i
g
i
a:
i

mansion and
the landscape of the estate. These open arcades were enclosed, however, within a few years of
completion. Reactions to the completed mansion were mixed, as revealed in the following

quote from an English traveler visiting Washington in 1832:

It is visible for many miles, and in the distance has the appearance of a superior English
country residence beyond any place I had seen in the states, but as I came close to it, I was
woefully disappointed.86


15 East Front of Mount
Vernon c.1792 and attributed
to Edward Savage reveals,
through the thoughtful place-
ment of trees, the ha ha wall,
and the curving lines of the
landscape, characteristics of
the English Landscape School
of design.

32 | 1802 - 1861

approach at Woodlawn plantation. Woodlawn, a Georgian mansion that sat high on a hill
overlooking Mount Vernon and the Potomac River, was the home of his sister, Nelly Custis
Lewis and her husband Lawrence Lewis. Lawrence Lewis, a good friend of Custis, shared his
interest in agriculture. Tudor Place, began in 1808, was the home of Custis’s other sister,
Martha Peters; over time it developed into a grand classical mansion with extensive gardens.
Chatham, the home of his future wife, Mary Lee Fitzhugh, was also located high on a bluff
overlooking the Rappahannock River. Yet only Mount Vernon exemplified the Custis’s ideal
estate.

The years of accompanying his knowledgeable guardian around the grounds of Mount
Vernon probably imbued Custis with the naturalistic design approach that would influence
him for the rest of his life. The Mount Vernon mansion had a two-story veranda which
extended the entire length of the back facade. The view from this porch was of the gently
sloping hillside, covered with long grass and dotted with specimen and massed trees, placed to
frame vistas of the river and distant shore. Such pastoral design elements—irregular spatial

organization, serpentine lines, gentle slopes and rough lawns extending to the foundations of
houses—were advocated in the English Landscape School of design. This picturesque, land-
scape design style grew out of the industrial revolution and the enclosure movement in
England in the mid-eighteenth century and was interpreted and illustrated in the gardens of
such prominent individuals as Andre Parmentier and Thomas Jefferson.22. As the description
of Mount Vernon illustrates, Washington also experimented with this relatively new style of

garden design.

5
&
z
3
r
é


nence. They wrote letters to congressional members and local newspapers, and voiced their
opinions to employees of the Army and members of the Commission of Fine Arts. In light of
their concerns, and with a desire to create momentum for funding the flower garden restoration,
ornate plans were drawn up by designers in the Quartermaster Generals Office. The beautiful-
ly rendered drawings, illustrating the “restoration” of the flower garden with many different ren-
ditions of intricately woven boxwood beds and a monumental stairway leading from the flower
garden to the Tomb of the Unknown Civil War Soldier, were taken before the Commission of
Fine Arts.

After General Bash assured the Commission that every effort had been made in the

designs to provide the
Civil War monument
proper stature in the
landscape, Chairman
Moore informed him
that the “Civil War
people would be satis-
fied if there could be a
view over the city from
the tomb, the same as
from the Tomb of the

Unknown Soldier of

3
2
4
3
3
aL

the World War.” He added that, after the Temple of Fame was removed, the placement of any
structure within the flower garden—namely the proposed summer house—would block this
significant view and he strongly advised against its construction.3! Regardless of the grand rec-
ommendations and plans, the Temple of Famc remained. No arbor was built, but the annual

flower beds, long disparaged by the Commission, were removed.

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
ACQUIRES ARLINGTON HOUSE

On June 10, 1933 the building designated as the “Lee Mansion” and the two slave quar-
ters were transferred from the War Department to the Department of the Interior, pursuant
to Executive Order 6166 which transferred all parks, monuments and reservations under fed-
eral-administration to the National Park Service.3? Because Arlington National Cemetery was
used for active burial, it remained under the jurisdiction of the War Department. The
Executive Order that recorded the transfer, however, did not specify the boundaries of the area
pertinent to the administration and protection of the buildings. While the buildings were now
under the administration of the newly-named Office of National Parks, Buildings and
Reservations (later to be renamed the National Park Service), the land surrounding them

93 The annual flower beds
were removed from the flower
garden area, south of
‘Arlington House by 1931.
The Temple of Fame, howev-
er, remained. The enormous
elm tree was mentioned by
Elizabeth Calvert in her
description of the flower gar-
den, almost one bundred years
before this image was taken.

1929-2001 | 153


OWNERSHIP OF ARLINGTON

Up until 1863, Arlington had been occupied by the federal government without legal
title to the property as was often the case in wartime. Mary Lee, as direct inheritor of the
estate of her father George Washington Parke Custis, still owned the land. Shortly after
McClellan's departure south in March of 1862, Congress passed a law authorizing “the col-
lection of direct taxes in the insurrectionary districts within the United States.” Under this
legislation, property owned by individuals loyal to the Confederacy within the boundary of the
United States, such as the Lees, could be assessed federal taxes. If these taxes went unpaid,
then the property would be forfeited to the government and put up at auction to be sold to the
highest bidder. This law was amended in 1863, to wit “any such sale of any tracts, parcels or
lots of land which might be selected under the direction of the President for government use
for war, military, naval, revenue, charitable, educational or police purposes might be at said
sale, be bid on under directions of President and struck off to the United States.” It was under
the authority of this law that the United States government attained ownership of the
Arlington estate.3+

On September 16, 1863, Mary Ann Randolph Lee, as holder of the title to Arlington,
was assessed $92.70 in taxes on property worth, according to the 1860 census, approximately
$34,100. She was given sixty days to pay. Mary, suffering from acute rheumatism and behind
enemy lines, was unable to make the journey to Washington herself and so sent someone else
to make the payment. The law, which required the owner of the property to make the tax pay-
ment, was held strictly in this case, perhaps because the wife of the leader of the Confederate
Army held the deed. In any case, the individual sent by Mrs. Lee was turned away. With the
taxes unpaid Arlington was forfeited to the United States. The property was to be sold at pub-
lic auction on January 11, 1864. On the sixth of January, under the 1863 amended tax act,
President Lincoln made an order directing that the Arlington estate be bid on and acquired by
the United States for war, charitable and educational purposes.3> Therefore the property was
purchased by the federal government at an auction for $26, 800.00. The local newspaper

described the event:

Sale of Confiscated Lands-sale anxiously looked for, took place in Alexandria at noon under
supervision John Hawkhurst William . . . .at times the bidding was quite spirited and the
prices were considered good. The first property sold was No 1, Arlington estate, late occu-
pied and owned by General R.E. Lee, 1000 acres valued at 34,100. Sold to the govern-
ment for 26, 800. No 2 Custis Mill property, 300 acres valued at 7000 Sold to R.E.
Flannigan for $4100.36

1861-1865 | 81


6 George Town and

Federal City, or City of

Washington by George Beck
was published in June 1801
in London, one year before
George Washington Parke
Custis began to develop the
estate that was to become
Arlington House.

n July of 1802 enormous hardwood trees such as oaks, hickories, and chestnuts covered
the hillsides of the property that George Washington Parke Custis, the adopted grand-
son of George Washington, had inherited only a few months before from his father, John
Parke Custis. The land was almost entirely unimproved—save for fields cleared by eigh-
teenth-century tenant farmers at the base of the slopes that descended toward the river from
the heights of land that G.W.P. Custis was to call Mount Washington. He later changed the
name to Arlington House, after the Custis family estate on the Eastern Shore. On the shores
of the Potomac, the black soil was rich and deep with silt compared to the relatively thin layer
of clay found on the heights. A small, four-room house and a couple of outbuildings were
located down on the flats where the few rough fields remained from tenant farming enterpris-
es, To build a farm and an estate out of the property the forest needed to be cleared further
up the gentle slope. Then an intensively grown market garden with rows of vegetables and
fruits might be successful. Alexandria to the south, and Georgetown to the north (both towns
connected to the Virginia shore by Mason’s Ferry) would provide a ready customer base for
the produce. The 57 slaves inherited by Custis would cut down the trees and burn the stumps.
The felled logs would be used in the construction of the slaves’ quarters down by the river.
The opposite shore of the Potomac was visible from a knoll which jutted out from a
ridge of the Mount Washington property. Brick and wooden buildings were scattered along
the river’s edge and in the forest that extended back from the swampy shores. The buildings
were primarily small structures, but the surrounding land had been cleared and the capital city
was beginning to take shape. Spindly trees and brush formed a green haze on the Potomac

Flats and on the rich flood plain of Tiber Creek, where vegetation had been planted to catch

g
e
2


7

208 | ENDNoTES


216 | BIBLIOGRAPHY

Specifications for Restoration of Flower Gardens and Summer House at Custis Lee Mansion Arlington County, Virginia,
National Park Service, National Capital Region, May 29, 1964.

Smith, Delos, “The Abingdon of Fairfax County,” Daughters of the American Revolution Magazine, June, 1929: 325-
330.

Smith, John (1580-1631), The True Travels, Adventures and Observations of Captain Jon Smith, Cambridge, England:
Cambridge University Press, 1908.

Smith, John, The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England and the Summer Isles, London: Printed by 1D. and 1.
H. for Michael Sparkes 1624, Cleveland: World Publishing Company 1966.

Snell, Charles W. Survey of Data Relating to the Physical History of the Custis Lee Mansion—Arlington House—From
the Master Files of the Park 1800-1867, National Park Service, Department of the Interior, February, 1979.

Snell, Charles W. Editor Harlan D.Unrau, Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, Virginia, George
Washington Memorial Parkway, Denver Service Center, Eastern Team, National Park Service, United States
Department of Interior, 1985.

Sobel, Mechal, The World they made Together: Black and White Values in Eighteenth-Century Virginia, Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1987.

Steele, Fletcher, “The Colonial Garden Today,” History of the George Washington Bicentennial Celebration Volume I,
Literature Series, United States George Washington Bicentennial Commission, Washington, D.C., 1932,

Stewart, Charles A., A Virginia Village, Falls Church, Va: Falls Church Village Preservation and Improvement
Society, 1985, reprint of 1904 edition.

Stevenson, Brenda E., Life in Black and White: Family and Community in the Slave South, New York: Oxford
University Press, 1996.

Stetson, Charles W., Four Mile Run Land Grants, Westminster, MD: Familyline Publications, 2nd edition, 1994.

Sweig, Donald, Northern Virginia Slavery: A Statistical and Demographic Investigation, Dissertation Presented to the
Faculty of the Department of History, College of William and Mary, 1982.

Swinton, William, History of the Seventh Regiment, New York, Boston: Fields, Osgood and Co., 1870,

‘Trachtenberg, Marvin and Isabelle Hyman, Architecture from Prebistory to Post Modernism, New York: Harry N.
Abrams, Inc., 1985.

Trowbridge, John F, The South: A Tour of its Battlefields and Ruined Cities, Hartford, Conn,; L, Stebbins, 1866.

Trollope, Anthony, North America, edited by Robert Mason, first published 1862, Harmondsworth, England,
Baltimore, Maryland: Penquin Books, 1968.

‘Truett, Randle Bond, Lee Mansion, Arlington Virginia, New York: Hastings House, 1943.
Tucker, Glenn, Robert E. Lee: Recollections and Vignettes, Harrisburg, PA: Eastern Acorn Press, 1983.

US Army Corps of Engineers Baltimore District, Archeological Monitoring: Electrical System Upgrade, Arlington
National Cemetery, Arlington County, Virginia, April 1991.


he chronology of the prehistoric development of land that became the Arlington

House estate in the nineteenth century must be extrapolated in part from a gener-

al account of the Middle Atlantic region. Though excavations have occurred on
the portion of the property called Arlington Woods (Section 29) and on lands adjacent to
Arlington National Cemetery, the scope of survey has been limited and therefore the exact use
of the property by prehistoric peoples is, as yet, not definite.’

The sequence of general prehistoric cultural development is divided into the periods
standard for the northern half of the eastern seaboard; the Paleo-Indian Period (ca. 10,000-
8,000 B.C), the Archaic Period (ca 8000-1200 BC) and the Woodland Period, which ends with
European colonization in 1608.’ This chronology is augmented by a comparison of the pre-
historic land conditions with the environmental attributes conducive to American Indian set-
tlement. Finally, a discussion of the findings of recent excavations on the Arlington House
property will provide evidence of American Indian land use in specific locations.

The climate of the Paleo-Indian Period was characterized by cold winters and moist

summers. Early in the period, coniferous forests of spruce and pine were dominant. Later

5 This map illustrates the
intensity of prebistoric activity
within the area known as
Arlington Woods or Section
29. Based on a map from
Cultural Resource
Investigations at Section 29 of
Arlington House, The Robert
E. Lee Memorial, prepared
for the NPS by Garrow and
Associates, 1998.

Road c. 1861,
abandoned 1874

> LT opareocraimraanl DEDIAN


to and from the capital. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it was the former home of the
leader of the Confederate Army, Robert E. Lee. Montgomery Meigs, a prominent Washington
D.C. engineer and the Quarter Master General for the United States, assumed responsibility of

ordering the first interments. In response to Rucker's recommendation, General Meigs wrote

on June 15, 1864,

The Arlington mansion and the grounds immediately surrounding it are by the direction
of the Secretary of War appropriated for a Military Cemetery. The bodies of all soldiers
dying in the hospitals in the vicinity of Washington and Alexandria after the grounds now
at Alexandria are full will be interred in this cemetery. You will cause the grounds not
exceeding 200 acres to be immediately surveyed, laid out and enclosed for this purpose not
interfering with the grounds occupied by the freedman's camp—I enclose a sketch showing
the form and location . .. Mr. Edward Clark will act as Architect and Engineer of the
Cemetery having accompanied me this morning on an inspection of the grounds he will be

able to point out the portion of the grounds in which internment should be immediately

commenced.*8

VIRGINIA
Soreeya Ges: BLE Maly Gan CA
he

bw x.cuase suey

ARLINGTON
Pata scm prvane

“Cheha:

Library of Congress

This U.S. Coast Survey map
was commissioned by General
Montgomery C. Meigs at the
creation of the National
Cemetery at Arlington in late
spring of 1864.

1861-1865 | 85



88 Arlington National

Cemetery Virginia. Plan for

Work to be Done at Lee

Mansion. August 16, 1923

3
é
2

Arlington House Archives

142 |

1929 - 2001

As part of the General Scheme for the Progressive Improvements to the National Cemetery,
submitted in October 1923 by the Quartermaster Generals Office, plans were drawn up detail-
ing the work to be done to the grounds immediately west of the mansion.3 Greenleaf con-
ducted the Commission’s review of the cemetery development plan. The proposal for the area
immediately west of Arlington House called for the removal of all the Victorian iron vases and
the existing concrete paving which encircled the house. New concrete walks were to be con-
structed by the army to provide access to the slave quarters, the newly built comfort station,
and the mansion.* In the 1923 plan, as in the 1921 plan upon which it was based, visitor access
and landscape aesthetics formed the two central components. For instance, according to the
plan, thick plantings were to be arranged to screen the recently rebuilt comfort station and the
pedestrian paths. Whether Greenleaf had any role in developing the 1923 plans for the yard
area of Arlington House is not known.

James Greenleaf (1857-1933) was a member of the Commission of Fine Arts from 1918
to 1927. Though well-known for his design of the private estates of the wealthy in New Jersey,
Connecticut and Long Island, through the 1920s he increasingly became involved in high pro-
file, public projects such as the Arlington House restoration. As he did at Arlington, Greenleaf
emphasized clarity of line and simplicity in vegetative palette in many of his landscape
designs.’ In addition to the attention devoted to the landscape by Greenleaf and other design-
ers, the structures of Arlington House were also receiving the notice of professionals. Only a
year after the development plans were created for Arlington National Cemetery, architect
Gilbert L. Rodier wrote an article for Architectural Forum Magazine, detailing the architec-
tural evolution of Arlington House. Within the article he included the first known measured


years of varied use. South of Arlington House, the garden with its center punctuated by the
‘Temple of Fame, was dotted with bright beds of annual flowers and ornamental grasses.
During the summer, along its eastern border a row of roses obscured the gravestones of the
Civil War officers. From the Temple of Fame, the Monument to the Unknown Civil War
Soldier was visible within the shadows of tall oaks and elms. The concrete paths through the
garden and around the monument’s base were little altered from the design of fifty years
before. From the Temple of Fame the view to Washington was framed by deciduous trees
located down the slope east of the garden. Between the garden and the southern slave quar-
ters, an asphalt road connected the old carriage drive east of the mansion with Sherman Drive
to the west. Concrete scored to resemble granite pavers completely surrounded Arlington
House, with only a few open spaces allowing for planting near the buildings. The largest open-
ing in the paving, located to the west of the mansion, contained the enormous deodor cedar
with branches reaching out horizontally across the yard. The large brick water tower installed
next to the cedar in 1881, had been removed around 1916 and in its place was a cast iron vase
and four large boxwoods planted at equal intervals around the circular island bed. A narrow
band of ground had been left open encircling the slaves quarters to allow for the ivy and trum-
pet vine that clung to the walls of the two outbuildings. Along the east fagade of the house,
large magnolia trees and the few shrubs that could survive in the ever increasing shade, con-
cealed the northern and southern wings. Five circular clumps of ornamental grasses and a row
of annuals punctuated the crest of the slope in front of the portico. A concrete path led to and
around the Sheridan grave from the concrete drive that passed in front of the house. A plant-
ing of evergreens surrounded the flag staff, which still rose from a knoll in front of Arlington
next to the tombs of L’Enfant, Wright and Sheridan. In what had once been the eastern half
of the kitchen garden, a large green house stood on the earthen terrace. A grape arbor ran
along the eastern edge of this terrace to screen the greenhouse from the steps of the Custis
Walk, located below and to the east. As part of an official cemetery plant nursery, the western
half of the former nineteenth-century kitchen garden was lined with neat rows of seedlings
acclimating to the natural elements before being planted out in the cemetery. The concrete
path that led from the yard area west of the house past the comfort station to this utilitarian
area was lined with a low hedge of boxwood.!!

According to the minutes of the Commission of Fine Arts, the findings of the restora-
tion committee’s site analysis were unanimous. They suggested that a heating plant be con-
structed adjacent to the existing public comfort station to replace the heating system inside
Arlington House. They firmly recommended, as previously proposed in the 1920s, that the
“granolithic walks and driveways” around Arlington House be removed and replaced with
gravel. Grass, the committee said, was to extend up to and around the entire building, except
for the area near the west entrances. The kitchen garden to the north of Arlington House was

to be restored in place of the greenhouse. A brick walk was to be located on the east side of

1929-2001 | 145


This proposed
landscape design,
with its symmetry,
brick sidewalks, box-
wood hedges, and
limited floral orna-
mentation was typi-
cal of the Colon-
ial Revival-style, a
design style whose
escalating nation-
wide popularity was engendered by the 1932 bicentennial celebration of George Washington’s
birth. Locally this anniversary was expressed in the construction of the Mount Vernon
Memorial Highway; a parkway stretching fifteen miles from Mount Vernon to Memorial
Circle, part of the design for Memorial Avenue, directly east of Arlington House. The park-
way, while planted with native swaths of vegetation and augmented with rustic guardrails, was
detailed with classical white signs ornamented with broken pediments. The design of
Arlington Memorial Bridge, which opened in 1932, also reflected the classical revival occur-
ring in Washington and elsewhere around the country. This movement was led by individuals
such as those who sat on the Commission of Fine Arts—schooled in the design principles of
the Ecole Beaux Arts.?!

‘To the artist of the Colonial Revival—whether with a medium of buildings, land or
canvas—beauty and use were to accompany each other always. Deriving from both the classi-
cal revival movement galvanized in Washington, D.C. by the McMillan Commission Plan of
1902 and the Arts and Crafts movement, illustrated in such horticulturally elaborate schemes as
Dumbarton Oaks and the residential designs of local landscape architect Rose Greeley, the
Colonial Revival style was widely represented during the 1920s and 30s along the east coast.
Whether the layout of the colonial revival garden could actually reproduce the exact design of
the specific garden in colonial times, was not of the utmost importance. The emphasis, as illus-
trated in such contemporaneous restorations as Colonial Williamsburg and Mount Vernon, was
on emulating the values and ideals thought to have been integral to the genesis of America. As
Arthur Shercliff, a landscape architect, wrote in an essay in The History of the George Washington
Bicentennial Celebration, “pleasure lay in a garden which showed man’s control of that wilderness
. . straight paths, hedges straight.” At Arlington, the paths that were created in the 1930s were
straight, as were the tightly trimmed boxwood hedges that lined the walks. In the same volume
Fletcher Steele, also a landscape architect, outlined the elements of the correct “colonial gar-
den.” ‘The service areas should be near together, all opening on the enclosed “yard” if possible.

Privacy, he noted, was of the utmost importance: “walls alternated with hedges and fences to

91 A view to Arlington
House, over the Arlington
Memorial Bridge, a few years
after bridge construction.
1939

1929-2001 | 149


the ferry near My Lord’s Island, to Falls Church (approximately in the same alignment as mod-
ern Wilson Boulevard) was called Awbry Road after Captain Awbry’s land holdings."

Like most mid-eighteenth century planters, Gerrard Alexander focused his efforts on
developing his land through farms worked by tenants and slaves. By 1760 he owned twenty-
four slaves and was one of the largest slave owners in the region. He also had six separate ten-
ant farms located on his property west of the route known as the Road to Alexandria. These
farmers may have been in addition to those identified living near the shores of the Potomac on
the earlier mid-seventeenth-century maps described above.*? Yet they may have been the
same, for tenants would often move within a property as the thin, sandy, alluvial soils of the
uplands that surrounded the rivers lost fertility quite quickly without active soil improvement.
Though it is not known what crops were grown by these specific tenant farmers, broader pat-
terns of agricultural development in the region reveal the context in which Alexander’s tenants
farmed.

By the mid-eighteenth century the cost and upset of the French and Indian War, in com-

10 This detail of an inter-
pretive map of Fairfax
County, Virginia in 1760 by
Beth Mitchell, illustrates the
land ownership and the loca-
tions of tenant farmers on the
land that was to become the
Arlington House estate.

14 | 1608 - 1802

bination with low tobacco prices
and increasingly depleted soil,
had depressed the Virginia colo-
nial market.* Earlier in the cen-
tury, though the overall output of
tobacco was increasing due to the
increased acreage under cultiva-
tion, the stagnating land produc-
tivity and the increasing cost of
slave labor intensified the effects
of the low economic return on
tobacco exports to England and
through England, to Europe.
For instance, in the 1730s and
1740s the demand for slaves had
increased in Virginia. The small-
er farms were consolidated into
larger farms to attempt to make a
profit even as the tobacco prices
fell. More slaves were needed to
work the larger farms. The
increased demand caused the
price per slave to rise substantial-

ly.* Therefore while tobacco

prices were cheap, slaves were


2
z
B

Office of National Parks, Buildings and Reservations, formally requested that Colonel Charles
G. Mortimer of Arlington National Cemetery continue in direct oversight of the restoration.
A third of the amount was allocated towards painting the interior and exterior of the buildings
and the planned replacement of the wooden steps on the east, north and south sides of the por-
tico with steps of stone. ‘The remaining money was to go to the restoration of the kitchen gar-
den and some “minor improvement to walks, gravel drives and grass plats on the mansion
grounds.”38 At the transfer of lands from the Department of War to the National Park Service
in 1933, military officials had expressed concern that the National Park Service would not
know how to adequately address the management needs of military sites. In response, admin-
istrators at the Department of Interior had assured officials at the Department of War that
appropriate military personnel would be consulted on projects concerning these former mili-
tary, now park, lands.3? Not only did the National Park Service have no legal jurisdiction over
the property surrounding Arlington House, they were not in a position to impose varied use
standards or restoration plans. Therefore the physical manifestation of the National Park
Service’s administration of Arlington House on the landscape was minimal for at least the first
few years. For the twenty-two thousand visitors who came to the grounds in March of 1934,
perhaps to take a look at the beginning recreation of the kitchen garden, the officers of the
War Department and the cemetery employees were the most visible management presence.

Early in 1934, the large circa 1880 greenhouse was removed from the kitchen garden,

though the brick pot-
ting house remained
in the northeast cor-
ner of the garden
space, Now that the
restoration of
Arlington House was
almost completed, the
army was no longer
allowed to use its
rooms for manage-
ment. The reproduc-
tion stable building
built circa 1907 on
the footprint of the
early nineteenth century stables to the west of Arlington House was converted into the admin-
istrative offices for the staff of the cemetery. The walk between the administration building
and the yard area of Arlington was bricked, visually connecting the brick walks of Arlington
House with that of the administrative area. The 1907 structure itself was rehabilitated with

96 The cemetery administra-
tion building was rehabilitat-
ed around 1935 with decora-
tive awnings. photograph,
6.1935

1929-2001 | 155


Coulling, Mary P., The Lee Girls, Winston Salem, NC: John F, Blair Publisher, 1987.

Custis, George Washington Park, Memoirs of Washington, by His adopted son George Washington Parke Custis, with a
memoir of the author, by his daughter. .. New York: Union Publishing House, 1859.

Dalzell, Robert F,, George Washington's Mount Vernon: At Home in Revolutionary America, New York: Oxford
University Press, 1998.

DeButts, Mary Custis Lee, Growing Up in the 1850s: The Journal of Agnes Lee, Chapel Hill: The University of
North Carolina Press, 1984.

Decker, Karl and Angus McSween, Historic Arlington: A History of the National Cemetery from its Establishment to the
Present Time... Washington: Decker and McSween Publishing Co., 1892,

Dicey, Edward, Six Months in the Federal States, London, 1863.
Dietrich, Richard V., Geology and Virginia, Charlottesville: The University Press of Virginia, 1970.
Dunham, Dorothy Lee, A History of Arlington County, Richmond, VA: The Dietz Press, Inc., 1946.

Dunlap, William, History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States, introduction by William P.
Campbell, New York: B. Blom reprint, 1965.

Emerson, Edward W., Life and letters of Charles Russell Lowell, captain Sixth United States Cavalry, colonel Second
Massachusetts Cavalry, Brigadier-General United States Volunteers, Port Washington, N.Y., Kennikat Press, 1971.

Emmons, Clark, History of the Seventh Regiment of New York, New York: The Seventh Regiment, 1890.

Evens, George C., editor, Visitors’ Companion at Our Nation's Capital: A Complete Guide for Washington and its
Environs et al, George G, Evans: Philadelphia, 1892.

Fox-Genoveses, Elizabeth, Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women of the Old South, Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press, 1988.

Friis Herman R., “Highlights of the Historical Geography and Cartography of Arlington County and Contiguous
Areas of Virginia: Prior to 1870” Arlington Historical Magazine 4, 1971, no 3; 21-34.

Froncek, Thomas, editor, An Ilustrated History of the City of Washington, Junior League of Washington, Wings
Books: New York, 1977.

Frye, Keith, Roadside Geology of Virginia, Missoula: Mountain Press Publishing Company, 1986.

Gage, Charles Ellsworth, Tobacco, Tobacco hogsheads and Rolling Roads in Northern Virginia Falls Church, VA: Falls
Church Historical Commission, 1959.

Garrow, Patrick H., Heather Mills, Jeff Holland, Todd Cleveland and Bill Nethery, Cultural Investigations at Section
29 Arlington House: The Robert E, Lee Memorial, submitted to Planning Division, Baltimore District, U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers, September, 1998, Garrow and Associates Inc., September 1998.

Gates, Isabel Likens, “Abingdon is Now But a Memory,” District of Columbia Edition-American Motorist, May 1930:
61, 94.

BIBLIOGRAPHY | 211


1865 - 1880



147A

PAIRRIAT&S

CHAPTER ONE

1 Only one temporally diagnostic artifact was discovered in the 1998 archeological study-a steatite sherd not asso-
ciated with the lithic extraction areas. It was dated to the late Archaic period. Patrick H Garrow, et al. Cultural
Investigations at Section 29 at Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, Arlington County, Virginia, (Atlanta, GA:
Garrow and Associates, Inc., September 1998): 145.

2 Garrow, et al: 8, The specific dates associated with the three developmental periods are highly controversial. For
instance, the dates of the Archaic period may vary as much as one thousand years, however the dates given are gen-
erally accepted.

3 Paul Cissna, Historical and Archeological Study of the George Washington Memorial Parkway, Arlington County,
Virginia, Occasional Report #4 Regional Archeology Program, National Capital Region, (National Park Service,
Washington, D.C., 1990): 6.

4 Garrow, et al.: 8.

5 Joseph R. Dent, Chesapeake Bay Prehistory: Old Traditions, New Directions, (Unpublished Manuscript, 1988): 59, in
Cissna, 1990: 6,

6 For further discussion into the lack of Paleo-Indian sites in Virginia in general see, E Randolph Turner, IIT
“Paleoindian Settlement Patterns and Population Distribution in Virginia,” in Paleoindian Research in Virginia: A
Synthesis, J. Mark Wittkofski and Theodore R. Reinhart, Editors, (Richmond, VA: Archeological Society of
Virginia); 1989.

7 Daniel L. Mouer. “Formative Transition in Virginia” in Late Archaic and Early Woudland Research in Virginia: A
Synthesis, edited by Theodore R. Reinhart and Mary Ellen N. Hodges, pp 1-88, as quoted in Garrow, et al.: 11.

8 Garrow et al., 145.
9 Cissna, 7.

10 Garrow et al., 11.
1 Tid.

2 Ibid, 13.

3 For a description of various existing archeological sites in Arlington County, see Paul Cissna's National Park
Service Report, Historical and Archeological Study of the George Washington Memorial Parkway. 1990. Two known pre-
historic sites are located on Theodore Roosevelt Island and listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
According to contemporary scholars further research is needed to support the identification of the villages. In addi-
tion, Proudfit (1889) identified a village site on the north side of what is now the Pentagon. This site has most like-
ly been destroyed.

\4 Cissna, The Piscataway Indians of Southern Maryland: An Ethnobistory from Pre-Europeun contact to the Present, Ph.D.
Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, American University, Washington, D.C. 1986: 111. Stephen R. Potter,
“The Indians of Seventeenth Century Fairfax” Fairfax Chronicles: A History, Archaeology and Preservation
Newsletter, 7(4): 1, 3-4.

15 Stephen R. Potter., 4a Analysis of Chicocoan Settlement Patterns. Ph.D. Dissertation, (Department of
Anthropology, University of North Carolina: Chapel Hill, North Carolina), 1982: 360 in Cessna, 1990: 7.


21 The beaux-arts style gets its name from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts academy in France. The objectives of the archi-
tectural and design program where many. Primarily, however, architects trained in the Beaux-Art attempted to
establish universal architectural ideals through the study of the five classical orders. Human movement through
space was to define the volume and form of the architecture as much as the ordered scheme of the design, often
reflecting function or status. Marvin Trachtenberg and Isabelle Hyman. Architecture from Prehistory to Post
Modernism. (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc 1985), 445, 455.

22 Fletcher Steele, History of the George Washington Bicentennial Celebration. “The Colonial Garden Today.” Volume
Il, Literature Series. United States George Washington Bicentennial Commission. Washington, D.C. 1932.

23 Bash to Moore, January 18, 1932. CFA archives.

24 Charles Moore, Chairman Commission of Fine Arts to General DeWitt, April 24, 1931. CFA archives.
25 James Greenleaf to Charles Moore, July 2, 1931. Moore to General DeWitt, April 24, 1931. ARHO.
26 CFA meeting minutes March 22, 1930. CFA archives.

27 Charles Moore to General Bash, March 21, 1930. CFA meeting minutes. CFA archives.

28 Arlington National Cemetery, Restoration of Arlington Mansion study for Drives, Walks, and Planting around Mansion
and on sites of Old Flower and Vegetable Garden. 1930.

29 Report dated July 5, 1931. ARHO.
30 Washington Star. July 5, 1931.
31 Charles Moore to General Bash, January 25, 1932. CFA files.

32 Executive Order No. 6166 of June 10, 1933 as interpreted by Executive Order No 6228 of July 23, 1933. (HSR,
120 and 134-135). This executive order consolidated all federally-administered parks, monuments and reservations
under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service, abolishing the Office of Public Buildings and Parks of the
National Capital.

33 Moore to President F.D.R., January 25, 1933. CFA archives.
34 Harold I. Ickes, Secretary of the Interior to Charles Moore, February 2, 1934. ARHO, CFA archives.

35 Resolution 180 “Resolution on Arlington Lee Mansion.” ARHO. Transfer from War Dept to NPS. April 3,
1939, Public No 19-76 Congress Chapter 36, Ist Session (H.R. 4425).

36“The Lee Mansion.” The Washington Post. Editorial Page. June 27, 1939.
37 Fairfax Downey, “Arlington.” Field Artillery Journal, May-June 1939.
38 Department of Interior, Memorandum for the Press. Release for November 10, 1933. ARHO.

39 Report on “restoration in part of the kitchen garden on north side of the mansion as contemplated in the origi-
nal study, improvement of the trees, walks planting and grass plots” J. L. DeWitt to Director, National Parks,
Buildings and Reservations. Oct 2, 1933. ARHO.

40 Plant nursery receipt, dated January 23, 1935. ARHO.

41 National Park Service. “Estimate of September 30, 1933.” July 9, 1934. ARHO.

ENDNOTES

| 205




By the winter of 1935, the restoration of the kitchen garden had been declared complete.*!
The presence of flowers in the kitchen garden is not surprising. Flowers were an impor-

tant part of the interpretation of the Custis-Lee Mansion, as it was then called, both inside and

outside the house.
Inside, bouquets
were used daily to
reinforce the idea
that the family had
simply “stepped
out for a moment.”
Outside, the im-
portance of the
flower garden to
Mrs. Custis and
Mrs. Lee was
emphasized. The

re-creation of the

g
3
<
z
2

flower garden to
the south of the house, though planned since the late 1920s, had always been considered more
problematic than the re-creation of the kitchen garden. Even though the National Park
Service did not own the land of either area, north or south of the mansion, they included the
kitchen garden plans in the 1930 treatment of the site. The flower garden restoration had
been tabled for want of further study. In addition, to restore the flower garden required the
removal of the Temple of Fame, still a sore point with some. Therefore, due to the inability
of the National Park Service to restore the flower garden, flowers gradually came to replace
many of the vegetables in the kitchen garden.

Regardless of the grand landscape plans proposed by the army in 1932 for the treatment
of the flower garden and the Tomb of the Unknown Civil War Soldier, the flat terrace south
of Arlington House remained simply a stretch of turf punctuated with the Temple of Fame.
Though the National Park Service requested $17,000 to finance the flower garden “restora-
tion” with picket fences, marble seats, a fountain, and plants in 1935, no funding was allocat-
ed.*? Perhaps to alleviate some of the skepticism, shortly around the time that the funding was
denied, a wide sandstone slab walkway was installed around the ‘Tomb of the Unknown Civil
War Soldier, replacing the simple concrete sidewalks that had formerly encircled the sarcoph-
agus.43 According to National Park Service records, during the summer of 1936, there were
over one million visitors to Arlington House to view the new restored buildings and landscape.
That year new white and green painted signs were prepared to guide visitors’ passage along
the brick walks.#

98 The kitchen garden filled
with flowers and fruit trees,
6.1933

1929-2001 | 157


19 Mary Fitzhugh Custis at
21 years old in 1809,

a year after the birth of her
daughter Mary Custis

20 George Washington
Parke Custis, ¢.1809

38 | 1802 - 1861

conformed perfectly to the design aesthetics generated in Britain during the end of the eigh-
teenth century.

With at least the concept of the overall design understood, Custis’s original two story
house was altered during the construction of the southern wing, so that the facades of the
buildings matched.*? Like the capital across the Potomac, Arlington House was built in stages
and not finished until 1818. The design and construction of Arlington House, though unique
in architectural design, was not completely without precedent. About ten years previously,
John Mason had began construction on a large Neoclassical home on Analostan Island, just
north of Custis’s property. Whether Hadfield drew inspiration from this structure is not
known. But there are similarities between the Mason mansion and the structure that was to
become Arlington. Like Arlington, the Mason house had large arched windows on the front
facade and was covered in a light-colored pebble-dash stucco. The house also had a portico
of the Doric or Tuscan order on the front facade, though not as enormous as at Arlington.5°
Like Custis’s plantation home, Mason’s mansion was sited to capture views and was construct-
ed in stages.5! In fact, only the central section and west wing of the Mason mansion’s five-part
pavilion design were ever completed.

On July 7, 1804, almost two years to the day after he first moved to Mount Washington,
Custis married Mary Lee Fitzhugh. Mary Fitzhugh, then sixteen, had grown up at Chatham
in Stafford County, Virginia. The main house of Chatham, a fifteen hundred acre estate, was
sited on a plateau defined
by steep ravines to the
north and south. Three
large terraces descended
down the western slope
which faced the
Rappahanock River. 52
Mary’s father, William
Fitzhugh, Jr., also owned

the nine thousand acre

2
H
zg
Fe
i
2

estate of Ravensworth,
south of Arlington in Fairfax County. During her marriage to Custis, after William Fitzhugh
constructed a large home at Ravensworth, Mary often visited. She inherited a portion of the
property through her father’s estate, and later additional property following her brother's
death.5} Interestingly, like Arlington, Ravensworth was approached through an “oak park.” It
is not known whether Mary gardened as a young girl or had any influence on the design of the
landscape at Chatham or Ravensworth, however her role in the development and care of the
gardens and grounds of Arlington is firmly established. Both Mary and her daughter, Mary
Randolph Custis born in 1808, were deeply involved in the design, care and organization of
the flower and vegetable gardens and to a slightly lesser extent-the entire Arlington Estate.




A great variety of figures may be indulged in for the flower-beds. Some choose oval or cir-
cular forms, others squares . . . and intersected winding gravel walks . . . and it should be

so situated to form an ornamental appendage to the house.'\2

Bridgeman also provides an early description of the proper arrangement of a mixed perennial
border, stating that “there is no part of gardening which requires so much elegance of taste

and fancy.” 113

34 The flower garden arbor
of the Custis-era flower
garden remained on the prop-
erty until the 1880s,
Stereoscopic card, ¢.1870

56 | 1802 - 1861

The flower garden’s
principal walk at Arlington
was most likely of gravel
and was approximately six
feet wide. The path went in
a straight line north to
south through the garden.
The path, narrowed to four
feet wide, passed through a
wooden arbor located in the
center of the garden.
Wooden benches curved
around the inside of the
arbor. Lattice work extend-
ed from the roof of the
arbor to the base on all six
sides of the hexagonal
shaped structure. Vines,
including yellow flowering

jasmine, and red and pink

i
4
e
&
a
:
E
5

honeysuckle covered most
of the woodwork throughout the summer. Brief descriptions of the arbor by Lee family mem-
bers and post-Civil War photographs, suggest that the structure was fairly simple, serving to
provide shade and a resting place, as well as an ornament for the embellishment of the garden.
In 1930 the former landscape gardener from the cemetery, David.H. Rhodes, described the
arbor as he remembered it, revealing more clues to its design. The woodwork, according to
Rhodes, was “of ordinary posts and lumber for the main structure, but the lattice work was of
dressed and painted wood. The top or roof of the arbor had a somewhat concave curved out-
line to a small central point at top.”!!4 According to two women who had been slaves at the
Arlington estate “two large magnolia trees, white and pink, were growing near to the center

and a good deal of box and shrubbery was located at the back” of the garden as well.!!5 Long



8 | 1608 - 1802

Indians did make some changes to their environment as illustrated through archeological exca-
vation and the documentation of contemporaneous cultures, such as noted in John Smith’s
published works. In the quote below, Smith describes the Algonquian long house, inadver-

tently revealing elements of contemporary English landscape design in his comparison.

Their houses are built like our Arbors of small young springs bowed and tyed and so close
covered with mats or the barkes of trees very handsomely, that notwithstanding either raine

or weather, they are as warm as stooves, but very smoaky.*

As would be true of later European settlements in Virginia, most Algonquian settlements

were located near the Potomac River, not far from fresh water springs. As Smith elaborated,

Their houses are in the midst of their fields or gardens which are small plots of ground.
Some twenty acres, some forty, some one hundred . . . In some places from two to fifty of
those houses together or but a little separated by groves of trees... .°

Within the primarily slash-and-burn agricultural subsistence economy of the tidewater
Algonquians, many varieties of maize, beans, squash, pumpkins, gourds, sunflowers and tobac-
co were grown. The Indians cleared wooded land for growing crops by removing bark from
the lower trunks and scorching the trees in the exposed area to quickly kill them. Some of the
dead trees were removed to provide planting space, while others were left standing to help pre-
vent soil erosion." When fields suffered nutrient depletion over time, Virginian Algonquians
cleared more forest. Two primary types of fields were created and maintained for crops. The
larger fields ranged from twenty to two hundred acres and were most often planted with maize
and less often with beans. The smaller gardens, from 100 to 200 feet per side, contained such
plants as squash, pumpkins and sunflowers and were located near the individual long houses.
In addition, the Indians made use of native plant and animal species to supplement their diet.
Two of the many plants pointed out by Smith in his writings were mulberries and grapes.
Though, according to Smith, such species were never “pruned nor manured” by the
Algonquians, this tree and vine respectively were often found growing successfully close to
dwellings." These two species would have significance in the later development of the plan-
tations and market gardens of eighteenth and nineteenth-century Virginia. Woods surround-
ing the Algonquian villages would often be clear of all underbrush due to the need for fire-

wood.” As Smith noted with admiration,

Near their habitations is little small wood or old trees on the ground . . . so that a man may
gallop a horse amongst these woods any way."


Both the slaves whose primary work was located in the house, yard and gardens—including
Selina Gray, George Clarke, Eleanor Harris, Perry Parks, Daniel and Ephriam—and most of
the slaves whose quarters were down on the farm, remained on the Arlington Estate.!9 Some
assisted the federal soldiers with tasks such as washing and cooking, while others continued
with agricultural work. Though they were “left with a month's provisions” according to the
journalist, most stayed on the estate for at least another year which required the production of
food.!! On the farm, about fifty slaves remained in the quarters at least through 1862 and most
likely continued to garden in their family vegetable plots as much as their situation allowed.!2
This type of self-sufficiency was common on plantations throughout Northern Virginia dur-
ing the war. For instance, slaves at Mount Vernon supported themselves after the abandon-
ment of the property by its owners through growing vegetables and selling firewood.!3 The
slave families at Arlington faced perhaps a greater challenge in their daily interactions with the
soldiers occupying the estate.

At the end of May, Brigadier General Irvin McDowell, in charge of the newly-named
Army of the Potomac, took over the tent headquarters set up by General Sandford just south

of the mansion at Arlington. Prior to the war, McDowell had been good friends with the Lee

39 As revealed in this view
east from Arlington House,
even during the Civil War,
many of the trees of the pic-
turesque Park were retained,
June 1864.

74 | 1861 - 1865

family and now he wrote to assure Mary Lee that her property would be protected.!+
Improvements to the military post continued. Within weeks a telegraph line, connecting
Arlington with Washington, was set up on wooden poles that descended down the east-facing
slope through the Park.!5 McDowell was anxious to know the exact situation of fortifications
within the territory occupied by the federal Army, therefore he commissioned the U.S. Coast
Survey to create a map of the District of Columbia and northern Virginia illustrating the forts,

batteries and roads then under construction.!6 Fresh from the Union army's repulsed attack

3
3
g
z



ILLUSTRATIONS

..Location map

Contextual boundaries map

..Map showing intensity of prehistoric activity within the area known as Arlington Woods. Based on a map
from Cultural Resource Investigations at Section 29 of Arlington House the Robert E. Lee Memorial The
Robert E. Lee, prepared for the NPS by Garrow and Associates, 1998. National Capital Region (NCR)
Cultural Landscape Program

..George Town and Federal City, or City of Washington drawn by George Beck, engraved by T. Cartwright.
Published Junel, 1801 by Atkins and Nightingale. Prints and Photographs, Library of Congress

Survey Plat of the Alexander Tract. Fairfax County March 31, 1746, George Washington Memorial
Parkway (GWMP) Natural Resource Files

Abingdon, 1929, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress

urvey of Alexander Tract, Daniel Jenings, Surveyors, September 4, 1750, GWMP Natural Resource
Files

Interpretive map of Fairfax County Virginia in 1760 by Beth Mitchell, GWMP Natural Resource Files

‘The Washington Family," painting by Edward Savage, c.1796. Mount Vernon Ladies Association of the
Union

..George Washington Park Custis, 1795, Robert Edge Pine, Courtesy of the Mount Vernon Ladies
Association of the Union

13 .,..sssssed Map of the City of Washington in the District of Columbia established as the permanent Seat of the Government
of the United States of America taken from actual survey as laid out on the ground, Robert King, Surveyor of
the City of Washington, 1818, Geography and Maps, Library of Congress

..Map of estates associated with the lives of the Custis and Lee families, National Capital Region Cultural

Landscape Program, 2001

‘East front of Mount Vernon,” painting attributed to Edward Savage, c.1792, Mount Vernon Ladies
Association of the Union

‘Vaughan Plan," by Samuel Vaughan, 1787, Mount Vernon Ladies Association of the Union

Sketch of Arlington House, John Farley, 1824, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, Virginia

Sketch of Mason estate on Analostan Island, c.1820, artist unknown, Prints and Photographs Division,
Library of Congress

ILLUSTRATIONS | x1


after the Lees had left Arlington, Elizabeth Calvert painted an image of a moment in the gar-

dens through her remembrances.

Is it at the touch of memory only that flowers bloom here in such exquisite perfection, or did
the yellow jasmine from its raised arbor in the center of the garden send forth a wide spread

fragrance and shower its countless trumpet shaped flowers down? Did the encircling bed of
daily roses send their offering of perfume in the air from their brilliant blooms, did the
pines in points of the garden beds shade masses and masses of lily of the valley from which
we gather in lavish quantities beauty and fragrance, did hyacinths, tulips, tall lilies all the
‘beauties of sisterhood’ bloom in unconstrained delight?\\6

Yet the flower garden was not simply a place of beauty. Instead it served to forward both
the political and the social beliefs of the Lee and Custis women. Slavery, as a social institution
and as an economic practice, played an integral role in the development of the flower garden
in many ways, some more obvious than others. While both Mary Custis and Mary Lee over-
saw much of the organization and design of the flower garden, the slaves did much of the actu-
al horticultural work. As Mildred Lee, the youngest daughter, recollected,

My mother spent hours bere, digging, weeding and directing “Old George,” little George,
Uncle Ephraim, Billy and swarms of small Ethiopians. I can see her now with a white
sun-bonnet hanging down her back! Visitors from Washington, Alexandria, Georgetown,
always ended by a stroll in the gardens,'\7

Moreover, it was through the selling of bouquets and garlands of yellow jasmine flowers that
Mary Custis and Mary Lee helped to fund the American Colonization Society.!!8

The American Colonization Society had been formed in 1817 to address the issue of
slavery in American society. The objective of the organization was to transport free African
Americans, and/or those slaves manumitted by their owners, from the United States to the
coast of Africa to form a colony.!!9 A predicted corollary effect of the emigration, and one pro-
moted by the society, was the diffusion of American democracy and Christianity throughout
the continent. In the early years of the Colonization Society, G.W.P. Custis believed strong-
ly in its doctrines.!2° However, by the 1840s and 1850s he had become disillusioned with their
validity as a method of solving the problem of slavery in southern society—though these were,
in fact, the years of the Colonization Society’s greatest influence.

In Virginia, members of the Colonization Society were primarily women of the gentry
class-connected to one another by kin, class and location. Many had been involved in and
influenced by the early nineteenth-century evangelical movement that had occurred within the

Presbyterian and Episcopal churches. Mary Custis and Mary Lee, both Episcopalian, embod-

1802-1861 | 57


I hope you have been able to sow the oats, clover seed and that the garden is advanced . . .
. you might clean up that part of the Park, just after entering the gate. Cut down the bri-
ars and small stuff with the briar scythes, and clean up the swamp and open the ditch. It
will improve the appearance of things and make it more healthy.'40

Lee believed that, in order to ensure that his daughters received their monetary inheri-
tance and the slaves
their freedom in the
allotted time, he
needed to improve
the efficiency of
Arlington.
Therefore he rented
out a relatively large
number slaves to
other estates, at least
one from every slave

family at Arlington,

3
2
ag
z
2

except for Thornton
and Selina Gray’s
and Margaret and Billy Taylor’s.!41 Such upheaval in the relatively stable familial relationships
within the slave community at Arlington, perhaps coupled with increased demands, resulted in
a number of slaves running away between 1858 and 1861. Abolitionists, in northern newspa-
pers and in person, urged the slaves to leave Arlington as well. Lee, not wanting to lose valu-
able property and perhaps burdened by the costs of jail and sheriff fees, took some slaves south
to the other plantations.!#2 Lee also made changes in other aspects of the estate management.
In the summer of 1859, he improved the buildings and grounds at Arlington Spring and then
leased it to a concessionaire. Fortunately, visitors to the spring kept coming, even without
G.W.P. Custis, the “patriarchal proprietor.”!43 On July 4, 1860, ten thousand people attend-
ed the Fourth of July celebration.'44 Lee faced many difficulties even after the financial
accounts of the White House and Romancock plantations were settled, for Arlington had rel-
atively few resources to enable it to be a self-sufficient farm. In July1860, Lee wrote to his son
in frustration:

It does not aggrieve me to tell you that it will take a stronger man than I am to supply
funds for the wants at Arlington, [and] the White House if this state of things is to con-
tinue. When will it end?\45

36 By 1864, the graves of
Mary Fitzhugh Custis and
George Washington Parke
Custis were marked by
significant monuments.

Te

1802-1861 | 63


62 “Restoration of Flower Garden”, Custis-Lee Mansion, National Capital Office, National Park Service, February
19, 1964. ARHO.

6 Statement of Representative Joel ‘T. Broyhill of Virginia before the Library and Memorials Subcommittee,
Committee on House Administration in support of HR 10595, 92nd Congress April 11, 1972. Public Law 92-333
Approved June 30, 1972. Copy in National Capital Region Reservation Files.

64 Land Record No. 742. Arlington House. May 15, 1975. ARHO. Transfer and Acceptance of Military Real
Property dated 10/21/1975. National Capital Region Reservation Files. 63 Stat. 384, as amended, 40 U.S.C. 483.

65 Receipt for vegetation. Dansville, New York. April 30, 1971. ARIIO.

66 Transfer and Acceptance of Military Real Property. Form DD 1354 Transfer Authority, Letter dated 4 November
1981, National Capital Region Reservation Files.

67 Audrey Calhoun, Superintendent George Washington Memorial Parkway to Jennifer Hanna, Historical
Landscape Architect, National Capital Region, July 1, 1999.

68 “National Park Service, Briefing Statement for the House Subcommittee Hearings, George Washington
Memorial Parkway, Section 29 Land Transfer to Arlington National Cemetery, January 20, 2000. Garrow, Patrick
H., Heather Mills, Jeff Holland, Todd Cleveland and Bill Nethery. U. $. Army Corps of Engineers. (North
Carolina: Garrow and Associates Inc.) September 1998.

69 Matt Virta, Cultural Resource Manager, George Washington Memorial Parkway to Jennifer Hanna, Historical
Landscape Architect, National Capital Region, August 8, 2001.

ENDNOTES,

| 207


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Cultural Landscape Report for Arlington House is the result of the efforts, insight, and
encouragement of numerous individuals and the cooperation of many institutions. The staff of
Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial were knowledgeable and supportive throughout
the research and writing of this document. Invaluable to the project were Mary Mallen,
(Former) Site Manager; Karen Bryne, Historian; Collen Curry, Curator; Delphne Gross, Park
Ranger; Matt Penrod, Park Ranger; and Frank Curcurullo, Supervisory Park Ranger.

The staff of George Washington Memorial Parkway never failed to provide assistance and guid-
ance as well through their wiliness to address questions and their detailed review of
document drafts. I am very grateful to Superintendent Audrey Calhoun; Assistant
Superintendent, Dottie Marshall; Dan Sealy, Resource Manager; Matt Virta, Cultural Resource
Manager; and Adam Badowski, Maintenance Worker Supervisor.

The project benefited through the sensitive review of the draft Cultural Landscape Report by
many staff of the National Capital Region (NCR), including, Darwina Neal, Chief of Cultural
Resources; Stephen Potter, Regional Archeologist; and Rebecca Stevens, Regional Historical
Architect.

A special thanks to Erik Dihle, Horticulturist at Arlington National Cemetery, and Thomas
Sherlock, Cemetery Historian. Profound thanks is also given to Warren Miller, Director of the
Visual History Project at Arlington National Cemetery, whose photographs capture not only
the beauty of the cemetery, but the history behind it.

Many libraries and archives were instrumental in the research of Robert E. Lee and his
Arlington, Virginia home. My thanks to the many experts who assisted me in my quest to
uncover the past, including but not limited to, Henry Gawasda, archivist, at the National
Archives and Records Administration; Ingrid Kuffman, librarian at the Arlington County
Library; Dean Norton, the Director of Horticulture at Mount Vernon; and Bryan Green,
Associate Curator for Prints and Photographs at the Virginia Historical Society. In addition
many thanks to the Mount Vernon Ladies Association of the Union, for their generosity in
allowing the reproduction of their images within this document.

Finally, this Cultural Landscape Report would not have been possible without the support
of the NCR Cultural Landscape Program staff. My special thanks to Maureen Joseph, Regional
Historical Landscape Architect, whose expert guidance throughout the entire
project benefited the study immensely. Perry Wheelock, (Former) Landscape Historian for the
National Capital Region, whose detailed understanding of landscape history helped to shape
the document from the very beginning. Thank you to Kay Fanning, Historian, and Judith
Earley, Historical Landscape Architect, for listening patiently to my tales of the Lees and occa-
sional research woes. Your encouragement and advice was so helpful. My special thanks to Nick
Parash, Anna Dymek, and Liz Henderson, whose exceptional talents with both computer
graphics and pen and paper, are now legendary. The final production was dependent on the
impressive talents of Cindy Marcotty, Graphic Designer, who created the beautiful volume lay-
out. Thank you to all.

Jennifer Hanna
October 2001

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS | VII


Fort
Tillinghast

feedin,
a

Former overseer’s:
house and slave
cabins

mule stable

\

0 400 800 1600
|

SCALE | INCH= 800 FEET

Aiccandria-Georgetown Turnpike

a fat *

LEGEND
ag Shoreline

Boundary

Primary roads
7? Secondary roads
co gg” Alexandria Canal
e

LAA Tree line
A Arty temporary structures

@ Milicary tore

t Tomb of Mary Randolph

Custis graves
(] Farm buildings

B  Syphaxhome
&  Freedmen's Village
cemetery

LA) Spring Buitdings

Federal Army Corral Detail

Spring buildings
unknown use

epring Z

SOURCES:

Ewanews of Wastans Yon PREPARED PRON O@ENAL SURVEYS OF TE
ENGWEE? DEPARTHENT 1964-1866. SHEET § AND 8. NARA Il RECORD
Grour 77. F99, Casrocamic BRaNcn

ARLINGTON PARE STAMES, NARA II. RG 92. FollO SHEETS I-9

MEIGS MONTGOMERY C. PART OF ARLINGTON, Vinenes USS. Coast
SuRVEY. RESISTER NO. 1065. Ov FLe, LiBRARY OF ConsRESS, CaRToGRAnCC BRANCH,
Wasneveton 0.€

ToROGRAMicaL Map OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA SURVEYED IN THE
YEARS 1858-59 BY A. BOSCME PUBLISHED By O. MCCLELLAND, BLNciaRD AND MOH.
Wasnveren D.C. 1841. Liekagy oF Consness

CALL # GS850 1861 66 Vautr oversize

Commesrenweuce OF CUSTIS AND LEE F amiLy MEMBERS, 1861-65,
‘ARLNGION House ARCMYES, HisTORcAL SOCIETY OF VinGima, LIBRARY OF ConGRESS,
‘TuooR Puace, Was TOW D.C.

ap OF THE Gano OF OCCUPATION AND DEFENSE OF THE DIMSON OF THE US ARwY ei
‘Rea. 1 Connann oF Bias. GaN. Iw MeDomst. 1861 US. Coast SuRvey A.0. Bache
‘Surr, Fievo WORK EXECUTED OURNG PARTE OF JUNE AKO JULY I86I. NARA IL

Map oF Easreme Vinenaa 400 Viceary OF WasuN6rON. 1882 US. Army, CoRrs OF ENG:
NEERS. NARA I, Recono Geour 77, CaRrocmarwic BRancx

Lotae oF Amon ow NariovaL CEMETERY] WLUSTRATING LOCATION OF FRREDNEN'S VILLAGE |
AND OISOH—APIED MATELY IO ACRE PLOTS, 1868 PARTIAL COPY IM Har FILES, ARKO.

CORRESPONDENCE OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ARRY, QUARTERBLASTER GENERAL'S OFPIE,
NARA |, RG 92 ano ARHO AReHiVeS

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT
1861-1865

Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

B55/9090% |g fe


After breakfast, she [Mrs. Lee] went with William [Fitzhugh] to the spot where the pre-
cious remains were to be buried. She fixed upon one between the road to the park and the
gate. The gate opens into the road leading to the old school house.'3!

IMPROVEMENTS

Beginning in the 1850s, Custis became “seized with a spirit of improvement” at Arlington,
encouraged by the increasing returns from his Pamunkey estates.!32_ For as he said to his
White House farm manager, William Nelson, in 1854, the White House wheat crop was the
best he had seen in his 52 years of farming.!33 The success of the crops, coupled with the
strong commodities market in Europe and South America, increased the prosperity of the
Custis household. He ordered guano and clover seed and plaster of Paris to increase the soil
fertility.3+ New steps were built on the portico, and hexagonal bricks were made for its floor.
Arlington Mill was also repaired. The railroad was being built through Romancock and
though the immediate affect, according to Custis, was negative due to Custis’s donation of land
and the potential taking of his resources at the estate, the future prospects of benefit from the
railroads was great.

As the decade progressed Custis, now in his seventies, became increasingly ill. Mary Lee
began to take charge of necessary improvements to the estate. She had great faith in her son’s
agricultural ability, gently questioning the path taken by his father, Robert E. Lee.

There is great talk of an agricultural bureau at Washington to improve the science of agri-
culture. I hope by the time you come to be a farmer it will have done great things. I trust
soldiering a few years will content you my dear son. I think your father would have been
glad in the earlier years of his married life to exchange his profession for that of a farmer
if circumstances had permitted. Your grandpa says when I tell him so [that] “he would not
then have gained so much glory.” But I think his happiness is better than glory and the
anxiety we all suffered during his long absence in that fatal country which has been the
growth of so many officers and soldiers... "135

Yet, young Custis Lee was not old enough, nor did he desire to take over complete responsi-
bility of Arlington. Much fell instead to Mary Lee. About a week before her father’s death,
she wrote to inform her husband that,

The stable being pronounced unsafe, we have a carpenter here putting on a new roof ...
if I had one on to superintend, I would have had the whole stable rearranged which would
have been much more satisfactory, nor do I know enough of building to know if they are

doing it properly.136

1802-1861 | 61


168 |

1929 - 2001

ing was located, however, was retained by the Department of Army and leased to the NPS
under a renewable five-year permit. The administration building, the early twentieth-centu-
ry reproduction of the original stables building, had been transferred to the NPS: the parking
lot and the nearby structures remained under the ownership of the Department of Army.§7
Around Arlington House, the graveled area continued to be extended as the brick walks
around the slave quarters were removed. National Park Service signs were added. The his-
toric elm tree, once located at the center of the northern edge of the flower garden, having
succumbed to Dutch elm disease was replaced. Based on analysis of the 1864 photograph col-
lection by Andrew J. Russell, a Kentucky coffee tree was planted immediately south of the
southern wing of the house.

By the 1990s, the flower garden again needed rehabilitation. A plan was created and
implemented based on both research into the specific Custis and Lee-era flower garden and
flower gardens of the early nineteenth century. The garden design utilized existing trees and
some existing shrubs and perennials, while adding plant material. Due to safety concerns, the
remaining brick walks near the house, slave quarters, and comfort station, and through the
kitchen garden were removed. Memorial Amphitheater was restored by the Department of
Army. The use of Section 29, or the wooded area located to the west of Arlington House first
set aside for preservation in 1964 by the Secretary of War, was reconsidered as space for buri-
als. Officials of the Department of Army, realizing that the current land of Arlington National
Cemetery would be at burial capacity within ten years, approached officials of the National
Park Service with a proposal to allow burials in such portions of the wooded area as could be
determined not to have historical significance or archeological resources. On February 22,
1995, the Department of the Interior and the Department of the Army signed an interagency
agreement to transfer portions of Section 29 or Arlington Woods. A Cultural Resource
Investigations Report was written, in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act
and in satisfaction of the requirements of Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation
Act, and other legislation. The report detailed the existing cultural resources within the pri-
marily wooded 24.44 acre parcel. A draft environmental assessment was developed based on
the Cultural Resource Investigation Report and the environmental issues regarding the site.
Released for public review in June of 1999, a decision on the land transfer is still pending.

In 1999, the pea gravel covering the walks and drive ways surrounding Arlington House
was replaced with bank run gravel. In 2000, the fire-damaged administrative building built
in 1907 on the footprint of the Custis Lee stables was rehabilitated for use as administrative
offices for staff of Arlington House: The Robert E. Lee Memorial.



The survey which Quarter Master General Meigs had requested was begun immediate-
ly by staff under Albert D. Bache of the U. S. Coast Survey. The survey simply outlined the
existing conditions of the property, showing trees, fencelines, and estate buildings, and those
buildings constructed by the federal forces. There were no design suggestions made. A series
of photographs made in June of 1864 by Andrew J. Russell, at the time a photographer with
the United States
Military Construction
Corporation, docu-
mented the condition
of the Arlington prop-
erty and recorded in
detail the destructive
effects of wartime use.
In December of 1865,
Smith Lee, Robert E.
Lee's brother, visited

Arlington. Studying

au
s
=
S
4
s

the altered landscape,
he remarked that the house might still be used for a home if the officers’ graves from around
the flower garden were removed and the cemetery fenced off. This perhaps influenced Meigs
to continue the cemetery development around the mansion.>+ The following quote, from an
officer stationed at Arlington one year after its establishment as a cemetery, suggests that
Meigs was determined to ensure that United States retain the property. Meigs himself, how-

ever, never stated this rationale for his actions.

The Quartermaster General, some time ago, expressed his regret, that interments had not
been made in close proximity to the Arlington House so as to more firmly secure the grounds
known as Arlington cemetery to the Government by rendering it undesirable as a future

residence or homestead.55

The lawns and gardens of Arlington, neglected and trampled during the war by the thou-
sands of troops that camped and drilled on the slopes, gradually were repaired. The bare earth
was resodded, though patches of weeds blanketed areas where grass refused to grow.56 The
flower garden was enclosed again—this time with a narrow paling fence, white washed as
before the war. The forests were gone down by Arlington Spring near the Potomac, in the
vicinity of Fort Whipple to the north of the house, and by the unfinished Fort McPherson to
the south.5”? But most of the enormous trees that before the war provided the dramatic dark

53 Part of a series of photo-
graphs taken by Andrew
Russell, a photographer with
the United States Military
Construction Corporation
who documented the landscape
of Arlington when it was offi-
cially declared a national
cemetery, about a month after
the first military burials.

This image is probably of the
northeast corner of the area
then defined as the cemetery,
currently Section 27.

1861-1865 | 87



ei

They cannot take away the remembrances of the spot, [Arlington], and the memories of
those that to us rendered it sacred. That will remain with us as long as life will last and
that we can preserve.!

Robert E. Lee to Mary Lee, Christmas 1861

n the late evening of May 23, 1861 the Seventh Regiment of New York was among the

thousands of soldiers ordered forward from the southern end of Long Bridge, where a

tete-de-pont was under construction, to the slopes of Arlington.? Near Arlington Spring,
as part of the first major military action of the Civil War, the soldiers of the Seventh con-
structed tents with branches cut from the many varieties of native trees that shaded the
smooth, sodded lawn of Custis's old resort. With picks and spades they joined the other reg-
iments the next morning, following the engineers’ lines of entrenchment, cutting into the hills.
On Arlington farm the fruit trees in the orchard by the overseer's house were felled for they
obstructed views.} Such earthworks were crucial to the defense of the Union capital, for “a sin-
gle hostile battery could have fired the city with its shells” fron the command of Arlington
House.4 In order to boost protection, by May 29th the Eighth New York regiment set up
camp amid the enormous oak and elm trees to the south of the flower garden.’ Deeper into
the war, placards were hung around many of the largest trees, asking soldiers to refrain from
cutting them down. Many soldiers must have been convinced, for when the war ended, many
of the largest trees near the mansion and flower garden remained.

But on that first morning, while the federal forces constructed earthen defenses down
near the Potomac River, only a few individuals climbed the heights to Arlington. Among them
was Major General Charles W. Sandford, in charge of all New York regiments within the

38 View of Arlington Heights
with military tents placed
near Arlington House as part
of the Army of the Potomac’s
headquarters, 1861

sy | oaoes sare

E
4
:



= =

moe ong

101 Rehabilitation of West
Grounds, Lee Mansion by
Irving Payne. October 1945

‘Arlington House Archives,

102 Layout and

Development Plan North

Garden, Lee Mansion

Grounds by Irving Payne.

160 |

March 18, 1948

1929 - 2001

“Arlington House Archives

requesting the 1930 “proposed study for the rehabilitation of the flower and vegetable gardens
lying south and north of the Lee Mansion” from the Department of Army cemetery staff.>3
Though the formal nature of Irving Payne’s design for the landscape continued the theine of
past designers on the site, including the extensive use of pruned hedges, his plant palette was
much more extensive. For instance, in an approximately two-acre environs of Arlington
House, he included over forty different varieties of shrubs. He proposed heavy foundation
plantings for the east side of the house and attempted to discourage visitor “trespass” through



Yet, there were some events that altered the landscape surrounding Arlington House for
which no one could plan. On November 25, 1963—three days after his assassination—
President John F. Kennedy was buried on the eastern slope below Arlington House. The orig-
inal burial site, chosen for its accessibility to the American people and its prominence in the
landscape, was quite small and surrounded by a white picket fence. Over sixteen million peo-

ple visited Kennedy's grave during the three years following his death.

Due tothe fj
overwhelming | j
crowds, ceme-
tery officials and
members of the
Kennedy family
decided a more
permanent site
should be con-
structed. The
architectural
firm of John
Warnecke and
Associates was
hired to design

the grave and its

g
g
&
£
a
|
t
z
a
3
z

surroundings.
The entire site, which includes a depressed circular walkway leading to a marble elliptical
plaza, is banked into the hillside. From the plaza, a short flight of steps leads to the rectangu-
lar terrace and grave area laid with irregular stones of Cape Cod granite. Originally walks
were to descend down the eastern slope linking Arlington House with the south side of the
Kennedy gravesite plaza. The walk, however, was not built. Instead, a small viewing terrace
was constructed slightly north and east of Arlington house, connected to the grounds by a
short concrete stairway. The area around the gravesite was planted primarily with flowering
trees including, magnolias, crab apples, cherries and hawthorns, and native species of yellow
wood, American holly and willow oaks.5? Following the dedication of the gravesite, the entire
hillside below Arlington House, about 3.2 acres, was set aside to honor the memory of
President Kennedy by the Secretary of the Army, assuring that it remains open forever.5°

In May of 1964, the Secretary of Defense ordered that the hardwood forest west of
Arlington House, containing 24.436 acres, be preserved in perpetuity, the land maintained in

a park-like manner to provide an appropriate setting for the mansion.°!

105. The vista from
Arlington House east towards
Washington, D.C. encompass
es the Kennedy Gravesite,
completed by 1967.

1929-2001 | 163)


40 | 1802 - 1861

Though harsh his description was quite apt, for agriculture in southern America at this
time was suffering. The benefits of fertilizer, including gypsum, guano and lime, as a method
of increasing soil fertility, were not widely understood and disseminated. Even individual
farmers who knew about the benefits often could not afford to implement change on their
properties. Property values in the area plummeted as the crop returns shrank due to depleted
soil coupled with the blockade of the Chesapeake Harbor by the British during the War of
1812. Contributing to this loss in property values was the emigration of farmers westward as
the soil in the east became depleted. Yet like Washington, Custis was tied to northern Virginia
by politics and through his personal quest to insure that the agrarian and patriotic values of the
early Republic were instilled in the next generation.

Though Custis often wrote to popular periodicals on the value of progressive agricul-
tural methods such as soil augmentation and deep plowing, lack of money was a major limit-
ing factor in his attempts to follow his own advice. He was not alone. Many farmers and plan-
tation owners found themselves in similar financial straits, or worse. Because of the amount
of land Custis owned, his resources were diversified enough to allow him to do better finan-
cially than other local farmers. The market garden on the Arlington property and distilleries
and mills at Romancock and on the Washington Forest Tract, respectively, provided supple-
mental income. He also sold rights to speculators to use the pastures of the Arlington estate
to fatten cows before they were sold at market. In 1816, Custis recorded 1500 head of cattle.
The cattle served an additional purpose since their manure was extremely valuable to increas-
ing production on Arlington Farm. So sure was he of manure’s benefits, that Custis offered a
prize to the individual farmer who could manure the most land with his own animals.!
Around this same time, he purchased the Lady of the Lake—a ferry used to ship his products
from the lower estates, Romancock and White House, to the markets of Georgetown,
Washington and Alexandria. Not until 1843, about twenty years later, did the Alexandria
Canal open and cross the Arlington estate from north to south parallel to the Potomac River.
Though Robert E. Lee, who married Mary Randolph Custis in 1831, expressed worries that
the slaves working in the fields of Arlington Farm would be distracted from their work by the
passing boats, most likely the canal was an economic improvement to the estate.62

But in the 1820s transportation systems were still primitive in the area. It was not until
technology allowed the improvement of internal transportation systems—canals and railroads
primarily in the 1840s and 1850s—that the area witnessed an agricultural renewal. These
transportation improvements were funded in part through increasing returns on agricultural
products. Expanding markets for grains and flour due to the removal of restrictions on West
Indian and South American trade in the 1830s had resulted in a wider use of agricultural
improvement methodologies, thirty years after Custis first began advocating them. In addi-
tion, northerners faced with rising land costs and overcrowding in states such as New York,

began to purchase land in the area, bringing with them new farming practices. In short,


—. <-— ee

Faint ar
* lg

36 | 1802 - 1861

as likewise your instructions relative to the clothing .. .. To Mrs. Custis you will be pleased
to say, that no addition has been made to the lot of working hands here [Romancock]. . At
White House there are three; two boys, twin children of Ceasar and Dolly and one girl,
daughter of Carpenter Billy and Dinah . . 3°

As time would reveal, such clear communication would not always be the case.

During 1803 the estate of Mount Washington (or Arlington) continued to develop. As
in many agricultural slave economies, fish were an important commodity. Anadromous fish
such as shad and herring were integral in the diet of the slaves and also supplemented the farm
income when the fish were salted, barreled and sold at inland markets. At Mount Washington
the tide and the current of the Potomac River were of almost equal strength, therefore fishing
was not restricted to high or low water. But the calm in the river flow also proved problem-
atic, for it caused frequent accumulations of silt and other debris, creating numerous snags
which could catch the valuable nets or seines and cause them to tear. Regardless of the obsta-

cles, however, the improvement of the estate continued.

CONSTRUCTION OF ARLINGTON HOUSE

By early 1804, Custis had most likely engaged George Hadfield to design the residence
that would become Arlington House, for construction of the south wing had begun.*! Where
Custis and Hadfield met is unknown, but, as young, wealthy men in a relatively small circle
their introduction is not surprising.+? George Hadfield had been in America only a few years.
A pupil at the Royal Academy of Arts, he had traveled extensively in Italy and absorbed the
theories and characteristics of the classical architectural style through drawing restorations of
ancient temples. In 1795, around the time that John Mason, Custis’s neighbor, began build-
ing his home on Mason’ Island, Hadfield accepted an offer to take over the construction of
the Capital in the new federal city. There he became entangled in controversy and was even-
tually discharged without completing the building. Following his work at the Capital,
Hadfield was employed in the design of private residences.4} In fact, Hadfield’s designs, with
Arlington House as one of the most prominent, were especially influential in the northern
United States where his architectural concepts were disseminated throughout the upper east
coast and eastern Midwest portions of the United States.#

According to recent scholarship, Arlington House, a two-story, stuccoed brick house,
was the first temple-form residence built in the United States.45 The classically-styled tem-
ple-and-wing structure is characterized by arched front facade windows, bilateral symmetry,
and a prominent temple portico. The enormous front portico, which by 1830 was scored or
painted to resemble stone, was designed in a simple Doric order, perhaps inspired by the
Greek Temple of Hera Argive at Paestum in Italy. The Temple of Hephaestus (or Theseum)

is also believed to have been an influence on the design of Arlington, as both temples have por-



xx | INTRODUCTION

HISTORY SUMMARY

The periods of development for the Arlington House: Robert E. Lee Memorial landscape are

as follows,

Pre-1608

Within this chapter, the sequence of general prehistoric cultural development is divided into
the periods standard for the northern half of the eastern seaboard; the Paleo-Indian Period (ca.
10,000-8,000 B.C), the Archaic Period (ca 8000-1200 BC) and the Woodland Period, which
ends with European colonization in 1608. This chronology is augmented by a comparison of
the prehistoric land conditions with the environmental attributes conducive to American
Indian settlement. Finally, a discussion of the findings of recent excavations on the Arlington

House property provides evidence of American Indian land use in specific locations.

1608-1802

Beginning with a brief discussion of John Smith’s exploration of the Potomac River in the
vicinity of the future Arlington House estate, this chapter discusses the early development of
the agricultural tenant landscape in northern Virginia, with specific analysis of the land grants
and tenants associated with the future Arlington House property. The relationship between
the Washington and Custis families is established, explaining the close associations between
the evolution of Mount Vernon and that of Arlington. George Washington Parke Custis’s
early development of the then-named Mount Washington property (Arlington House) is

discussed.

1802-1861

This chapter describes the development of the Arlington House estate under the ownership of
George Washington Parke Custis (GWP Custis) and Mary Custis Lee. The physical mani-
festations of the economic system of slavery are addressed, as are the specific ramifications of
GWP Custis’s desire to continue the legacy of George Washington. The integral relationships
among Arlington Spring, Arlington farm, the park, gardens, the woods and other estates
owned by the Custis family are considered. The physical changes to the estate associated with
Robert E. Lee are described.

1861-1865
The physical effects generated by the use of the estate as the Headquarters of the Army of the
Potomac during the early part of the Civil War are addressed within this chapter. The signif-

icance of the site as a holding of the United States Federal Forces and the consequences of the


Pielmeier, Douglas, “Arlington House: The Evolution of a Nineteenth Century Virginia Plantation,” unpublished
thesis, summer 1996.

Potter, Stephen, Commoners, Tribute and Chiefs: The Development of Algonquian Culture in the Potomac Valley,
Charlottesville: The University Press of Virginia, 1993.

Prussing, Eugene Ernst, The Estate of George Washington, Deceased, Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1927.
Rand McNally and Co.'s Pictorial Guide to Washington et al, Chicago: Rand, McNally, 1904.

Mary Randolph, The Virginia housewife, or; Methodical cook : a facsimile of an authentic early American cookbook with a
new introduction by Janice Bluestein Longone, New York : Dover Publications, 1993, from Stereotype ed., with amend-
ments and additions, Baltimore: J. Plaskitt, 1836.

Reed, Sarah A., A Romance of Arlington House, Boston Mass: The Chapple Publishing Co., Ltd., 1908.
Report of the Arlington Memorial Amphitheater Commission, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1923.

Rhodes, David H. “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden south of Arlington Mansion by D. H. Rhodes,
Landscape Gardener at Arlington, Where he has been employed since 1873,” Office of the Quartermaster Supply
Officer, Washington, D.C., ¢.1930.

Riedy’s Joseph PB, “Coming from the Shadow of the Past: The Transition from Slavery to Freedom at Freedman’s
Village 1863-1900,” Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, October, 1987: 405-406.

Roadside and Harwell, Incorporated, Arlington National Cemetery Master Plan, Under Contract to US Army Corps
of Engineers, Baltimore District, 1998,

Roark, James L. Master's without Slaves: Southern Planters in the Civil War and Reconstruction, New York: Norton,
1977.

Rose, Cornelia Bruere, Arlington County Virginia: A History, Arlington, Virginia: Arlington Historical Society, 1976.

Rose, Ruth Preston, “Mrs. Robert E, Lee vs. the U.S. Congress,” Northern Virginia Heritage, Volume I, June,
1981; 11-16,

Rose, Ruth Preston, “Mrs, General Lee’s attempts to regain her possessions after the Civil War,” American History
Magazine, October, 1978.

Roundtree, Helen C. and Thomas E. Davison, Eastern Shore Indians of Virginia and Maryland, Charlottesville:
University Press of Virginia,1997.

Russell, William Howard, Sir, My Diary North and South, Edited and introduced by Fletcher Pratt, New York:
Harper, 1954.

Report of the Arlington Memorial Amphitheater Commission, Final Report upon the construction and completion of the
Memorial Amphitheater and Chapel which has been erected in the National Cemetery at Arlington, Virginia by Authority of
Congress, Washington Government Printing Office, 1923.

Schildt, Bobbi, “Freedmen’s Village,” Northern Virginia Heritage, February, 1985.

Shafer, Mary Louise, “Arlington County, Virginia in Transition: 1870-1920”, unpublished thesis, George
Washington Graduate School, 1981.

BIBLIOGRAPHY | 215


1802 - 1861



American Agriculture may be ranked George Washington, R.R. Livingston, late ambassador
to France, D. Humphreys, late Ambassador to Portugal and Spain, and G.W.P. Custis.!8

Custis’s promotion of wool production took an even more prominent form in his annu-
al sheep shearing. At these events, held in April of the years between 1805 and 1811, individ-
uals from around the area gathered by a fresh water spring (later named Arlington Spring) at
the edge of the Potomac River, just east of the farm. Here, with George Washington's mili-
tary tents erected next to rustic arbors covered with honeysuckle and laurel, the guests gath-
ered to watch the shearing, to eat and to listen to speeches of Custis and other well-known
landed farmers. The public sheep shearings at Arlington Spring established a precedent of
hospitality and display at the estate. Though Arlington Spring, as the social gathering place
and resort came to be called, would last for another fifty years, the sheep breed called
Arlington Improved never caught on. By 1809, the breed was losing popularity to the
European merino. With the War of 1812 imminent, the last sheep shearing was held in April
of 1811. However, sheep would graze at least occasionally within the park at Arlington for the
next fifty years. As a relative of Custis wrote of the view from the front portico of Arlington
in the 1850s:

We [went] down to the porch where the beginning of the day is beautiful to behold, its early
light thinning on the dewy lawn where the sheep who have sought shelter near the house
during the night crop the moist grass. !9

EARLY IMPROVEMENT OF THE ESTATES—
ARLINGTON, WHITE HOUSE AND ROMANCOCK

From his vantage point high on the hill, Custis could look down through the oaks,
cedars, hickory and elms to the cleared fields of the farm and on to the emerging city of
Washington across the river. The house in which he lived during his first two years at Mount
Washington, though not as small as the overseer’s residence down on the farm, was humble
compared to the later mansion. Of brick construction, the first floor of the house had only
three rooms.20 Perhaps Custis had grander ideas in mind than this simple brick structure. In
any case, he did not have the resources to afford them yet.

In placing his modest home on the most prominent and highest point on the 1100 acre
property, overlooking the river, Custis was following an established custom. From the begin-
ning of the American colonies, primary structures were often built on high points, for both
aesthetic and defensive reasons. As the century progressed, as technology and settlement
advanced and the ideas of the English landscape school drifted to the newly formed United
States, the aesthetic drama of a high elevation became even more valuable to the elite. Often
in Virginia, the largest land owners carefully selected their elevated positions, siting their plan-

tations to assure maximum prominence in the landscape.?!_ Custis was familiar with this

1802 - 1861 | 31


Immediately behind the house, within the ravine area, the land was poorly suited to develop-
ment due to the steep grade and unstable soil, unsuitable for building or farming.!28 Besides
Custis did not need to cut down the forests at Arlington since he had the Washington Forest
tract, 1200 acres of almost completely forested land only slightly to the south. There he had a
saw mill as part of the Arlington Mill establishment. Relatively small numbers of trees were
taken from Arlington for firewood, or stovewood, as it was called by the Custis’s and Lees. In
fact, it was recognized that the removal of select vegetation from the forest would improve its

condition, as shown in the following quote from Mary Lee to her mother,

Parkes [a slave] might also have out a few loads of that wood just back of the grove, which
you know was much improved by some attention of that sort formerly.'29

However more than an economic rationale probably lay behind the preservation of the
forests at Arlington. Early on in the history of the estate, the forests were considered integral
to the success of the home’s design. The dark trees provided a beautiful, imposing backdrop to

35 Drawing of the gravesite
of Mary Fitzhugh Custis,
c. 1853

60 | 1802 - 1861

the pale-colored classical
architecture of Arlington
House—a characteristic
of the estate commented
on throughout its history.
During the Marquis de
Lafayette’s return trip to
America in 1824, he spent
an evening at Arlington.
As they stood together on
the portico, looking out
over the grand prospect
towards Washington,
Lafayette cautioned Mary
Custis, “Cherish these

forest trees around your mansion. Recollect, my dear, how much easier it is to cut a tree down

2
Hy
H

than to make one grow.”!30 In amongst these forest trees roamed animals and birds, hunted by
Custis and his grandsons. Walks were taken in the woods for pleasure. The path to the “old
school house”, or church of the Arlington slaves located on the Syphax property, led through
the forest to the south of the mansion. Finally, it was here, in the forest just slightly southwest
of the house, that George Washington Parke Custis and Mary Fitzhugh Custis were buried.
The burial spot of Mary Custis, who passed away in 1853, was chosen by her daughter.



73 In the flower garden the
number of dead is written in
flowers, 1920. The temple
of Fame, 1885-1969, stands
the background. photograph

by Charles Martin

The Temple of Fame
had been erected in 1884
from the stone columns,
entablature and frieze dis-
carded from the US Patent
i Office after a large fire
] 3 destroyed portions of the
& structure in 1877. A gate-
way and rostrum at the
National Cemetery at the Old Soldier’s Home was created out of the same material.? About a
year after construction of the ‘Temple of Fame, the names of many Civil War heroes of the
Union Army were engraved into the frieze around the domed roof and onto the columns.!0
For the next seventy years, the Temple of Fame would serve as a focal point in the grounds
surrounding Arlington—revered by some, reviled by others.

In 1888 one of the most honored of the Union leaders during the war, General Philip
Sheridan, passed away. A prominent spot on the slope to the immediate east of Arlington
House was chosen for his burial. ‘There was great controversy over his burial location. No
voices expressed concern that his grave would detract from the setting of Arlington House. To
the contrary, in contemporary descriptions of the cemetery, the granite block of his grave,

74. The irony of a monument
to General Sheridan, a
Union officer, in the shadorw
of Arlington House did not go
unnoticed. postcard, c. 1895

122 | 1880 - 1929

PRONT OF SHERIDAN'S

bearing a bronze relief of a flag and the head of the general was thought to be one of the most
beautiful and sacred elements of the grounds, looming up large in front of the “Lee
Mansion.”!! Access to this important grave site was of primary importance; for this reason,
the cemetery at the Soldiers Home had been considered as a burial spot, for it was in closer

proximity to the residents of Washington D.C. After much debate, however, the Arlington

‘Arlington House Archives


LEGEND

OQ Evergreen tree, most likely a variety of cedar
O Decidious trees, most likely varieties of elm and oak
Acer, sp.

Magnolia, sp.

Flower Bed

Gravel

EEO O©-

Hardwood Forest Concrete

SOURCES:

5 aa onrenrAmmaron Yas 9% Gee 08 0m KARA Cr

Tomb of
the Unkown
Civil War,

Soldier, 1866

rAoueren stan Cerone vom 28

we ane fae eee aan Mon Sd

msn mmc 9 Quatemsnen Gena Orme Carma rat

este! al Fa tere see

"dower cas earrae Gua eee

“Northern "Servants" Quarters,
‘Storage, Cemetery Staff Housing

Aaurotn Hoe Anca, Lena Cooney, Nata Anos

\
NOTE:
Location of vegetation is approximate and
based primarily on historic photographs.

‘Area most likely used for
growing vegetables and ae a

Potting Building, c, 1880

~ Rehablitated
flower garderi
1865-160

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

} CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT
fo: 1865-1880

Greenhouse 1870-1880

Southern "servant's quatre Historic Period Plan
Cemetery staff housing, storage ARLINGTON HOUSE
rae vy ; THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
6.1865 0 40 80 160 ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
" |__| PREPARED BY:
SCALE | INCH= 80 FEET NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

455 /A0903



80......++++U.S.S, Maine Memorial, postcard c.1930, Arlington House Archives

81........View to Arlington House from slope to east, postcard 1912, Arlington House Archives

82.........-Government Experimental Farm and Arlington National Cemetery aerial view, c.1925, Arlington House

Archives

83 ....+000eeeMcMillian Commission Plan, 1902 unpublished rendering, first published with the title General Plan of

the Mall System, Archives of the Commission of Fine Arts

84......0Atlington House, postcard c.1910, Arlington House Archives

Arlington National Cemetery, aerial photograph, c.1928, Arlington House Archives

86 ....

Tomb of the Unknown Civil War Soldier and Temple of Fame, postcard c.1910, Arlington House
Archives

87 ....-++.--4rlington National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, Preliminary Plan for Improvement of Grounds prepared under
direction of National Commission of Fine Arts, September 1921, George Gibbs, Jr., Landscape Architect,

Arlington House Archives

88......Arlington National Cemetery Virginia, Plan for Work to be Done at Lee Mansion, August 16, 1923, Arlington

House Archives

...Arlington House, east and west facades, in Architectural Record, March 1924:32

...Arlington National Cemetery, Restoration of Arlington Mansion, Study for Drives, Walks and Planting Around
Mansion on sites of old flower and vegetable garden, Quartermaster General’s Office, Department of Army,
1930, Arlington House Archives

1 escsseWest end of Arlington Memorial Bridge looking west, c. 1938, NPS/National Capital Region (NPS
Federal Project #386)

92..eueMount Vernon Flower garden, 1932, photograph in History of the George Washington Bicentennial
Celebration. Vol. Tl. Literature Series, United States George Washington Bicentennial Commission:
Washington D.C. 1933, Mount Vernon Ladies Association of the Union

93 .ssesemStone well cover, well house and bell near northern slave quarters, 1933, Arlington House Archives

94....e0Plan illustrations for the "restoration of the flower garden and the redesign of the Monument to the
Unknown Civil War Soldier,” 1932, colored pencil on trace paper, Arlington House Archives

95 ..eueLawn south of Arlington House, location of flower garden, looking north, 1931, Arlington House

Archives

Cemetery administration building, east fagade, after rehabilitation, c.1935, Arlington House Archives

97 seueueKitchen garden after removal of greenhouse, looking north toward potting building, 1938, Arlington
House Archives
9B...usaeeeThe kitchen garden, looking south, c.1953, Arlington House Archives

ILLUSTRATIONS | XV


RO

—~
i
i)

CHAPT!

- 1929

1880



White House and Romancock had been farmed since their purchase by John Custis in
the mid-eighteenth century. Unlike John Custis and later George Washington, G.W.P. Custis
was highly reliant upon the agricultural success of these properties. The Mount Washington
(or Arlington) estate was not intended to be self-sufficient. Instead, Arlington was a family seat
supported by the profit from production at the other estates. This fact would guide its devel-
opment into a primarily decorative landscape until G.W.P. Custis’s death in 1857. Only when
Arlington was separated in ownership from the Pamunkey properties by Custis’s will to his
grandchildren, would new requirements of the landscape arise.

The property of Romancock and Lower Quarter (the slaves’quarters), as it was often
referred to in quarterly farm accounts, contained approximately 4656 acres including 1200
acres of marsh land and a grist mill.32_ During the mid-eighteenth century, under the owner-
ship of John Custis and the oversight of George Washington, the primary crops produced on
the Romancock property were tobacco, corn, and wheat, though oats and peas were also
grown.3} By the time the grist mill was constructed on the property by James Anderson in the
early nineteenth century, cotton had replaced tobacco as the primary source of revenue. Corn
and wheat, however, remained important crops.3+ In addition, the large area of marsh pro-
vided hay and pasture for livestock-primarily sheep, cattle and hogs.35 Approximately sixty
slaves were involved in the agriculture, milling, and distilling at Romancock.36 Diversity of
land use on the Pamunkey estates helped to insulate Custis from the harsh agricultural econ-
omy as the nineteenth century progressed.

White House and Old Quarter was about five hundred acres larger than Romancock.
White House, where Martha and John Custis first lived, was the most valuable of all John
Custis’ estates during the 1750s.37 This remained true, for Custis paid almost twice as much
tax on White House as on Romancock during the early nineteenth century. In 1832 White
House and Old Quarter listed ninety-seven slaves, fourteen horses and mules, two colts,
forty seven head of cattle with six calves, one-hundred-forty-nine sheep, ninety-four hogs and
sixty pigs.38

‘Though the monetary output of these two estates was directly tied to the agricultural
ability of the farm manager and to the resources of the farm itself, the success of the produc-
tion was also influenced greatly by the clarity of communication between Custis and his farm
managers. Early in his life Custis seems to have been fortunate, having in his employ knowl-
edgeable and responsible managers. Such a relationship is shown in a letter from a manager

of the Romancock and White House estates.

As respects cider and brandy, there is none. I think I wrote you in the latter part of the
spring there was no fruit. I have not seen a crab apple this season neither here nor else
where. Destruction of fruit was very general in this section of country, both of apples and
peaches. Your instructions respecting the shipment of stoves will be punctually attended to

1802-1861 | 35




154 |

1929 - 2001

remained under the jurisdiction of the Department of War, Quartermaster General’s Office.
The work of the restoration therefore continued under the direct supervision of Colonel
Charles G. Mortimer, in charge of Arlington National Cemetery at the request of Arno B.
Cammerer, Director of the Office of National Parks, Buildings and Reservations. The
Commission of Fine Arts was not particularly pleased. On January 25, 1934 Moore wrote to
President Roosevelt asserting that, “the transfer of the mansion itself to the Office of National
Parks, Buildings and Reservations is bound to lead to a host of petty conflicts of authority . . .
In the interest of good administration, both mansion and cemetery should be in the same
hands, responsible to the superintendent 6n the ground.”33 Though at first FDR “rather
agreed with Chairman Moore,” Harold Ickes, then Secretary of the Interior, quickly discussed
the matter with the President and it was decided to let matters stand.3+ Moore was not the
only individual to protest the transfer. Colonel Mortimer complained that the expense and dif-
ficulty in administering the site would increase. A Congressional resolution forwarded by the

General Organization of the Sons of Confederate Veterans stated:

whereas this unified estate mansion and grounds had always been one before, . . . .and
whereas in view of the fact that the Department of the Interior is charging a small admis-
sion fee to Arlington and other historic, Governmentally controlled houses, and it being of
the opinion of the Sons of Confederate Veterans that this principle does not encourage patri-
otism and is undesirable therefore . . . the transfer of the Lee Mansion back to the admin-
istration of the War Department shall be considered an act of justice and an act of retain-
ing patriotic historic unity.

An editorial in the Washington Post spoke out against the transfer of Arlington House
as well. “By Executive Orders . . . the mansion was separated from its historic unity. .. . placed
under the administration of the parks service of the Department of Interior. This was no
doubt considered practical, but the tradition of Arlington has been cut in two. Many persons
are asking that Arlington Custis-Lee mansion be restored to its historic unity with its
Arlington grounds under the War Department.”}¢ A simplistic reason for the outcry may have
been the ten cent admission to Arlington House charged by this newly-formed section of the
National Park Service.37 The National Park Service, known for its management of the west-
ern wilderness lands—the icons of Yosemite and Yellowstone—now had control of many of the
historic, cultural landmarks of the east. How would the United States Interior Department
handle this new duty?

KITCHEN GARDEN RESTORATION

In 1933, with the passage of the Public Works Administration Act, $12, 209.40 was
allotted to restore the gardens of Arlington House. Arno N. Cammerer, the Director of the


178 | ENDNOTES

35 A description of the house, as it remained in 1908, is given in an article by J. Harry Shannon in the Mustrated
Sunday Magazine as cited in Walker et al., 19.

36The high mortality rate during the 1600s in Virginia most likely played a role in the prevalence of impermanent
architecture. So too did the requirements of the tobacco, cash crop agricultural economy which was tied to the eco-
nomic instability of England. For a very good discussion of impermanent architecture of the seventeenth century
in Virginia and Maryland see, Cary Carson, Norman F, Barka, et al. “Impermanent Architecture in the Southern
American Colonies” in The Winterthur Portfolio, A Journal of American Material Culture (Summer/Autumn, 1981):
135-197.

37 For further discussion of structures and rural landscapes of eighteenth-century Virginia see Camille Wells's “The
Planter’s Prospect: Houses, Outbuildings and Rural Landscapes in Eighteenth-Century Virginia” in Winterthur
Portfolio. 28, 1. This article describes the development of agricultural architecture through the analysis of farm
advertisements in the Virginia Gazette during the eighteenth century.

38 Michael T. Miller, Alexandria’s Forgotten Legacy; The Annals of Wm. F. Carne. (Alexandria, VA: Alexandria Library,
1984), 159.

39 Map of Howsing tract, 1746 surveyed by Jeremiah Hampton, Feriando O’Neal and Joseph Dorsey. Arlington
House: Robert E. Lee Memorial, Archives.

4 Issac Rhys, The Transformation of Virginia 1740-1790, (Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press
1982):33.

41 Awbry Road retained that name into the nineteenth century.

42 According to a secondary source map, the tenants were, from south to north, Benjamin Williams, Owen Morris,
Robert Mills, Charles Story, George Boucher, John Williams and William Boylstone. All of the tenant farms were
located to the west of the road to Alexandria except for that of Benjamin Williams. From an interpretive historical
map of Fairfax County Virginia in 1760 by Beth Mitchell. Published by Office of Comprehensive Planning, County
of Fairfax 1987. George Washington Memorial Parkway, Tarkey Run Headquarters Library.

43 For further discussion of the affects of the French and Indian War on the American Colonies see Francis
Jenning’s Empire of Fortune, Crowns, Colonies and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America. (New York: W.W. Norton
and Company, 1988).

44 Allan Kulikoff, Tobacco and Slaves: The development of southern cultures in the Chesapeake, 1680-1800. (Williamsburg,
VI: University of North Carolina Press, 1986): 78-79. For a numerical analysis see Donald Sweig Northern Virginia
Slavery: A Statistical and Demographic Investigation Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Department of
History. College of William and Mary. 1982.

45 To further analyze, by 1749, slaves made up twenty-eight percent of the population. In 1757, within the Turro
Parish of Fairfax County in which Alexander's land was located, twenty-one men held 75 slaves (or forty percent of
the total slave population) in groups of twenty or more, The proportion of owners with less than ten slaves was
high, however, the percentage of slaves in this group was lower. Sweig, 31.

46 Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793.

47 Kulikkoff: 101; U.S. Bureau of the Census. Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1970,
(Washington, D.C.1976): 1158, 1190-1191.

48 Stetson, 10.



6 Jennifer Hanna. Ornamental Garden Design: The Rise of Floricultural Publications and the Role of James Vick, Rochester
Seed House Owner (Thesis, Cornell University 1997): 93-121.

7 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden . . .”: 3.

8 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden . . .”: 3. Photograph, in Fame’s Eternal Camping Ground:
Beautiful Arlington, Burial Place of America’s Illustrious Dead. Enoch A. Chase in National Geographic Magazine. 630.
Photographer, Charles Martin.

° Letter, Anon. May 6, 1888. ARHO.

10 The cornice was inscribed with the names of Washington, Lincoln, Grant and Farragut; its columns with the
names of Meade, McPherson, Sedgwick, Reynolds, Humphreys, Garfield, Mansfield and Thomas. John B.
Osborne, The Story of Arlington (1899): 35.

11 “Where Sheridan Will Lie: Something about Arlington Cemetery.” New York Times. Aug 9, 1888. ARHO: Karl
and McSween, 88.

12 Thid.

13 Rear Admiral David D. Porter was born June 8, 1813 in Chester Pennsylvania. During the Civil War he was a
commander in the Navy. He passed away in February of 1891.

14 According to Decker and McSween, the slope was reserved as the burial place of highly distinguished officers
of either the armny or the navy.” Old Arlington, 88.

15 Crook died on March 21, 1890 in Chicago while in command of the Department of the West. He was original-
ly buried in Oakland, Maryland, but was moved to Section 2 of Arlington National Cemetery on November 11,
1898 due to the neglect of his grave site in Maryland.

16 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden . . .”: 10. ARHO.

17 Rhodes, “Historic Memories of Arlington . . .” {1930]. “Granolithic Pavement Around Mansion at Arlington
National Cemetery,” Nov. 8, 1893, Depot Quartermaster’s Office. ARHO. The Grand Army of the Republic was
founded in Decatur, Illinois on April 6, 1866 by Benjamin F. Stephenson, membership was limited to honorably
discharged veterans of the Union Army, Navy, Marine Corps or the Revenue Cutter Service who had served
between April 12, 1861 and April 9, 1865.

18 See map, Arlington, Va Military Reservation, Fort Myer and the National Cemetery with Annex showing the road to
Aqueduct Bridge. (Depot Quartermaster General’s Office, Washington, D.C. Jan10, 1894). Copy map files ARHO.

19 Frank L. Averill, Guide to, and maps of, the national capital and vicinity, including the fortifications (Washington, D.C.,
Law reporter print 1892): 19. “The Fort Drive: Major Powell’s Proposed Circuit of the War-Time Defenses,
Historic Remains about this City.” Washington, D.C. Evening Star May 23, 1896.

20 Harper's Weekly. May 29, 1886, Vol. 30: 347.
21 Decker and McSween, Historic Arlington, 28-29.

22 Stable was destroyed by fire on July 21, 1904. New stable blueprints dated September 14, 1904. Contract for con-
structing stable awarded to R.E. Boiseu of Washington 1907 for 6495.00 The new stable was 67’ 8” long by 34” 4”
wide RG 92. File # 85160 Box 1037. Office of the Quartermaster General 1800-1914 Document file.

ENDNoTES | 201


drawings of the build-
ing.6

Shortly thereafter
changes in the adminis-
trative personnel of
Arlington occurred that,
like the varied personali-
ties of the Commission
of Fine Arts, would
impact the future devel-
opment of the grounds.
In January of 1926,
almost one year after
passage of the legislation
calling for the restora-
tion of Arlington House,
General B. EF Cheatam
was appointed —as
Quartermaster General.
General Cheatam,
whose father was on

Lee’s _ staff

Arlington House Archives

General

89 Arlington House, prior
to any organized restoration
work, as illustrated in
Architectural Record March,
1924

through the Virginia
After General

Cheatam’s retirement in 1930, he served as the resident superintendent for Stratford, General

campaigns, had a great personal interest in General Lee and his home.

Lee’s birthplace.” In contrast, General William E. Horton, who came in shortly after General
Cheatam as Chief of the Construction Division, was known for his interest in, and fine col-
lection of, colonial era artifacts. In March 1928, spurred by Chairman Moore and perhaps by
the personal interest of the Quartermaster General Cheatam, the first $10,000 was appropri-
ated by Congress to fund the restoration. Moore was quick to remind the new Quartermaster

General of the objective of the restoration in the minds of the Commission of Fine Arts:

The entire work in Arlington is based on the restoration of the mansion and grounds as an
estate representative of the manners, customs, and taste of the first half century of the
Republic.8

Colonel L. H. Bash came into the Quartermaster General’s Office in September 1928, and

later succeeded Horton as Chief of the Construction Division. He eventually became

1929 - 2001 | 143


Sa.
gE roy werent = :
3 ' one

tote 7

30 "Arlington House, The
Seat of G.W.P. Custis, Esq.”
in Harper’s New Monthly

Magazine, October 1853

52 | 1802 - 1861

Probably no later than
the late 1840s, the main
¥ c entrance to Arlington was
; located on the Alexandria
and Georgetown ‘Turnpike
directly west of the farm. A
narrow, dirt or graveled, car-
riage drive passed through
the gate immediately west of
the turnpike, wound west up
the hill, first passing through
fields of broom sedge and
Indian corn dotted with
green cones of cedars.
Approximately three-fourths
mile up the road, a footpath
extended north off the drive
and into the park which
descended down the hillside

ARLINGTON House
THE SEAT OE WP LER E A

ington House Archives

; from the house. In the park,

Adi

hemmed in on the south by the carriage drive to the house and on the north by the thick native
forest growth, trees grew in graceful clusters and singly in “solitary beauty”, either allowed to
grow in place or planted to frame views.% A graveled foot and bridle path led among these
trees, the surrounding grass kept short by the livestock which often roamed the hillside and by
the periodic cutting of the slopes with scythes. Rough stone seats were placed at intervals to
capture views of “the Beautiful.” 0° This English Landscape-style garden, described in popu-
lar literature as being “an artful imitation of nature,” was evocative of the grounds at Mount
Vernon.!9! At Arlington the slope to the east of the house was called “the Park” by the Lee
family members. This description of the Park at Arlington in Harper’s New Monthly
Magazine of 1853 contains characteristics similar to many other “parks” on contemporary

estates along the east coast.

In front, sloping toward the Potomac is a fine Park of 200 acres, dotted with groves of oak
and chestnut and clumps of evergreens and behind it the dark of forest.\°?

The Park may have been created at the very beginning of the estate development
through the influence of William Spence, George Hadfield, Mary Custis, or G,W.P. Custis
himself. The Park may have also developed more gradually through the use of the space for


the silt during the floods that would cause river water to nearly lap against the marble walls of
the “president’s palace.”' East from the heights of Mount Washington, the old agricultural
estates and recent city dwellings were visible as dots on the distant hills. Duddington, the seat
of Daniel Carroll, an early Washington, D.C. landowner, dwarfed the new capital building
which had only two stories of the north wing completed. Thomas Law, the husband of
G.W.P.’s sister, Elizabeth Parke Custis Law, had recently constructed a home near the river’s
edge. The allees and drives of the ornate gardens on Mason’s Island, the home of John Mason,
were visible to the northeast of Mount Washington.

Prominently placed on the brow of the highest hill on the property, the grand estate of
Arlington House would be created by G.W.P. Custis to honor the memory and ideals of his
adopted grandfather, George Washington. Custis would spend much of his life attempting to
fulfill this mission through the construction of his classical mansion which would sit clearly
visible from the new national capital. He would be a gentleman farmer, as was his adopted
grandfather. To Custis this land was new and ready to be modeled into a home suitable to his
station, his ancestors, and his own political, agricultural and aesthetic values. In order to
understand the landscape that G.W.P. Custis inherited, a description of the events taking place
on this landscape prior to 1802 must be given. For portions of this land, had been farmed for
hundreds of years before Custis arrived.

EARLY EUROPEAN EXPLORATION AND SETTLEMENT

In 1608 John Smith, an adventurer backed by the London Virginia Company to search
for gold, furs and a South Seas passage, became the first Englishman to navigate the Potomac
River? Smith, born in 1580 in Wiloughby, England, became involved in the colonization of
America through the profit making ventures of the Virginia Company in 1606.’ Though
Smith would return to Jamestown, Virginia without gold or a route to the South Seas, the
books he wrote and the maps he drew describing the appearance of the Potomac River valley
give an interesting glimpse of life at the beginning of the seventeenth century.*In his works he
documented the land uses and designs of the Algonquians, the Indian tribe which once lived
upon the land now comprising the grounds of Arlington House.

John Smith and his crew identified approximately eleven different Indian groups while
navigating the Potomac River from its mouth to the Little Falls.’ The Nacotchtanks and the
Tauxenents, part of the Conoy chiefdom, were the groups located closest to the area that was
to become the Arlington estate.‘ The relationship and the treaties between the Conoys and the
English associated with the colonization of Virginia were very significant in the chronology of
land development, or lack thereof, within Fairfax County during the eighteenth century.

The total population of the Conoys located on the Virginia side of the Potomac was
between 2550 and 3600 people.’ Such a small number of inhabitants extended over such a

large portion of land probably had minimal effect on the landscape. However, the Algonquian

1608 - 1802 | 7


Of course, the marriages, births and deaths of family members and slaves at Arlington also
affected the development of the property.

In June of 1831, Mary Randolph Custis married her childhood friend Robert E. Lee.
Lee, though a member of southern aristocracy through both the Lee and Carter families, was
an army officer with little inheritance and limited financial resources. This lack of family
wealth would play a role in the development, or lack thereof, at Arlington. Lee was born at
Stratford Hall in 1807, the son of Henry “Lighthorse Harry” Lee, a Revolutionary War hero
and former governor of Virginia, and Ann Hill Carter of the Shirley plantation on the James
River. Throughout Mary Custis Lee and Robert E. Lee’s forty-year marriage, Lee was away
from Arlington for the majority of the time due to his military carcer. In contrast, Mary Custis
Lee and the seven Lee children spent a great deal of time at Arlington. During the few years

28 East faade of Arlington
House with the portraits of
Robert and Mary Lee, 1831

50 | 1802 - 1861

that Lee was stationed
close to Arlington, he
assisted G.W.P. and Mary
Custis in their oversight of
the estate and outlying
plantations. It wasn’t until
after George Washington
Parke Custis’s death in
1857, however that Robert
E. Lee had much direct
involvement in the devel-

opment of the Arlington

estate. Yet his emotional

connection to the home as revealed in letters and occasional visits is clear. Five years after his

marriage to Mary Custis, Robert E. Lee wrote,

The country looks very sweet now, and the hill at Arlington covered with verdure and per-
fumed by the blossoms of the trees, the flowers of the garden, honey-suckles, yellow Jasmine,
&e is more to my taste than at any other season of the year.°*

LANDSCAPE APPEARANCE BY 1840

By the mid-1840s the general arrangement of the landscape—the image that Robert E.
Lee’s words evoke—was probably in place, though like the agricultural portion of the estate,
the design was constantly evolving. It is very difficult to know when each portion of the land-
scape developed. By this time, however, the main elements of the Arlington estate landscape
were: the farm, the “Park”, the flower garden, the garden grove, the yard, the vegetable gar-
den and the forest. A clue to the progression of their development may be found in the gen-


79 Tourists at Arlington,
postcard, ¢.1910

126 | 1880 - 1929

} Homeot General bee, ARLINGTON, Va

ing bed west of Arlington House. ‘The top of the cedar was broken off. Though its removal
was considered by cemetery staff, the tree was eventually preserved.

Through the first decades of the twentieth century, the magnolias on the east front of
Arlington House continued to grow and shade out the smaller shrubs at their base. After the
land around the mansion was paved in 1893, the white iron urns were set into planting beds.
One such island bed was at the southern end of the southern wing. An urn was placed in this
bed, surrounded by individual boxwood specimens. Iron urns were also placed to the east of
Arlington House, beside the drive that extended along the front of the house, within beds of
annuals and ornamental grasses. In the center of the planting bed in front of Arlington House
the flag pole arose from a small berm, its base framed with evergreen shrubs.

Yet these changes to the Arlington grounds were ignoring, and even sometimes wiping
away evidence of the past. While the wooden headboards of Civil War casualties were
replaced with stone, the gravestones of Mary and George Washington Parke Custis in the
southwestern portion of the grounds, were “stained and defaced” without a “railing around the
graves.” Only the lilies-of-the-valley continued to grown in swathes around their bases.?? Just
the crumbling brick walls of the overseer’s house remained down on the farm. The house was
most likely deemed superfluous when the Freedmen’s Villagers were forced to leave in the late
1880s and was subsequently condemned by the Department of Army! The stable built under
the direction of Custis, to the west of Arlington House, was destroyed by fire in July of 1904.
The reconstructed stable, finished within three years, was built of brick in a style very similar
to the original, with its Doric-columned portico, symmetrical-wing, and stuccoed walls.22 The

‘Temple of Fame took the place of the flower arbor. ‘The revered graves of northern officers

H
g
!
3


This type of fence became quite common along the C & O Canal during the first half of the
nineteenth century. It was also used at Mount Vernon, but Custis makes no note of its use at
Washington’s estate in his article. Though he wrote to the periodicals and newspapers of the
day, proclaiming the necessity of agricultural advancement and the importance of George
Washington in the history of the United States, Custis also created for himself the perfect
venue at which to convey these ideas—Arlington Spring.

Arlington Spring was first begun as a place to hold the early nineteenth-century sheep
shearings started by Custis to publicize his breed of native sheep. In 1811, Custis made some
of his first improvements to the site by erecting a “bower for the reception of his guests that
was adorned by laurels and honey suckle...””! Though the sheep breed never truly caught on,
the spring itself became extremely popular as a day resort at which individuals from the sur-
rounding cities could relax, picnic and dance. The calm water from the wide Potomac River
lapped against the wooden wharf at the eastern edge of Arlington as the ferries docked to bring
the visitors across from Washington.”2 The two ferries were huge broad barges with very shal-
low drafts—only nineteen inches on the “G.W.P. Custis”- which allowed them to navigate the
tides of the Potomac River. On the fenced, eight-acre site of Arlington Spring seats were
placed under the locusts, cedars, maples and oaks growing in clumps in the long grass.”} The
famous spring flowed up from a rocky outcropping near a enormous oak tree, which grew near
the outdoor dancing pavilion. The kitchen and dining room, simple wood-sided one story
structures built in the early 1840s, were tucked up against the berm of the Alexandria and
Georgetown Canal, which divided Arlington Spring from the farm. All the structures were

rustic, creating a syl-
van resort at which
all the “respectable
people of Washing-

ton”

regardless of
their “current condi-
tion in life” could
gather.”* By the
1850s, between 50
and 200 people
would come to the
spring each day dur-
ing the summer.’5
Though slaves would
sometimes serve the
guests at Arlington

Spring, free blacks

Arlington House Archives

21 A description of
Arlington Spring was includ-
ed in an article on the
Arlington estate by Benson
Lossing in Harpers
Magazine, 1853.

1802-1861 | 43



4 The Federal land man-
aged by the National Park
Service is surrounded by
Federal land managed by the

Department of Army.

XxIL | INTRODUCTION

B NATIONAL PARK SERVICE PROPERTY

= NATIONAL PARK SERVICE-OWNED
BUILDINGS

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE-OWNED PROPERTY BOUNDARIES 2001

1929 to 2001

Within this chapter, the restoration of Arlington House and surrounding landscape during the
1930s is described. The development of the landscape through the twentieth century is
addressed through a discussion of various design and master plans and jurisdiction transfers.

The ramifications of the transformation from maintenance facility to renowned tourism des-

tination are addressed.


Within a year, Martha Custis was engaged to George Washington, a colonel in the
Colonial army. With her two young children, John and Martha (Patsy), she moved to Mount
Vernon soon after her marriage. Washington accepted the two children as his own, assisting
greatly with the raising of both.” With his marriage to Martha he controlled her dower rights
of one-third of the large estate of Daniel Custis, and even more financially important, the two-
thirds share of John Custis’s inheritance. As his guardian, George Washington attempted to
guide the education of John, hiring a series of tutors for the boy. However, correspondence
between John, Washington and his tutors suggests he was not the most dedicated scholar.
Regardless he managed to get through an education centered in Annapolis and later King’s
College in New York City. While in Annapolis he met Eleanor Calvert. The Calverts, whose
home was Mount Airy in Upper Marlborough, Maryland, were well acquainted with the
Washingtons.® ‘The two were married in 1774 after John’s studies in New York City were cut
short by his older sister Patsy’s death in 1773. In order to prepare John for his inheritance of
the Custis properties, George Washington took him and Nelly to Williamsburg in the fall to
visit the Custis properties there. These plantations, inherited by John through his mother
Martha, were in the counties of New Kent, King William, York, Northampton and Hanover.”

Shortly after Eleanor Calvert and John Custis were married they came home to Mount
Vernon. During the first couple years of their marriage they lived both at the White House
plantation and Mount Vernon.“ Towards the end of 1778, anxious to have his own home now
that he had two children, and concerned that currency would continue to depreciate due to the
Revolutionary War, John began to look for land convenient to Mount Vernon and Mount Airy
and large enough to support a plantation. In 1778 he found what he was looking for in the
thickly timbered tract along the Potomac River belonging to the Alexander brothers, John,
Philip and Gerrard—the future land of Arlington.

Custis ended up purchasing the land from the brothers for quite a large sum, and was
severely reprimanded by his stepfather, George Washington, for the outrageous terms of pur-
chase. To Robert Alexander, Custis agreed to pay 12 £ per acre to Robert Alexander and, at the
expiration of twenty-four years, to pay the principal with compound interest. Under the terms
of this agreement Custis would not own the land outright until twenty-four years from the date
of the contract. Custis agreed to pay Gerrard Alexander eleven pounds per acre, to be paid at

Christmas of that year. As Washington wrote in a letter to his adopted son,

as a friend and as one who bas your welfare at heart, let me entreat you to consider the con-
sequences of paying with compound interest . . . with respect to your purchase from Robert
Alexander I can only say that the price you have offered for it is a very great one, but as
you want it to live at and as it answers yours and Nellie’s views and is a pleasant seat and
capable of great improvement, I do not think the price ought to be a capital object with you.*
The tracts of land purchased from the two Alexander brothers were separated by a tract

1608 - 1802 | 17


MEMORIAL
AMPITHEATER (974

OPEN
GUTTER, c. 1900

TOMB OF THE UNKOWN HARDWOOD FOREST

CiviL WAR SOLDIER, 1866

SHERMAN DRIVI
€. 1861 (Tas PORTION)
‘ASPHALT

FEF

Ice House
¢.1818-¢.1890"

WELL HOUSE, eee ants

6. 1880p
mn NORTHERN “SERVANTS” QUARTERS,
STORAGE, CEMETERY STAFF HOUSING

COMFORT STATION, FIRST ¢. 1890,
SECOND, ¢. 1921 LA
~

WATERTOWER
‘880-c. 1916) oo

HARDWOOD FOREST

TA
T [ f IN)
aaa

PLANT-ACCLIMATION BEDS, ¢. 1880

GRAVELED SERVICE DRIVE, c. 1880

S A omens POTTING BUILDING, «. 1680

LP, FOUNTAIN

LT}

UT.
£7

GRAPE VINE ON TRELICE, UN«NOWN paTE
ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY
GREEN HOUSE c. 1660

RE-DESIGNED
FLOWER GARDEN
1885-¢,1940

ices fs E i
Hirenine. (O) i :

GENERAL CROOK'S RalL

GRAVE 1898:
GREENHOUSE 1870-1680

4 160

SCALE | INCH= 80 FEET
a

To ELECTRIC RAILWAY STATION STOP

SOUTHERN "SERVANT'S QUARTERS"
CEMETERY STAFF HOUSING, STORAGE
AbMiRAL
PORTER WRIGHT

GRAVE GRAVE
1891 ro

‘SHERIDAN (ENFANT GENERAL
MONUMENT: MEMORIAL:

1888 1911

Custis WALK
1895

JANNUAL PLANTING
BEDS (c. 1685)

LEGEND

& TEMPLE OF FAME, 1885-1965

C} EVERGREEN TREE. MOST LIKELY
A VARIETY OF CEDAR

DECIDIOUS TREES, MOST LIKELY
VARIETIES OF ELM AND OAK

© ACER, SP.

E> Macnouia, sp.

CQ HORSE CHESTNUT

@ Boxwoon
O  Frower Beo

GRAVEL

CONCRETE

J NON-EXTANT BUILDING, C. 1929

SOURCES:

3 naranasComronrAmaaron Wane (8% Get 08 re noe MARA Cory

a 7 kamen E1416 toms Jamal 168 Samm Ms umsmen Occ 7 C18
Goto 9 Faer meer) ow ne areas Comore US. Coneret Nanas 8
Ser cea ras Lasunt or Come Canrmnt Brvon Wanton OC
enc Paver Aone ln Ate Narna Content Neem 8283
Seer Sutmcmatex Consasa Srnce Mana R80 Cour ey At
Agana, taen Mees FY Hh sm Ha Cane i Am
‘Siete nai ohare eae "baer Surette Ores Maaton Om
Soares "tk chs a. Corrs rss cwtebesomsrem

sana crm amas ames 6 naremare Cea Oem Cor Wrst

Axineran natn Coen ms Pet Ronen Gam Le Mam
Shiver fk Paso Bo hee bee Rafe fo oe

SNOT Nenana Cone to ha Pa emer ac

Amonon Marana, Comer eyeing ox Maan Sr es, ae 4
i cer ar econ co 1

Amon Karna Cv PAT LA 9 Amero cin tans Lm
(ei owen va moses Sb, ues ee Coen Boe, ome
SEuBo aoe

Pertaunec CRuseron, Anant Wee ANE, LRA Cones, Nat aod

NOTE:

LOCATION OF VEGETATION IS APPROXIMATE.

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE REPORT

1880-1929
Historic Period Plan

ARLINGTON HOUSE

THE ROBERT E. LEE MEMORIAL
ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
PREPARED BY:
NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION
CULTURAL LANDSCAPE PROGRAM
J. HANNA, A. DYMEK, E. HENDERSON, N. PARASH

455 / JOGO4.



224 | MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY

1942 War Department Building Road Network and Nearby Access Road projects, Arlington, Virginia und Washington,
D.C,, August 1942, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/81 106.

1942 Location of Water Lines Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, February 17, 1942, NCR Archives.

[1943] Proposed Extension of Arlington Nutional Cemetery, Arlington Reservation and Vicinity, National Capital Parks
and Planning Commission, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/81091.

1945 Rehabilitation of West Grounds, Lee Mansion, Irving Payne, National Capital Parks, signed and annotated,
map files, Arlington House Archives.

1945 Fort Myer Military Reservation Virginia, Boundary Line Survey, U.S. Engineer Office, June, 1945, map
files, Arlington House Archives.

1945 Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, Area under jurisdiction of National Park Service, suggested addition,
Arlington House Archives.

1945 Rehabilitation of East Grounds Lee Mansion, Irving Payne Designer, National Capital Parks, signed and
annotated, map files, Arlington House Archives

1947 Plat of Transfer of Jurisdiction, Office of the Secretary of War, June 13, 1947, Washington, D.C., Arlington
House Archives,

1948 Revised Planting Plan North Garden Lee Mansion Grounds, Arlington National Cemetery, November 29, 1948,
designed by Irving Payne, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1948 Revised Planting Plan North Garden Lee Mansion Grounds with notes, designed by Irving Payne, map files,
Arlington House Archives.

1948 Layout and Development Plan North Garden Lee Mansion Grounds. Arlington National Cemetery, March 18,
1948, Arlington House Archives.

1949 Revisions to Fire Alarm System Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, National Capital Parks, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/41900.

1949 Revisions to existing heating system—Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, National Capital Parks, April
29, 1949, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/80082.

1954 Camellia Planting, Lee Mansion, National Capital Parks, Landscape Architectural Division, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/80061.

1955 Plat of Transfer of Jurisdiction, National Capital Parks, Engineering Division, TIC files, NCR Archives,
855/80076.

1957 Repairs to Slave Quarters, Custis Lee Mansion, Architectural Division, National Capital Parks, ‘TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/25000 and 855/41001.

1964 Plan of Archeological Excavation on Existing Conditions, Archeological field work, Bruce Powell, Regional
Archeologist, July 1963, National Park Service, National Capital Office, Design and Construction Division,
Arlington House Archives.

1964 Restoration of Flower Garden, Custis-Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, National Park Service,
National Capital Region, 4 sheets, map files, GWMP Archives, Turkey Run, Virginia.


Virginia Historical Society, Richmond, Virginia

ticos and massing similar to Arlington House.*6 The land upon which the Arlington residence
was to be located gradually sloped from north to south and grading had to be undertaken in
the construction.4” Most likely the area to the north and south of the house was smoothed
into flat terraces at this time in preparation for the gardens. Whether Hadfield had any input
in the design of the landscape is unknown. Recent scholars have suggested, however, that had
Hadfield had a longer, more prosperous career, he would have become extremely influential in
the development of the picturesque garden in America.48 Regardless, the creation of a tem-
ple-form residence backed by a forest and fronted by what would be a pastoral park landscape

17 The earliest extant sketch
of Arlington House was done
by Jobn Farley in 1824.

18 Mason estate on
Anolostan Island, c.1820,
artist unknown

1802 - 1861 | 37


[1930] Arlington National Cemetery: Present Layout of Arlington Mansion showing approximate location of drives, walks,
plantings, etc, Quartermaster General’s Office, original Arlington House Archives,

[1930] Arlington National Cemetery, Restoration of Arlington Mansion, Study for Drives, Walks and Planting Around
Mansion on sites of old flower and Vegetuble Garden, Quartermaster General’s Office, original Arlington House
Archives.

[1930]  Custis-Lee Mansion-Arlington National Cemetery, measured and drawn by Rodier and Jundzin Architects,
Washington D.C., TIC Files, NCR Archives, 855/26900.

1931 A Plan of Arlington Estate on the Potomack River, Quartermaster General’s Office, map files, Arlington
House Archives,

1933 District of Columbia Engineers Commission Map, Cartographic Division, NARA II.

1933 Sketch showing proposed partial restoration of Veg. Garden, Executive Office, Arlington National Cemetery,
Arlington, Virginia, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/81055.

1933 Arlington National Cemetery, August 8, 1933, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/81060.

1935 Map of the Arlington National Cemetery showing walks, drives and burial sections, Executive Office of
Arlington National Cemetery, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/ 81048.

1935 Fort Myer Virginia Military Road from East Boundary of Arlington Reservation to the Virginia Approach to
Highway Bridge, Quartermaster General's Office, inap files, Arlington House Archives.

[1935] Arlington Reservations, Virginia comprising, Fort Myer Military Reservation, Arlington National Cemetery,
Department of Agriculture Experimental Farm, Naval Radio Station and Department of the Interior Reservation, TIC
Files, NCR Archives, 855/81071.

1935 Arlington Reservation Virginia Fort Myer Military Reservation, Arlington National Cemetery, Department of
Agriculture Experimental Farm and Naval Radio System, War Department, Washington D.C., TIC files, NCR
Archives, 855/81070.

1939 Map of the Arlington National Cemetery Fort Myer Virginia, showing location of various utilities, waterlines
sewers drains, telephone and power cables, etc., August 1939, map files, Arlington House Archives

1940 Arlington House, Historic American Buildings Survey, Public Works Administration, Program Federal
Project # 498-A, including “East Elevation overlay slowing plan and elevation of proposed planting for Lee
Mansion”, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/80055.

1940 Arlington National Cemetery Virginia, Topographic and Cadastral Map. September 1940, Quartermaster
General’s Office, Cartographic Division, RG 92, NARA I.

[1940] Potomac River at Washington, D.C., Virginia Channel, condition after dredging, U.S. Engineering
Office, no date, map files, Arlington House Archives.

[1940] No name, shows topography of Arlington National Cemetery, no date, map files Arlington House
Archives.

1941 Existing and Proposed Bounds of Mansion Area, November 29, 1941, Arlington National Cemetery, Fort
Myer, Virginia, Arlington House Archives.

MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY | 223


deciduous trees such as oak, hickory and chesmut became more prevalent as the climate
warmed and the sea level rose. Paleo-Indians are believed to have organized into social groups
to facilitate the movement required to utilize the natural resources necessary for survival. Such
migration would have followed the patterns of plant growth, animal movements, and lithic
locations.’ Archeological evidence in the Chesapeake Bay area reveals that the subsistence
strategies of native peoples included the hunting of deer and elk, the gathering of plants and
the procurement of aquatic resources such as fish and shellfish. The likely locations for the
exploitation of these natural resources would have been along the headwaters of sinall streams
with poorly drained soils. Due to the increased sea level of contemporary conditions, such
areas are primarily saltwater marshes today.’ Interestingly, an analysis of the Paleo-Indian sites
excavated in the Middle Atlantic Region reveals that “over two-thirds of all [known Paleo-
Indian] sites are located in the transition zone between the Coastal Plain and the Piedmont

95

physiographic provinces.”* Though the site of Arlington House falls into this general area, no
specific archeological deposits have yet been found which contain artifacts dating to the Paleo-
Indian period.*

The Archaic period is defined by its temperate ecosystem and the formation of the
Chesapeake estuary. This period is commonly divided into three sub-periods, the Early,
Middle and Late. Early Archaic sites (7800-5300 B.C) identified within the general region of
the Middle Atlantic tend to be quite small in size. Throughout the Archaic period, American
Indian subsistence was based on hunting, fishing and the gathering of wild plants. In the
Middle Archaic period (6500-3000 BC), the climate began to get warmer and wetter and sea-
sonal change became much more pronounced. Subsistence economies expanded with
resources exploited on a seasonal basis. Not until the Late Archaic period (3000-1200 BC),
however, did some prehistoric groups begin living for extended periods of time in permanent
or semi-permanent villages.’ Steatite bowls, in addition to other domestic tools such as fire-
cracked rock hearths and storage pits, are characteristic of the Late Archaic period as well. A
shard of a steatite bow! was found in Section 29 of the Arlington House property, suggesting
that the area was utilized at least as early as the Late Archaic period. While only one of the
artifacts was temporally diagnostic in the archeological investigation of Section 29, unearthed
scattered lithic tools and debris provided evidence of prehistoric quarrying for quartzite and
quartz." The majority of these artifacts were associated with the extraction of lithic material,
not the creation of tools. Workshop areas may have been located on higher ground outside
Section 29, however no archeology was conducted outside the boundaries of the wooded area.

Occupation sites would have most likely been located along the Potomac and on bluffs
and knolls around feeder streams.’ In fact, the transition from a “Halifax sylvan adaptation to
a Susquehanna river adaptation oriented to aquatic resources” has been identified as a chrono-
logical marker of the change from the Middle to Late Archaic period." This is especially cru-

cial to comprehension of the prehistoric use of the land that was to become Arlington, as it is

PALEO-INDIAN PERIOD | 3


76 Granolithic Pavement

around Mansion at Arlington
National Cemetery.
November 8, 1893,
annotated for clarity, 2001

124 | 1880 - 1929

MAINTENANCE AND CHANGE ARLINGTON
HOUSE-"EMPTY AND SPOTLESS”

In the early 1890s, technology was creating an even stronger links among the national
cemetery, Washington, D.C. and other surrounding communities. The Arlington and Falls
Church Electric Railway ran to the northwest of Arlington House and stopped at the Fort
Myer Gate into Arlington National Cemetery. To the east of Arlington House, the
Washington, Alexandria and Mount Vernon Electric Railway ran along what had once been
the Alexandria and Georgetown Turnpike, by then renamed the Alexandria and Georgetown
Road. The rail stop
was located at the
Sheridan Gate. By
1893, a paved walk,
later named the
“Custis Walk”,
extended from the
Sheridan Gate
entrance up the
slope to Arlington
House. Benches
were built to pro-
vide seating along
the walk.

Between 1873
and 1890 little had
been done to

g
e
2
E
a
:
EH

improve the surface of roads with macadam or other paving. According to the recollections of
Rhodes, during times of heavy rains the gravel roads through the cemetery and the ground
around Arlington House would become a “quagmire and almost impassable.” This was espe-
cially true during times of high use, such as in the spring of 1892 when the Grand Army of the
Republic encampment was held in Washington, D.C. The large group of Army veterans vis-
ited the damp grounds of Arlington House and turned lawns and drives into a “quagmire.”!¢
Shortly thereafter, proposals were made to lay granolithic paving around Arlington, providing
for ease of movement and maintenance.!7 By 1893 granite pavers and scored concrete paving
surrounded the entire house, for the first time providing a circulation route around the
northern wing of the mansion. At this same time, asphalt pavement was laid on the main drive
between the mansion and the western or Fort Myer entrance. In addition, a granolithic side-

walk was laid near to and parallel with the north side of the drive from Arlington House to




the

garden and the redesign of

94 This 1932 plan for
“restoration of the flower

the Tomb of the Unknown

Civil War Soldier,” with
its parterre flower beds,

is similar to the flower garden

at Mount Vernon.

The 1932 design was never

152 |

implemented.

1929 - 2001

built over the well west of the mansion.2? By 1931, most of the concrete paving surrounding
the mansion and outbuildings had been replaced with gravel. Following the plan of 1930,
brick walks were installed to connect the kitchen garden with the main house, slave quarters
and comfort station. The use of brick not only conformed to the theories of Colonial Revival
design, it created a hierarchy of circulation on the grounds, helping to guide the one million
visitors who passed through the site each summer. Lilac, yew and boxwood lined the walk to
the greenhouse and screened the comfort station. A iron dinner bell was erected near the com-
fort station. Nevertheless, the restoration of the historic Arlington kitchen garden had not
begun due, in part, to the need to tear down the cemetery greenhouse first.30

By 1932 the restoration of the structures, the main house and two slave quarters, was
almost completed. ‘The summer kitchen had been restored in the bottom floor of the north-
ern slave quarters. However changes to the landscape since the 1860s, namely the construc-
tion of the comfort station to the immediate north of the slave quarters, required that the
openings to the kitchen be placed on the south fagade of the slave quarters instead of the his-
torically accurate north facade. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the ground to
the north and east of the northern slave quarters most likely sloped down from the main house
towards the kitchen, allowing for ground level access from the northern side to the ground
level, banked summer kitchen. The interior of the summer kitchen was re-excavated as it had
been filled close to or just after the Lee family’s departure, and plantings screening the railings
around the entrances to the lower floor were made.

Yet it was not only the comprehensive restoration of Arlington House, its gardens

and grounds,
that captured
the attention of
the public. ‘The
improvement
of surrounding
memorials -
particularly the
‘Tomb of the
Un-known
Civil War

Soldier - also

warranted
attention. Beginning with the construction of the ‘Tornb to the Unknown Soldier in 1921 and
continuing up until the Second World War, Civil War veterans and their descendants, as well as
patriotic societies and the Secretary of War himself, expressed concern that the Civil War mon-

ument, located behind the flat terrace of the former flower garden, was not given enough promi-


24 | 1608 - 1802

CONCLUSION

Perhaps the landscapes of Mount Vernon and the infant federal city across the water provided
inspiration for the eventual development of the Arlington estate. It is difficult to say with cer-
tainty. Regardless, the views of the surrounding landscape were the result of hundreds of years
of slow development. The fields at the base of G.W.P.’s sloping property were created by the
tenants of John Alexander, or perhaps earlier by Algonquian tribes. G.W.P.’s father, John
Parke Custis, had purchased this property thirty years prior because of its location, its aspect,
and its aesthetic potential as a grand estate. Yet he never had the chance to fulfill his vision.
There was no physical evidence of his ownership on the land, save for the tenant houses and
rough fields near the Potomac. In the new century, improvements in transportation connect-
ing this land to the markets of Georgetown, Washington and Alexandria would help create the
economic environment in which the estate could develop. Just over a year would pass before
Custis would begin in earnest to build the grand monument to his heritage—the Arlington

House estate.

14 Estates associated with
the lives of the Custis and Lee
families are overlaid on a
map of modern day Virginia.


The “heights of Arlington”, as the estate was described in local papers, promised strate-
gic advantages for both the northern and southern forces, so high above the city of
Washington. Yet to the Union, occupation of Arlington was crucial, for without it the defense
of the capital was jeopardized. The Lees knew this and expected the Union forces to take pos-
session very soon. The carpets were rolled up. The curtains taken down. The most valuable
belongings, including some of the Washington relics, were sent to Richmond and
Ravensworth, where the family was to stay. Everything was boxed, stored in closets or locked
in the attic. With Robert in Richmond, her youngest children safe at Ravensworth, and prepa-
rations for departure made, Mary Lee waited. She wrote in disbelief to her husband:

I never saw the country more beautiful, perfectly radiant. The yellow jasmine in full bloom
and perfuming the air, but a death like stillness prevails everywhere. You bear no sounds
from Washington, not a soul moving about.\48

A few days later, acceding to the pleas of her husband who was afraid for her safety, Mary Lee
departed Arlington with a few of her slaves, leaving others behind to tend and possibly protect
the estate.

Under a full moon on the night of May 23, 1861, a column of eight thousand men
marched across the Potomac, over Long Bridge and spread out over the low land of Arlington

and on towards Alexandria.!4? The war had begun.

CONCLUSION

Arlington, begun in 1802 by George Washington Parke Custis, was influenced by many fac-
tors. The organization of the estate—the formal flower garden, utilitarian yard, Park, forest,
slave quarters, fields, farm and spring—each reflected the physical structure demanded by an
early nineteenth-century slave economy. The landscape also illustrated the aesthetic tastes of
both the individuals involved with the site and the era in which they lived. The role of George
Washington Parke Custis as the bearer of the legacy of George Washington was revealed in
the design of Arlington House, in the creation of a classical mansion “visible with half an
eye.”!50 In the conception of Arlington Spring as a retreat for the middle-class, Custis pro-
vided an audience for his own stories, helping to assure the continuation of this legacy. The
farm next to the spring on the flat pocosin of the Potomac, while not large, met many of the
needs of the Custis and Lee families and the approximately sixty slaves who lived on the prop-
erty. However the other two estates, White House and Romancock, provided the funds nec-
essary for the development of Arlington and the financial security, such as it was, of Custis and

1802 - 1861 | 65


awnings jutting out over new window sash. A large parking lot extended around the building.
It was named the Chaffee Place public parking after the cemetery superintendent whose new
Colonial Revival-style house was nearby. A large greenhouse, a replacement for the one torn
down in the kitchen garden, extended west from the back of the administrative building. This
work was completed by April of 1935.

With the greenhouse removed from the immediate vicinity of Arlington House, the
work of restoring the kitchen garden could begin in earnest. According to newspaper reports
and the documentation of the army and National Park Service, only fragmentary evidence
served as the basis for the restoration of the kitchen garden. The Quartermaster Generals
Office, under Colonel Mortimer and L.M. Leisenring, followed the landscape treatment plan
created in 1930 by the army and approved by the Commission of Fine Arts.

By the summer of 1934, once the old clay and debris had been hauled out and 100 cubic
yards of top soil brought in, the kitchen garden had been divided into two main beds. The

97 The potting building
remained at the northeastern
corner of the kitchen garden,
after the greenhouse was
removed. photograph 1938.

156 | 1929 - 2001

eastern plot was in
the location of the
former green-
house. The west-
ern bed had been
created years earli-
er by cemetery
staff as a planting
space to acclimate
greenhouse
i seedlings to the
i outdoors. A low
| boxwood _ hedge

had been planted
around this rectangular bed about 1932. Concurrently, shrubs were planted to screen the
comfort station. To complete the symmetry of the design, a low boxwood hedge was added
around the newly-built eastern bed. In addition to a perimeter brick walk around the entire
garden, a brick walk ran north to south through the center of the garden, dividing the eastern
and western plots from one another. A cruciform-shaped turf walk then divided the interior
of the two plots, creating a total of eight planting beds. The gravel drive, constructed in the
1880s to access the greenhouse, remained in place along the western border of the garden.
According to the design plans, the entire garden was to be surrounded by a fence on the out-
side of the perimeter brick walk. The fence was never constructed, most likely for lack of
funds. By the summer of 1934 perennial and annual flowers had been planted in the outside

borders of the garden. Vegetables, bulbs and young seedlings were growing in the interior.*°


192 | ENDNOTES

142 “Transcript of R.E. Lee’s Return to the Court as Executor of G.W.P. Custis’ Estate for Period 1857 and 1858,
Will Book 7, page 485. ARHO.

143 National Intelligencer, June 29, 1858.
144 Nelligan, 424-425.
145 RE. Lee to George Washington Custis Lee, July 4, 1860, R.E. Lee Papers, Library of Congress.

146 Lee had commanded the Federal forces at Harpers Ferry during the raid there in October of 1859. Freedman.
Lee. I, 395f. See also Nelligan, 426,

147 Robert E. Lee to George Washington Custis Lee, January 23, 1861. ARHO
148 Mary Lee to Robert FE. Lee, May 9, 1861, Ely-DeButts Collection. Library of Congress. ARHO.

149 At the same time as this group of soldiers crossed, another smaller group crossed the Aqueduct Bridge from
Georgetown, while a third regiment came ashore in Alexandria. Nelligan, 463.

150 Robert E. Lee to Mary Custis Lee, April 24, 1832, Ely-Debutts Collection. Library of Congress. ARHO

CHAPTER FOUR

'R.E. Lee to Mary Lee, December 25, 1861. ARHO

2 A tete-de-pont is a field earthwork created to protect a bridge.

3 Clark Emmons, History of the Seventh Regiment of New York (New York: The Seventh Regiment 1890): 201.
4 Ibid, 199-201.

5 “Letter from the 8th Regiment Headquarters of General Sandford”, New York Times. May 29, 1861. “Washington
Sunday June 9, 1861.” New York Times, Junc 13, 1861.

6 Major-General Charles W. Standford. May 25, 1861 as quoted in The History of the Seventh Regiment.

7 Diary of S.P. Heintzelman. May 26, 1861. Heintzelman Papers. Library of Congress. Manuscript Division;
Neligan, 465.

8 Mary Lee to General Sandford, May 30, 1861. Transcript in Lee Papers, Virginia Historical Society.
9 New York Tribune May 27, 1861. ARHO.

10 Mary Lee to General Sandford, May 30, 1861.; “An inventory of the slaves at Arlington belonging to the estates
of G.W.P. Custis taken January 1, 1858.” Will Book 7. Alexandria County Records: 368-378. ARHO.

11 New York Tribune May 27, 1861.

12 Fred W. Conklin to “Charley.” December 16, 1861. ARHO. Robert Goldthwaite Carter, April 25, 1862 as quot-
ed in Four Brothers in Blue (Washington, Press of Gibson Bros., Inc., 1913).

13Joseph Reidy, “Coming from the Shadow of the Past: The Transition from Slavery to Freedom at Freedmen’s
Village, 1863-1900.” The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography: 408.


182 | ENDNOTES

CHAPTER THREE

This building was most likely the house, identified by a 1746 map of the Howsing tract as belonging to a tenant
of Gerard Alexander during the period of time in which the map was created, Howsing ‘Tract Map surveyed by
Daniel Jennings 1750; Tract map dated March 31, 1746, Surveyor Jeremiah Hampton et. al. George Washington
Memorial Parkway Headquarters, Natural Resource Map Files, Turkey Run, Virginia. A pocosin is a swamp or
marsh especially in an interfluvial area of the coastal plain of the southeastern United States.

2 Custis began construction of Arlington House in 1802, though it was not called Arlington House until 1804.
Arnest, Harry Lee and John D. Sligh. Historic Structure Report, Architectural Data Section, Phase II. (National Park
Service, Department of Interior 1985): 11.

3 Karl Decker and Angus MeSween. Historic Arlington. (Decker and McSween Publication: Washington, D.C.
1892). According to the authors, Decker and McSween, the house of the former manager/overseer of Arlington
farm was still standing in 1892. See also, Environs of Washington prepared from original surveys in the Engineer
Department 1864. Map (U.S. War Department. Office of the Chief of Engineers. Headquarters Office):
Cartographic and Architectural Branch RG 77. National Archives at College Park, MD. U.S. Coast Survey. A.D.
Bache Supdt. Part of Arlington Virginia, Surveyed for M.C. Meigs, QMGUSA. 1864. Library of Congress, Mapping
Division. Copy ARHO.

4 This 18,000 acres includes approximately, Mount Washington/Arlington House (1100), Washington Forest ‘Tract
(1200), Mockin and Smith’s Islands (6,000), Romancock (4656), White House (5,000) and Arlington on the Eastern
Shore (537). For lists of inherited slaves see, W.W. Abbot, editor of The Papers of George Washington Volume 6,
Colonial Series. “Schedule A: Assignment of the Widow's Dower.” (Charlottesville : University Press of Virginia,
1983-1995): 217-220; Prussing, Eugene Ernst. The Estate of George Washington, Deceased. (Boston: Little, Brown and
Company 1927): 448-459,

5 John Michael Vlach, Back of the Big House. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press 1993): 8. In 1860
there were only about 2300 plantations at which 100 or more slaves were owned in the slave holding states. Though
these slaves were not located all at one plantation, the mere fact that Custis owned outright so many individuals, is
a clear indication of his position in southern aristocracy.

6 Recorded April 4, 1803 in Deed Book E, Alexandria County, D.C.: 127-132, 133-135.

7 Eugene Ernst Prussing, The Estate of George Washington, Deceased. (Boston: Little, Brown and Company 1927):
448-459 and “Worthy partner” : The Papers of Martha Washington compiled by Joseph E. Fields, (Westport, CN:
Greenwood Press, 1994): 102-107.

8 Almost twenty years earlier, George Washington had received donkeys from both the King of Spain and
Lafayette. After a few false starts, he was highly successful in breeding mules. Those that Custis purchased at the
public sale were descendants of the original stock. See John C. Fitzpatrick. The Writings of George Washington, 1745-
1799. Volume 28. (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1931-1944): 426. and G, Terry Sharrer’s. “An
Undebauched Mind: Farmer Washington at Mount Vernon 1759-1799” in Magnolia: Bulletin of the Southern
Garden History Society. Winter 1999-2000.

» Prussing, 448-459.

10 G.W-P. Custis to Alexander Moore, Alexandria Virginia. February 15, 1843. Custis Family Papers, Mount
Vernon.



42 | 1802-1861

I attacked an ash pocosin [swamp], with Irishmen, some four years ago, dyked and ditched
... which kept out the tide and drained the surface sufficiently for cultivation. In March
4 part of it was standing in wood... . The wood was cut off, the brush burnt and the first
of June men brought on their backs, bales of corn plants- without horse, plough or hoe-they
made a hole with a sharpened stick and thrust in the plants, all of which lived and flour-
ished and after receiving two hoeings to keep down the weeds, the crop ripened to the tune
of at least 20 bushels the acre . . . indeed a tangled forest of corn.66

Custis recognized the value of soil fertility in sustaining such yields and quickly pointed
out the unique characteristics of the ash pocosin that created such results. He also urged the

reclamation of these marshes throughout the area.

An ash pocosin is not an affair of mud and bulrushes, as most marshes are, but a collection
of vegetable matter, decaying since the time of father Noah . . .Stock kept constantly on this
land is a great advantage to it, giving it [the land] firmness, and preventing the growth of
weeds. . . In this case the green sward soon roots out the wild growth, and gives the very
finest pasture. The dykes are always planted with pumpkins and afford a very great crop.67

Custis continued to experiment with different crops on his reclaimed marsh land. For
instance, in a letter to his wife Mary Custis in 1839 he mentions his plans to grow hops and
pasture hogs on the drained pocosin. He also laments the loss of the cabbage crop and the
promising celery—most likely both grown in the market garden on the farm. Like all farm-
ers, Custis was reliant on the economics of the market and on the weather. Some years were
worse than others. In 1830 Custis requested leniency on a bank loan due to the “poor condi-
tion of agriculture in the area.”6? Always attempting to increase his income, Custis experi-
mented with various agricultural techniques. For example, though a post and rail fence was
used around the kitchen garden, a ditch and fence combination enclosure on Arlington Farm,

as described in the following passage:

The great value of wood in this part of the country, together with the perishable nature of
its fencing (locust, cedar and chestnut excepted, which are very expensive) induced me to try
an experiment in banking and ditching, for the purposes of enclosure. I first cut a ditch of
five feet in width and three feet in depth, and leaving an offset of nine inches, sodded the
face of the bank, fronting on the road, of a western exposure. The bank was topped by a
fence of two old rails. The sodding has stood well the effect of three winters; the offset peeled
away by the post which has induced me to dispense with it, and sod entirely to the bottom
of the ditch. The height from the bottom of the ditch to the top of the bank is now eight
feet; two rails make about two feet more... an enclosure thus made is proof against the
inroads of all kinds of trespassing animals . . . and nobody burns it-nobody steals it . . .7°


his dependants. Mary Custis’s marriage to Robert E. Lee did little to alter the development of
the estate directly, for Lee was rarely there, though his emotional attachment to the home was
very strong. Arlington House, perched high on the slope overlooking the city of Washington,
conformed perfectly to the ideals of a nineteenth-century, picturesque, family-seat. Such a
commanding prospect also met the strategic needs of the Union forces. Only then did the

legacy of Arlington House as the “Lee Mansion” begin.

66 | 1802 - 1861


As in villages of freed slaves elsewhere, steps were taken to remove the inhabitants and their

homes from Arlington. Due to the ensuing controversy, however, the residents of Freedmen's

Village were allowed to
remain. An inventory of
the residents, buildings and
other improvements was
made and the individuals
were allowed to purchase
their homes. The federal
government retained own-
ership of the land, in addi-
tion to the right to evict the
residents with little notice.
Between 1866 and 1868
about four hundred acres of
land—property outside of
the boundary of the
National Cemetery but
within the original bound-

aries of the estate—was

60 Approximately four
hundred acres of land
surrounding Freedmen’s
Village was divided up into
10 acre parcels and rented to
Freedmen’s Village residents

divided up into parcels
averaging ten acres each

and rented to the Freed-

5 . s
men's Villagers in an 3 ‘for agricultural use in 1868.
attempt to increase their 7 Only a portion of the map
: 3 (1868) has been found
financial autonomy. Land = thus far.
=a
3

was cleared where feasible

and used to grow crops
including corn fodder, buckwheat, and potatoes.!5 In addition to cultivating the surrounding
fields, many of the villagers were employed by the cemetery and at Fort Whipple as day
laborers. !6

Former slaves of Arlington, including Martha Smith, Daniel Richardson, Margaret
Taylor, and Lawrence, James and William Parks, lived in the village and on the scattered ten-
acre farms.!7 Yet only one family, the Syphax's, claimed legal ownership of the land upon
which they lived and worked.!8 Maria Syphax and her descendants had lived on the parcel, a
seventeen acre triangle cut out of the southern border of the original estate, for forty years.
With the entire estate under federal ownership, the children of Maria and her husband Charles
Syphax were worried that they might lose their property, as no official deed had recorded the

1865-1880 | 101


CHAPTER TWO

' Pierre L'Enfant refers to, in notes and labels on his maps, the site of the furure White House as the “Presidential
Palace.” See Plan of the City Intended for the Permanent Seat of the Government of the United States, Facsimile of man-
uscript in John Rep's Washington On View: The Nation's Capital since 1790. (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North
Carolina Press 1991), 20-21. Description also aided through analysis of “A Map of Washington, D.C. : The evolu-
tion of the center of two centuries of growth and change” by Joseph Passonneau and Partners. The map of condi-
tions in 1800 was created by TLL. Loftin. It is an exact tracing from a 1798 version of the LEnfant design for
Washington. Buildings and locations on the Loftin’s map are identified through the use of the 1800 survey made

for President Jefferson.

2 Thomas Froncek, An Mlustrated History: The City of Washington. (New York: Alfred A. Knopf 1977): 10. Stephen
R. Potter, Commoners, Tribute, and Chiefs: The Development of Algonquian Culture in the Potomac Valley,
(Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993), 8-14.

3 The men set sail on December 20, reached Virginia and established the colony of Jamestown in April. As the
months passed, unrest increased within the colony due to the lack of supplies, harsh weather, quickly disseminating
disease and a perceived laziness of some colonists by others. Sick of the arguments, eager to make a fortune and
desperate to find food for the colony, Smith left Jamestown to explore and map the Chesapeake Bay region. What
he found, as he traveled by boat with his crew as far as the Potomac fall line at Little Falls, was not uninhabited
wilderness. Instead he encountered many different groups of Algonquian Indians living along the shores. For infor-
mation concerning the development of land property law in Virginia see, The Statures at Large: Being a Collection of
All the Laws of Virginia from the First Session of the Legislature in the Year 1619, Second Edition. (New York). 1823.

4 Two of John Smith’s books on Virginia were Map of Virginia (1612), and General [sic] History of Virginia, New
England and the Summer Isles (1624). They provide a portrait of the colony of Virginia during the early seventeenth
century, though colored by contemporaneous ethnocentrism.

5 Near Little Falls, the Algonquian Indian groups on the Maryland shore were the Nacotchtanks, Piscataways,
Pamunkeys, Najemoys, Potapacos and Yacomacos. The groups living on the Virginia shore were the Tauxenents,
Patawomekes, Matchotics, Chicacoans and Wicocmocos. Potter, 11.

6 Conoy was the name given to the group of Algonquian-speaking peoples by their Iroquoian-speaking enemies.
According to a description contained in a letter written in 1639 by a Jesuit priest, the extent of the Conoys’ terri-
tory, as determined by the control of the paramount chief, included land from St. Mary’s County, Maryland to
Washington, D.C. Such a dominion possibly included the lands on the Virginia side of the Potomac River from a
point opposite the city of Washington to below Mount Vernon. As such, the Conoy dominion most likely includ-
ed the lands that would become the Arlington Estate. Potter, 19. See also Clayton Colman Hall’s Narratives of Early
Maryland, (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1925): 125.

7 Potter, 23. Paul Cissna estimates approximately 3600 people in the Conoy group total, most located on the
Maryland side of the Potomac River circa 1608. Paul Cissna Historical and Archeological Study of the George
Washington Memorial Parkway, Arlington County, VI. Occasional Report #4, National Capital Region, (Washington,
D.C.: Department of Interior, 1990).

8John Smith, The True Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captain Jobn Smith in Europe, Asia , Africa and America:
and The Generall History of Virginia, New England and the Summer Isles, Books I-III, Edited with introduction and
notes by E.A. Benians, (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1908); 109. Also quoted in Commoners,
Tribute and Chief, 24.

9 Smith, The True Travels, Adventures and Observations of Captain John Smith .. ., 109

ENDNoTES | 175


country where sufficient space and appropriate climate and soils allowed. It was to consist of a
“grove of five avenues with center about the oval in the Western part of the grounds to be
crossed by five avenues at right angles so as to make a shaded hall of verdure and a grove of
weeping willows near the south gate where the ground is favorable.” The Sylvan Hall was
planted in the southwest corner of the cemetery around an elongated oval cul-de-sac in 1870.25

For the most part, however, the energies and funds of the War Department were focused
on burial and the improvement of existing resources. In spring of 1864 a circular drive was
laid out in the northwest corner of the property to access graves located there. ‘The carriage
roads that wound around Arlington House during the time of the Custis and Lee families were
regraded and redefined. The drive that circled around the work yard west of the house was
reestablished, as was the circular turn-around to the east of the northern wing. The roads that

had been added during the war; the road between the southern slave quarters and the flower

63 Both the roads of the
Custis-era and those that
were constructed during the
Civil War, were restored fol-
Jowing the creation of the
national cemetery. Detail of
map U.S. National Ce
Arlington Virginia. 1869,
annotated for clarity, 2001

104 | 1805 - 1880

$2 Ffrcow rane

garden, and the road that descended down the hillside from west of the mansion to the
Georgetown and Alexandria Turnpike were reconditioned. Circulation links were also neces-
sary to connect the burial plots with the cemetery headquarters of Arlington House and sur-
rounding public roads. One burial location on the grounds, the “Lower Cemetery,” was locat-
ed in the low-lying northeast corner of the property. The other primary burial plot was in the
section called the “National Cemetery,” on the higher elevation of the southwestern corner.?6
In 1869 a road was built along the northern boundary of the cemetery. Yet even by 1870,
though the cemetery roads were recorded in good condition, scars from the four-and-a-half

years military occupation were everywhere.27

At every few rods one encounters remains of old redoubts and entrenchment, sometimes
occupying the summits of little knolls and sometimes standing threateningly upon the bare
plains. Across the embrasures of the forts, trees have grown, in leaning postures; the gun-

‘Arlington House Archives,


George Washington Memorial Parkway Archives

John Alexander's will, executed in 1690, bequeathed 6,550 acres of land, including the
original Howsing tract property to his sons Robert and Philip.** The northwestern boundary
of the patent was the line which currently delineates Arlington National Cemetery and Fort
Myer. The southern boundary followed Great Hunting Creek, called Indian Cabin Creek in
the patent. The eastern boundary was the Potomac River. ‘Pokecory’ trees, the Indian name
for hickory trees, marked the southwestern boundary. My Lord’s Island, now known as
Theodore Roosevelt Island, was included.” In 1693 Philip gave Robert his portion of the land,
excluding 500 acres which he retained for himself.*

Robert Alexander died in 1735 leaving to his children 4,930 acres of land. To his two
daughters, Parthena and Sarah, he bequeathed eight hundred acres. Pearson’s Island (16 acres
located south of Four Mile Run) he left to his son John who resided on the island. Holines
Island (302 acres, just north of Four Mile Run) and 1,125 acres adjoining Holmes Island he
conferred to his son Gerrard. Each of these tracts were described in the will as having slaves
and stock located upon them.” This left approximately 2,500 acres which was divided between
the sons John and Gerrard—with John taking the land south of Four Mile Run and Gerrard
taking that to the north. These land inheritances were, as typical in eighteenth-century
Virginia, entailed.” Such a method of property conveyance assured that land ownership would

remain in the same families for generations. John and Gerrard, however, were determined to

aoknipe —_

Pr waplanation of Pat oe = a
a |e =¥E3 a ar . <

ance |G Leh ES aed Faded. Dhak ote ony

2a 2 fr a9 | Gace lanes) ES De
Ann | tod ja Hie 2

ance | Si vical

Stn |e a tw (roi

ot | Prone mands ane . mere)

a oa ee we

eh be

Bis BoE ERPS
He ; dew ef see aor

uy yaad Bb

own their inherited land in fee simple—which allowed them the right to sell the land or divide
the property through their wills without the bonds of predetermined issue. They were suc-
cessful in their suit to acquire the absolute ownership of their land, reconveying to John
Alexander 1,421 acres and to Gerrard Alexander 2,713 acres total in fee simple in 1745." All
of the land north of Four Mile Run, including the property which would eventually become
the Arlington Estate, belonged to Gerrard.”

7 This survey was created in
1746, shortly following the
division of the Howsing

Tract between brothers,
Gerrard and John Alexander.

—————_____

1608 - 1802 | 11


By the time the Arlington Memorial Bridge opens a new and picturesque route to the
National Cemetery another shrine of universal interest to Americans restored to its origi-
nal state will be thrown open to the public.54

CONCLUSION

85 Arlington National

Cemetery from the air,
61925

3
a
&
3

The exact objective of the restoration was not yet clear; regardless it had begun. The
fight over the objectives of the restoration would profoundly shape the development of the
landscape. Would the new design reflect the colonial period of Custis and Washington, or
would it instead mirror the early Victorian characteristics of the 1860s as a “shrine” to General
Lee? Over eighty years had passed since the Tomb of the Unknown Civil War Soldier was
placed in the grove south of Arlington House. Now monuments and memorials rose from the
green hillsides in all directions. Across the Potomac River, Washington, D.C. had expanded
exponentially. Arlington National Cemetery was linked to surrounding communities through
rails, rivers and roads. Though the cemetery and the country remained racially segregated, the
sectionalism that had affected Arlington and America was healing in the face of new interna-
tional struggles. In the coming years, the restoration of Arlington House and grounds would

occur within this complex environment.

136 | 1880 - 1929


Major Mortimer responded that screening the gravestones from the west was fine, but that
they should still be visible from the east.48

With the end of World War II in 1945, a bed of hybrid tea “Peace” roses was planted
immediately east of the southern slave quarters. Elsewhere around the grounds, evidence of

deferred maintenance was visible, especially in the plantings. In addition, some landscape ele-

ments thought to pose
hazards to visitors were
addressed. For in-
stance, shortly after the
war, the assistant super-
intendent wrote to
request that the “wick-
ets”, the thick, scal-
loped, wire edging sep-
arating the planting
beds from the walks to
prevent people from
taking short cuts across
the beds, be replaced
with a short hedge to prevent visitors from stumbling.4? Wisteria and trumpet vine were
smothering the outbuildings, their thick tendrils working under the historic stucco.5° With
the war over and the grounds of Arlington House in need of rehabilitation, the wording of the
legislation that had transferred Arlington House and the slaves’ quarters from the Department
of War to the Department of the Interior was revisited. Jurisdiction over and management of
the grounds was confusing. In 1947, it was determined that the executive order pursuant to
the 1933 transfer of Arlington House could be construed to allow for the transfer of enough
land to maintain the structures and interpret the site as a national memorial. The phrase
“enough land” was determined to take in the land of the kitchen garden, including the potting
building and the yard area. It did not include the comfort station and the land upon which it
sat near the northern slave quarters, nor did it include the flower garden south of the mansion.
In total, 97000 square feet or 2.374 acres was transferred in fee simple to the National Park
Service.*!

With the legal transfer of this portion of the original Arlington estate property, the
National Park Service embarked on a massive vegetative rehabilitation and redesign. Irving
Payne, Chief Landscape Architect for the Buildings and Grounds Division of National Capital
Parks within the National Park Service, had created a plan for the redesign of the grounds to
the east and west of Arlington House in 1945, though installation was not planned until March

of 1948.52 In 1948, Payne generated a rehabilitation plan of the northern kitchen garden, first

100 Planting bed of Peace
roses, southwest of Arlington
House, 1967

1929-2001 | 159


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Arlington House rises from a steep hillside, above the eternal flame burning at the gravesite
of John F. Kennedy in Arlington National Cemetery. Overlooking the city of Washington,
D.C. the classical Greek Revival residence and its surrounding gardens, ringed with the
graves of Union officers, reveals only part of the story of this now sacred landscape. This
first volume of The Cultural Landscape Report for Arlington House: The Robert E. Lee
Memorial traces the development of this landscape through narrative and graphics by peel-
ing away the layers of human purposes and values to record physical change on the formerly
1100-acre property.

The Arlington House estate was begun around 1802 by the adopted grandson of George
Washington, George Washington Parke Custis, as a stage upon which to demonstrate his
worthiness as the bearer of his revered grandfather's legacy. Perched high on the hillside, the
mansion was designed to be impressive from a great distance - even from far across the river
in Washington. Arlington Spring, a public resort at the edge of the property, next door to
the quarters of the slaves who worked the fields, served as the place for Custis’s patriotic tales
of grandeur. His audience sometimes numbered in the thousands.

Thirty years later, Custis’s daughter Mary married Robert E. Lee, the future leader of the
southern army during the Civil War. But prior to the decision that drew him into the arms
of the Confederacy, Robert E. Lee considered Arlington his home. Lee was rarely in resi-
dence nor was he owner of the property: he was a soldier who spent most of his time cam-
paigning with the army that was protecting the nation’s expansion to the west. Only after
Custis’s death in 1857, did Lee come back to Virginia to manage Arlington fully. Of course,
Robert E. Lee had only a few short years to farm.

For, with the onset of the Civil War, Arlington’s commanding prospect also met the strategic
needs of the Union forces. In May 1861 they took over the estate as the headquarters of the
Army of the Potomac. Within a few years, newly free African Americans, some of whom had
been slaves at Arlington, were renting lands of the former estate, now divided by the gov-
ernment into ten-acre parcels surrounding a Freemen’s Village. Finally, when the time came
to bury the tens of thousands of named and unnamed soldiers, who died in the Civil War,
Arlington again was chosen. The first burials on the estate - on land that would become, by
the end of the Spanish American War, the nation’s cemetery - were made next to the ceme-
tery of Freedmen’s Village.

Most land development is intricately entwined with environment, economics, politics and
personal aspiration. At Arlington, however, the land has been appropriated over and over
again by those whose ideas were national in scope. After congressional debate and popular
argument, in 1925 Arlington House became a memorial to Robert E. Lee. At Arlington the
interactions between cultures are etched into the ground. Before Arlington House was a
memorial, it was the center of maintenance for the cemetery. The flower garden was cut in
half with monuments, the work yard swept clean. Since 1933, the National Park Service has
owned and managed Arlington House and interpreted this remarkable place to the public.
Most of the research, site analysis and writing for this document was completed between 1999
and 2001. Research into the experiences of those who lived and worked on the Arlington
property continues.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | IX


186 | ENDNOTES

Gardens in the Eighteenth Century: Eighteen Illustrated Essays on Garden History. Ed. Robert P, Maccubbin and Peter
Martin. (Colonial Williamsburg Foundation: Williamsburg Virginia 1984), 102.

49 Tt has been suggested that the building materials for Arlington House were taken from the site. This is difficult
to prove or disprove. Nelligan, 74.

50 Fanning, 35.

51 John Mason on Anolostan Island employed a well known gardener, David Hepburn. He would go on to write
with John Gardiner in 1804, one of the earliest horticultural treatises to include aspects of ornamental garden
design in America-The American Gardener containing ample directions for working a kitchen garden, every month of the
year and copious instructions for the cultivation of flower gardens, etc. (City of Washington: Samuel A. Smith for Authors
1804).

82 Shawn Eyring, “Chatham Manor Cultural Landscape Inventory.” (Department of Interior, National Park
Service. October 1992).

53 In 1809, at the death of her father, Mary Lee Fitzhugh Custis inherited 800 acres of the Ravensworth estate. In
1830 she inherited approximately 5700 acres of the estate to be kept in trust for Mary Custis Lee, her daughter. In
Mary Custis Lee’s death in 1874, this property was divided amongst her children. For more information on
Ravensworth and this inheritance, see Netherton, Nan. Fairfax County History (Fairfax, Va.: Fairfax County Board
of Supervisors, 1992): 161-163.

54 First known use of the name Arlington House by G.W.P. Custis is in G.W.P. Custis to the Speaker of the House of
Representatives December 11, 1804. (Washington, D.C.; 1804); as cited in Nelligan, 81.

55 The Old Arlington property was sold by G.W.P. Custis sometime in 1832 for $8,500 to John Goffigon Sr. R.E.
Lee to Mrs. Mary Custis August 15, 1832. Library of Congress, Custis Family Manuscripts.

56 For more information on the development of milling in the area see Louis C. Hunter’s A History of Industrial
Power in United States, 1780-1930. (Charlottesville : Published for the Eleutherian Mills-Hagley Foundation by the
University Press of Virginia 1979); See also, The Evolution of Mill Settlement Patterns on Antietam Drainage.
‘Thesis College of William and Mary 1984.

57 Alexandria Gazette, June 19, 1804: 2.

58 Netherton, 194-195. Op cite. Shepherd. Statues at Large, 1: 378-88.

59 National Intelligencer, Nov 24, 1810; Alexandria Gazette Dec 31, 1810. Nelligan, 116.

60 Nelligan, 143.

61 National Intelligencer; November 24, 1809.

62 RE. Lee to Mary Custis, March 20, 1839, DeButts-Ely Manuscripts. Library of Congress. ARHO.

63 ‘This description is based on a variety of sources including, the Insurance Policy for Arlington House written by
Robert E. Lee, dated 1859; U.S. Census Bureau Records 1850, 1860 Agricultural Census, Alexandria County,
Virginia. National Archives. Washington, D.C, Arlington Corral &c. Arlington, VA July 25, 1865 Record Group
77, National Archives. This map, part of a land survey undertaken during the Civil War, documents the locations
of Arlington farm buildings by indicating the former use of Civil War army structures confiscated by the Federal
Army. Environs of Washington Map (1864). National Archives, RG 77.


Arlington House Archives

The additions to the cemetery grounds were accompanied by changes to the structures as well.
New slate roofs were added to the slave quarters, stable and to the wings of the mansion.!
With the settlement of the Lee court case and the disbanding of Freedmen's Village, the
acreage devoted to cemetery use increased. In order to supply the demand for vegetation to
plant out in the grounds, by 1888 a new greenhouse and a potting building had been con-
structed in the eastern half of the what had been the kitchen garden.2- The greenhouse was
one hundred feet long and thirty feet wide, with a brick foundation and glass walls inside an
iron frame. The cornice of a two-story potting building, attached to the immediate north of
the greenhouse, was ornamented with dentils and had a ventilation copula projecting from
each face of the slate-clad hipped roof} An access road between the yard area to the west of
the mansion and the potting house was built along the western edge of what had been the

kitchen garden area.

Between the access
road and greenhouse
were the plant growing
plots. With the con-

struction of these new

Watertower
facilities, the circa- . Ss
1870 greenhouse was : ,

removed from the

flower garden.+

z
i
3

69 Children at well near the

northern slave quarters,
1904

70 This map detail reveals
the location of the greenbouse
as well as the comfort station
to the immediate north of the
northern slave quarters.
Arlington Va. Military
Reservation Fort Myer and
the National Cemetery with
Annex Showing the Road to
Aqueduet Bridge. January
10, 1894.

1880 - 1929 | 119


pierced the eastern slope that rose to the new foundation plantings near the house. Arlington
was, as one woman wrote in 1906 after walking through the unused rooms, “empty and spot-
less.”23

Yet as war had torn the country apart, war would help to heal at least the sectionalism, if
not the racial division, that circumscribed the cemetery grounds.’4 In February of 1898 the
sinking of the American ship the USS Maine in Havana harbor signaled the beginning of the
Spanish-American War. The outcry from the American public, partially spurred by extensive
media reporting, was enormous. The bodies of the American sailors who died in the explo-
sion were brought back to Arlington National Cemetery where the men were buried with hon-
ors and a monument to the sinking of the USS Maine was later erected. Arlington National
Cemetery was no longer, as it had been in the past, primarily associated with the burial of
Union soldiers (regardless of the fact that the existing burials included a relatively small num-
ber of Confederate soldiers as well as
many Freedmen’s Villagers). Instead,
America rallied behind the patriotic
military cause. The tragedy of the
sinking of the Maine unified the
country in its identification of
Arlington as a national cemetery. For
as John Osborne, whose brother had

just died in the war, wrote of

2
aL
3
q
3
2

Arlington House in one of the first official histories of the cemetery:

. . « « Indeed not even hallowed Mount Vernon is so rich in historic associations, for
Arlington is at once the old home of the adopted son of George Washington. . . . the
former home of the principal actor in the drama of the ‘Lost Cause’ and as such endeared
to all Southerners; the last resting-place of thousands of heroic defenders of the Union and
therefore cherished at countless firesides in every Northern State; and, finally, the eternal
bivouac of hundreds of gallant martyrs of our recent war for suffering humanity, by whose

solemn advent Arlington has been consecrated anew as truly a National Cemetery.?5

With renewed vigor, Americans came to the cemetery and to Arlington House—in
honor of Washington, in reverence of Lee, in mourning of those recently lost—all with curios-
ity for a landscape etched deeply with the ideological struggles of the nation. The Spanish-
American War resulted in new graves, new mourners, and new attention to the grounds
around Arlington House. For the former home of Robert F. Lee was integral to the National
Cemetery, was in fact its vortex. The view east from the portico stretched beyond the iron

urns and annuals bordering the front drive, past the granite blocks dedicated to Rear Admiral

80 U.S.S. Maine Memorial,
postcard c.1930

1880-1929 | 127


1964 Restoration of Flower Garden, Custis-Lee Mansion, Arlington National Cemetery, as built drawing, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/80107.

[1965] [Planting plan for south of flower garden], Arlington House Archives.

1965 Jon EF: Kennedy Gravesite Landscape Plan, John Cart, Warnecki and Associates, map files, Arlington House
Archives.

1965  Jobn FE. Kennedy Gravesite Architectural Plan, John Carr, Warnecki and Associates, map files, Arlington
House Archives,

1966 Masterplan Custis-Lee Mansion, 14 sheets, National Park Service, map files, GWMP Archives, Turkey Run,
Virginia.

1974 Road and General Layout, Arlington National Cemetery, Cemetery Division, Office of Support Services,
Department of the Army, Arlington House Archives.

1976 Repair of Cemetery Roads, Arlington National Cemetery, 8 sheets, Department of the Army, Baltimore
District, Corps of Engineers, Arlington House Archives.

1980 Interpretive Exhibit Site Work at Arlington House, George Washington Memorial Parkway, 2 sheets, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/80008.

1981 Repairs to the High Voltage Electrical System, Arlington National Cemetery, 5 sheets, U.S. Army Engineer
District, Baltimore, Corps of Engineers, Arlington House Archives.

1982 Water Service Improvement to Arlington House, Gauthier Alvardo and Associates, Department of Interior,
National Park Service, GWMP Archives, Turkey Run, Virginia.

1982 Arlington House, Historic Structures Report Drawings, 13 sheets, Department of Interior, National Park
Service, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/41009.

[1983] Preliminary Landscape Plan, Arlington House Museum, George Washington Memorial Park, TIC files, NCR
Archives, 855/80011.

1984 Rebabilitation of Arlington House Museum Building, 8 sheets, Arlington National Cemetery, George
Washington Memorial Parkway, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/80011.

1996 South Flower Garden Restoration, Arlington National Cemetery, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/80162.

1996 Arlington National Cemetery Master Plan, 17 sheets, Roadside and Harwell, Incorporated, GWMP
Archives, Turkey Run, Virginia.

MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY | 225


She gained the ear of Senator Louis C. Cramton of Michigan, who would later sponsor the
restoration’s enabling legislation through Congress.

Charles Moore and the Commission of Fine Arts (CFA) became aware of her objectives
concerning the treatment of Arlington House. He was eager to ensure that the CFA, Keyes
and the congressional representatives were all of like minds concerning the Arlington House
and grounds restoration. As he was to find out, however, they were not. He wrote to Frances
Keys in late summer of 1921 after reading her letters in Good Housekeeping Magazine, one
year after the dedication of the classically-styled Arlington Memorial Amphitheater and the
‘Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Ina dispatch from Upperville, Virginia, to the Star of uly 31, your name is given as one
of the leaders of the group of women who will attempt to obtain permission of the
Government to reclaim the historic old residence Arlington, and furnish it. This commis-
sion [CEA] has made plans for the treatment of the grounds around the mansion, with a
view of restoring to them the character of a house of that period. These plans are now before
the Secretary of War for adoption and we have no reason to think that they will not be
adopted since they have been approved by the Quartermaster General... .41

Yet to restore the mansion and grounds to the period of the house’s construction—or the
first fifty years of the Republic as Moore would later term it—was not exactly what Frances
Keyes or Senator Cramton envisioned. Though the actual restoration of the grounds was still
ten years in the future, the plans referred to by Moore in the letter would serve as the basis
for this future restoration. In March 1923, Moore wrote to the Quartermaster General warn-

ing him of the restoration ideas brewing:

There is a movement on foot to have the Mansion furnished, in which movement
Representative R. Walton Moore of Virginia, Representative Louis C. Cramton of
Michigan and others are much interested. Various organizations have proposed to under-
take the task but it has seemed to the Commission of Fine Arts that no one organization
should be permitted to monopolize the work in which there is widespread interest . . . it is
eminently proper that the name Arlington Mansion should be applied to the house and that
it should be refitted both as to the house itself and the grounds immediately surrounding it,
as a home representative of the first fifty years of the Republic of the United States.42

However, with the influence of Frances Parkinson Keyes (who would go on to become
a widely read novelist) and other individuals, a bill to restore Arlington House “as nearly as
practicable to the condition in which it existed immediately prior to the Civil War,” was for-

warded through Congress by Senator Cramton.

1880 - 1929 | 133


26 | 1608 - 1802


188 | ENDNOTES

83 Receipt. “Received of George WP Custis Esq. Eighteen dollars which with other funds before received is in full
of wages for plastering at Arlington House and of all demands.” August 22, 1818. Receipt. “Received of G.W.P.
Custis two hundred dollars on account of his building being fifteen hundred and fifty dollars in cash up to this date.”
August 18, 1818. ARHO.

84 GW. Custis to Cornelius McLean payment receipt for $1550.00 for construction of house. Custis Manuscripts,
Virginia Historical Society. Richmond, Virginia.

85 New York Republican Chronicle. (March 16, 1818) reprinted in the Washington, D.C. Gazette (May 7, 1818), See also
“The Building of Arlington House,” by Murray Nelligan in the ARHO archives. Mary Randolph (1762-1828). The
Virginia House Wife. (Birmingham, Alabama: Oxmoor House, Reprinted 1988).

8 Godfrey T: Vigne, Six Months in America, (London: Whittaker Treacher & Co., 1832), 147 as quoted in Nelligan,
149.

87 David H. Rhodes, “Historic Memories of Arlington National Cemetery by David R. Rhodes, Landscape gar-
dener at Arlington From April 14, 1873 to March 1930. Transcript copy ARHO.

88 Information about the appearance of the ice house is limited. The first map of the site dates to the Civil War and
little historic written documentation dating to ownership the Custis and Lee families addresses the ice house. The
last map which documents the location of the ice house is dated to 1894. For discussion of recent archeology at the
site see Garrow and Associates, Inc. Cultural Resource Investigations at Section 29 at Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee
Memorial, Arlington County, Virginia, September 1998, ARHO

89 “Recollections of Emma Syphax, Sarah Wilson, Annie Baker and Ada Thompson.” Former slaves, 1929. Calvert,
“Childhood Days at Arlington.” ARHO.

90 Elizabeth Randolph Calvert, in her description of the property at the time of the Custis and Lee family use,
describes the room at the western end of the southern slave quarters as a “sleeping room”, not a home or house.
When one considers that eight individuals used this small space for housing, such a reference is not surprising. In
addition, Lee in writing the insurance policy for the property identified the southern building as a store house, not
a quarters. Calvert, Elizabeth Randolph. “Childhood Days at Arlington.” See also Robert E. Lee, Insurance Policy
for Arlington, Dated 1859, ARHO.

1 “Recollections of Emma Syphax, Sarah Wilson, Annie Baker and Ada Thompson.” Transcript dated 1929.
Calvert, “Childhood Days at Arlington.” ARHO

92 Image of east facade of Arlington House., 1864. Civil War photographs of Washington and Virginia in the AJ.
Russell Album, 1861 - 1865. RG 64. National Archives. Cartographic Branch. Interview with James Parks, former
slave at Arlington. Transcript circa 1925. ARHO.

93 Mary Lee to Mary Custis May 1, 1844. Custis Papers. Virginia Historical Society.
94 RE, Lee to Capt. Andrew Talcott. May 5, 1836. Lee Family Papers. Virginia Historical Society
95 "Thomas Law, Address to the Colombian Institute of Washington. 1830. ARHO.

96 G.W.P. Custis’s address to United States Agricultural Board as reprinted in National Intelligencer, September 27,
1855,

1 Custis went so far as to suggest that his farm manager, William Nelson and Edmund Ruffin, the man credited
with the promotion of fertilizers in the agricultural press, write articles and promote agricultural advancement as a
team.


206 | ENDNOTES

42 Aug 23, 1935 National Park Service request and estimate. ARHO.

8 Map of Arlington National Cemetery showing Walks Drives and Burial Sections. Executive Office Arlington National
Cemetery April 13, 1935.

44 Harper L. Garrett, Assistant Historian, United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service. May
18, 1936, In 1943 the signs around the mansion were still white with green letters. August 31, 1943. Stanley W.
McClure, Acting Chief National Memorials and Historic Sites Division, NPS to Mr, Gillen. ARHO.

45 Chas. G. Mortimer, Colonel to Mr. Hetrick, Lee Mansion, January 19, 1942. ARHO.

46 “Where Sheridan Will Lie: Something about Arlington Cemetery.” New York Times. Aug 9, 1888. Copy
ARHO: Karl and McSween, 88.

47 Randle B. Truett, Chief National Memorial and Historic Sites Division, NPS to Mr. Gillen, NPS, July 9, 1942.
48 Chas G. Mortimer to Mr. Randle B. Truett, Sept 10, 1942.

49 Frank T. Gartside, Assistant Super. to Mr. Thompson, August 24, 1945.

50 Walter H. Sheffield to Mr. Thompson, March 27, 1946,

52 “Rehabilitation of West Grounds Lee Mansion. Rebabilitation of East Grounds, Drawn in September of 1945, planned for
execution in March 1948. Layout and Development Plan, North Garden: Lee Mansion grounds, Arlington National
Cemetery. Irving Payne 1948, ARHO.

53 Benjamin L. Breeze, Acting Chief Planning Division, NPS to L. M. Leisenring, The Quartermaster General’s
Office, Construction Division. Architectural Section, December 10, 1947, ARHO.

54 This technique of using thorny vegetation to help guide visitor’s experience of sites was used by Payne in other
National Park Service locations, including Meridian Hill Park in Washington, D.C.

55 “Museum Planned as Adjunct to Lee Mansion.” Washington Evening Star April 18, 1950.

56 Interview, by L. M. Leisenring of Mrs. Annie Baker and Mrs. Ada Thompson daughters of Thornton and Selina
Grey. March 3, 1930. Transcript ARHO.

57 Statement of Representative Joel T. Broyhill of Virginia before the Library and Memorials Subcommittee,
Committee on House Administration in support of HR 10595, April 11, 1972 ARHO. House Joint Resolution 274,
84th Congress, a resolution paying tribute to Robert E. Lee introduced by Joel T. Broyhill Rep. From Virginia:

Also sponsored in the Senate by Senator Estes Kefauver,

58H. R, 5138 (Pub L. 86-170, 73 Stat. 390 ). Roger Erest, Secretary of Interior to Mr. Aspinall. April 13, 1959.
Land Record No 332. Nov. 20 1959. Land acquired by transfer from the Secretary of the Army by letter of
November 3, 1959, ARHO. Land Acquisition file.

59 John EF. Kennedy Grave at Arlington May 25, 1965. Technical Information Center Map. 81117-5 and 81118-36.
National Capital Region. National Park Service.

60 Official web page of Arlington National Cemetery. The redesign of the Kennedy gravesite was begun in 1965
and completed July 20, 1967. hetp://www.arlingtoncemetery.org/

6! Land Record No 470. May 19, 1964. National Capital Region Reservation File.



vin |


aN

haap DreltiArpapuy

MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY

Eighteenth Century

1746 Survey Platt of the Alexander Tract—Defendant Plaintiff, Fairfax County March 31, 1746, George
Washington Memorial Parkway (GWMP) Natural Resource Files.

1750 Survey of Alexander Tract, Daniel Jennings, Surveyor, September 4, 1750, GWMP Natural Resource Files

1760 Mitchell, Beth, An Interpretive Historic Map of Fairfax County Virginia in 1760, Fairfax Virginia, Office of
Comprehensive Planning 1987, GWMP Natural Resource Files.

Nineteenth Century

1818 A Map of the City of Washington in the District of Columbia established as the permanent Seat of the Government
of the United States of America taken from actual survey as laid out on the ground, Robert King, Surveyor of the City of
Washington, Geography and Maps, Library of Congress.

1860 Map of Virginia Showing the distribution of its Slave Population from the Census of 1860, Washington
June 13, 1861, Cartographic Division, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland,
(NARA Tl), Record Group (RG) 77, DR 150 sheet 7.

1861 Topographical Map of the District of Columbia surveyed in the years 1856-59 by A. Boschke, published by D.
McClelland, Blanchard and Mohun, Washington D.C. 1861, Cartographic Division, RG 77, NARA II, also Library
of Congress G3850 1861 .B6 vault oversize.

1861 Map of the Ground of Occupation and Defense of the Division of the U.S. Army in Virginia, Command of Brig.
Gen. Irving McDowell, US. Coast Survey A.D. Bache Supt. field work executed during parts of June and July 1861,
NARA IL.

1861 Manuscript Map of the 12th Regiment Camp between Alexandria and Arlington Heights, Cartographic
Division, NARA II, RG 77, 211 L, Sheet 12.

1862 Map of Eastern Virginia and Vicinity of Washington, U.S. Army, Corps of Engineers, Cartographic Division,
RG 77, NARA IL.

1862 Potomac River from Indian Head to Georgetown, Survey of the U.S. Coast and Geodeodetic Survey, 1883,
Cartographic division , RG 77, NARA Il.

1863 Map of the District and Vicinity Made from Published Copies of the Boscbke Map, with Manuscript Additions for
Adjacent Areas in Virginia and Maryland and Annotated to Show the Line of Fortifications around Washington and
Alexandria, Army Corp of Engineers, Cartographic Division, NARA II, RG 77, US 265-A.

1864 Baileys Cross Roads to Miners Hill Virginia, Surveyed by C. Rockwell, U.S. Coast Survey, A.D. Bache
Superintendent, Cartographic Division, RG 77, NARA II.


20 | 1608 - 1802

perhaps he did not as successfully emulate them.

Washington guided young G.W.P. in his formal education, as he had the boy’s father.
Even though “Young Washington”, as he was sometimes called, was not the most determined
scholar, he had a series of influential tutors, including ‘Tobias Lear and the Reverend Stanhope
Smith.” In 1798, the boy entered St. Johns College in Annapolis, Maryland. He spent only
one year there, however, before returning to live at Mount Vernon. That ended his formal
schooling, much to Washington’s regret. When he came of age, G.W.P. would inherit an
enormous amount of land and a large number of slaves. George Washington wanted to ensure
that G.W.P. was prepared to succeed under the heavy responsibility of their management. It
is also important to note, in defense of G.W.P., that although formal education was an integral
part of a planter’s upbringing, Custis was the only male child of a wealthy land holder.
Therefore Custis knew that he would inherit property and become a gentleman agriculturist,
a landed farmer. Children who had many male siblings or those males not first born were
often required to learn a lucrative trade such as law, medicine or engineering. A military career
was also possible; though financial success was not certain.” Hence for G.W.P. Custis, doing
well in his scholarly achievements was not so much an economic necessity, as a social grace and
political advantage.

In the last years of the eighteenth-century, the country was again preparing for war,
nervous about possible conflict with France. The ports of Alexandria and Georgetown were
bustling. After a three month training period and with the influence of General George
Washington, G.W. P. entered the army as a Lieutenant. The war never came, but thereafter
G.W.P. was referred to as Major in certain social circles, the rank at which he was discharged.
With the war with France averted, the local social and economic environment continued much
as it had prior to the Revolutionary War. After his term as president (1789-97), Washington
returned again to Mount Vernon, to oversee his fields and his almost 300 slaves." G.W.P.
stayed with him at Mount Vernon.

The Fairfax County land owners who had held their property for the longest, such as the
Washingtons, the Lees, and the Fitzhughs, held much of the power in the community. The
wealthy land owners, through their elected offices and appointed positions, directed the loca-
tion of roads and bridges by appointing road surveyors. They regulated water mills and ordi-
naries (taverns), nominated tobacco inspectors, and sited warehouses, churches and court-
houses. They were also justices in county courts. As a young man, G.W.P. Custis would pro-
mote this arrangement though his political aspirations—becoming a member of the Federalist
party—fighting the egalitarian theories of government that were gaining prominence in many
other sections of the country. Like most of the upper class, he believed that the government
should remain in the hands of the wealthy and well-educated, despite what his fellow
Virginian, Thomas Jefferson, expounded. Custis’ beliefs would lead him to run for the Fairfax

County General Assembly in 1802. Supporting a Federalist platform, he condemned the idea


100 | is6s - 1880

was accompanied by problems as well. As the superintendent of Arlington wrote to the

Quartermaster General in the late summer of 1867:

I have the honor to draw your attention to that part of the cemetery in front and below the
house, between it and the main road [Alexandria and Georgetown Road], which, by the
removal of the sod during the summer of 1866 and 1867 has the appearance of a wilder-
ness of weeds, in some places from five to seven feet in height.\2

Down at the farm and spring by the Potomac River, the consequences of the war were
even more extreme. The agricultural buildings on the farm and the picturesque kitchen and
pavilion of G.W.P. Custis's Arlington Spring had all been modified by the army to serve spe-
cific functions during the war or removed completely for lumber. Though the brick overseer's
house, into which Custis had first moved in 1802, had suffered damage it remained. It was sur-
rounded by the temporary structures and the modified agricultural buildings that had con-
tained the veterinary facility and horse and mule corrals of the Union army. Following the
Civil War, the enormous corral and the structures that could not be used were removed. The
remaining buildings were eventually incorporated into Freedmen's Village on the southern
end of the federal property. But most of the trees, including the enormous oaks and elms that
had sheltered Arlington Spring, were gone.!3

The poor condition of the Arlington estate exemplified the general situation of much of
northern Virginia by the end of the Civil War. During the conflict northern Virginia had been
both between and behind enemy lines. As John Trowbridge, a northerner visiting the area
between Alexandria and Manassas soon after the surrender at Appomattox described the scene,
there was “no sign of human industry, save here and there a sickly, half-cultivated corn field.
The country for the most part consisted of fenceless field abandoned to weeds, stump lots and
undergrowth.”!4 Yet numerous northern businessmen and farmers like Trowbridge, many of
whom had passed through northern Virginia during the war, were returning south with their
families, eager to take advantage of falling land prices. These communities of northerners, as
well as re-established southern agriculturists, gradually improved the farms and economy of the
area surrounding the cemetery. In time, the appearance of both Arlington National Cemetery
and the privately held farmland surrounding the federal property improved. ‘The land of the
former Arlington estate not incorporated into the cemetery to the east, west and south of the
mansion remained a military reservation and was used for agriculture. Many of the former
slaves of G.W.P. Custis lived there in Freedmen's Village.

FREEDMEN'S VILLAGE CONTINUES

The legislative mandate of the Freedman's Bureau, which had established Freedmen's

Village at the southeastern corner of the Arlington Estate in 1863, was due to expire in 1868.


194 | ENDNOTES

28 Edward Dicey, Six Months in the Federal States (London 1863): 16-18.

29 Ibid, 17.

30 Decker and McSween, 61; See also Six Months in the Federal States, entry for March 1862.

31 Fort Whipple, later removed, became the site of Fort Myer which exists today.

32 Anthony Trollope North America ed. 1968, (New York: Harper & Brothers 1862, 1968 edition): 315

33 D. H. Rucker to M.C. Meigs. Washington, D.C. June 24, 1863. See also, Map of Arlington Stables. June 1865.
National Archives, Cartographic Division. F-110.

34 Libel of Information filed in United States v. All the Rights, Titles of Robert E. Lee etc., February, 1864. ARHO.

35 President Abraham Lincoln. 6 January 1864 as cited in 43d Congress Ist Session. Senate Mis. Doc. No. 96.
Memorial of G.W, Custis Lee of Virginia Setting Forth bis Claim to "Arlington” é&, April 6, 1874.

36 Arlington Mill was destroyed in August of 1861, soon after the military occupation of Alexandria Virginia.
Pictorial War Record: Battles of the Late Civil War. V.\ (New York: Stearns & Co.) 1882: 303.

37 The final fate of the Arlington estate was decided in a Supreme Court decision which determined that the tak-
ing of the property from the Lee family was not legal. Deed transferring the property from G.W.C. Lee to the
United States Government. March 31, 1883. ARHO.

38 For more information on the history of Freedmen’s Village, see Joseph Reidy’s “Coming from the Shadow of the
Past: The Transition from Slavery to Freedom at Freedmen’s Village, 1863-1900 in the Virginia Magazine of History
and Biography. (October 1987); Paul Skeels Peirce, The Freedman’s Bureau: A Chapter in the History of Reconstruction
(lowa City, Iowa: University of Iowa 1901); Act to Establish Bureau for the Relief of Freedman and Refugees March 3,
1865. U.S. Statutes at Large, Treaties and Proclamations of the U. S. of America Nolume 13. (Boston 1866): 507-509.

39L, Col. Elias M. Green to M.C. Meigs, Quarter Master General, July 22, 1863. ARHO.

4 Freedmen’s Village at Arlington, National Archives and Records Admin. RG 92. F110.; Harpers Weekly. (New
York). May 7, 1864.

41 John Tweedale, Chief Clerk to Secretary of War to Quarter Master General, March 27, 1888, George I: Borrett,
Letters from Canada and the United States.

# David Donald Ed. Inside Lincoln's Cabinet: The Civil War Diaries of Salmon P. Chase (New York, London and
Toronot, 1954): 235 in Joseph Reidy “Coming from the Shadow of the Past: The ‘Transition from Slavery to
Freedom at Freedmen’s Village, 1863-1900,” in The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography (October 1987).

+3 During this time, from 1863-1868, there were five government farms in the area called “camps”. They were
Springdale, Rucker, Wadsworth and Collins, The exact location of the farms is unknown, though some were most
likely within the boundaries of the Arlington Estate. Reidy, 414. See also Harpers Weekly (New York) May 7, 1864.

+ Riedy, 426,

45 In an omnibus act approved by President Lincoln on July 17, 1862, Section 18 provided: “That the President of
the US shall have power, whenever in his opinion it shall be expedient, to purchase cemetery grounds and cause
them to be securely enclosed to be used as a national cemetery for the soldiers who shall die in the service of the
county.” Monro MacCloskey, Hallowed Ground: Our National Cemeteries. (New York, R. Rosen Press 1968).


presence of the army on the site
throughout the Civil War is con-
sidered. The founding of
Freedmen’s Village in the south-
eastern portion of the site is dis-
cussed, as is the complicated
process of the establishment of
the National Cemetery at
Arlington.

1865-1880

Chapter five describes the
early development of Arlington
National Cemetery, from the
gradual incorporation of the
agricultural and picturesque
landscape of the Custis and Lee
families’ to the official acquisi-
tion of the property by
the Federal government. The
preservation of elements dating
to the first half of the nineteenth
century, are discussed, as well as
the creation of new memorials in

remembrance of the Civil War.

1880-1929

Chapter six describes the development of Arlington National Cemetery in reference to
Arlington House, as its vortex and chief maintenance facility. The ramifications of segrega-
tion and sectionalism in the memorialization and development of the site are addressed, as are
the consequences of increasing numbers of tourists to the site. Finally, the discussion and

physical alterations that preceded the restoration of Arlington House and its dedication as a

PROPERTY BOUNDARIES NATIONAL PARK SERVICE 1950

3 The total acreage of
Arlington House, the Robert
E. Lee Memorial currently
managed by the National
Park Service has increased
over time to its present level
of approximately 28 acres.

memorial to Robert E. Lee are considered.

INTRODUCTION | xxI


xvi | ILLUSTRATIONS

“Airview of Columbia Island” looking north, photographer Abbie Rowe, August 14, 1950. 1325-G,
Museum Resource and Conservation Center, NPS

.Planting bed of ‘Peace’ roses, southwest of Arlington House, 1967, Arlington House Archives

Rebabilitation of West Grounds, Lee Mansion, National Capital Parks—Irving Payne, October 1945, signed
and annotated, Arlington House Archives

..-Layout and Development Plan North Garden Lee Mansion Grounds, Arlington National Cemetery, March 18,
1848, Arlington House Archives

...View up slope to Arlington House from east, 1953, Arlington House Archives
...First grave marker of President John F. Kennedy, 1963, Prints and Photographs, National Archives II
..View from Arlington House east towards Washington, D.C., 2001, NCR Cultural Landscape Program

..Plan for the Restoration of the flower garden, 1964, National Park Service, Arlington House Archives

107.......Yard area west of Arlington House, 1969, Arlington House Archives

108...

..Flower garden, looking north towards southern slave quarters, 1971, Arlington House Archives

South facade of Arlington House and the flower garden, 2001, NCR Cultural Landscape Program.

...East facade of Arlington House over grave-lined hills, 2001, NCR Cultural Landscape Program


FOREWORD

Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial, sits on a hilltop above the Potomac River,
commanding an impressive view of the City of Washington, D.C. It is easy to see why George
Washington Parke Custis, George Washington's adopted grandson, selected this site to build
his home in 1802. The new federal City was developing before his eyes and he could watch it
all happen. The 1100-acre estate held the promise of good farming and pastureland, expan-
sive forest, and plentiful game and fish; and with slaves to work the land, Custis believed he

had everything a gentleman farmer would need to build a successful plantation.

While it took 15 years for Mr. Custis to finish construction of his home, the decisions that he
made during this period in the design and in the preservation of the landscape surrounding the
house have had long lasting effects on the estate and provide today's setting. The resulting
house and the landscape that included a park and gardens have impressed many who have vis-
ited the estate. This was true while the estate was under Mr. Custis's management as well as
later, when it was under the stewardship of his son-in-law Robert E. Lee; and it remains so

now, under National Park Service administration.

It is hard to imagine today what the entire 1100-acre plantation originally looked like because
of the graves of Arlington National Cemetery that surround the house and the remaining 16
acres of the estate. Arlington National Cemetery almost overwhelms Arlington House. This
makes it all the more important that we determine the estate's history and significant resources
and decide upon a course of action to preserve those resources. For it is only through this
preservation that we will be able to continue to tell the story of creation and use of Arlington
House, so integrally linked to the formation and design of our national cemetery. This
Cultural Landscape Report and Site History compiles in one place the site's heritage, docu-
ments the changes over time, and establishes what is important to preserve. It is a great man-
agement tool and I applaud all who worked on creating it. The next step, implementing
preservation strategies, is perhaps the hardest, but I believe that this report will be an invalu-
able guide for our efforts.

Audrey Calhoun

Superintendent

George Washington Memorial Parkway
National Capital Region

National Park Service

FOREWORD | v


tures and improvements. According to the findings of the study, there were 763 individuals liv-
ing on the former Arlington estate outside the boundaries of the cemetery. They had
improved their individual lots by adding trees, vines, houses and outbuildings, though they did
not own the land. According to the findings of the study, on the portion of the former
Arlington estate outside the boundaries of the cemetery, eight agricultural buildings and slave
quarters remained from the era of G.W.P. Custis. These structures were located near the east-

ern edge of the property, where the farm and market gardens of the Arlington estate had once

66. This map was part of an
inventory conducted prior to
the discontinuance of
Arlington's Freedmen’s
Village in the late 1880s,
Map of the Arlington Estate,
Virginia, 1888.

112. | 1865 - 1880

FREEDMENS VILLAGE 1888

National Archives



ee Be

SS The artist most likely
utilized liberal dramatic
license when sketching this
section of the cemetery as no
graves were ever known to be
west of the Tomb. However,
the image illustrates clearly
the prevalent melancholic
aesthetic. Tomb of the
Unknown Civil War Soldier
in “Soldiers Cemetery at
Arlington Heights,” Harper's
Weekly March 27, 1869

90 | 1861 - 1865

CONCLUSION

On the first day of the federal invasion of the site in May of 1861, a young army Captain,
Charles Russell Lowell, followed the carriage drive through the forests and green meadows of
the park to Arlington House. Looking out past the bivouacked troops towards the city of
Washington, he proclaimed in a letter to his mother that he had seen “no place like it for posi-
tion and well-improved natural advantages.”63 Sixty years before this sarne expansive prospect
had convinced George Washington Parke Custis to build a grand home here, where it could
be seen by everyone, as a tribute to his adopted grandfather George Washington. The Union
army took away Arlington from Custis's daughter for almost the same reason; because the
estate's elevated position held a view that encompassed all of the federal capital. And when a
place to bury the tens of thousands of named and unknown soldiers who died in the battles of
the Civil War was needed, the high ground of the estate again seemed the most appropriate.
In quietly though unwittingly surrendering their home to the reconstruction of the Union, the
Lee family made an enormous sacrifice—a gift that would be echoed in the thousands of white

gravestones that would soon line Arlington's once forested hills.

i
e
2
3
Zz
&
2
2
2


stuccoed while the Custis and Lee families lived there, for the yard was not an area that was
meant to be entered or seen by guests of the Custis and Lee families. Like the farm and quar-
ters below, the yard was at least partially controlled by the house slaves—a space appropriated
by the individuals through their many tasks. In fact, historic images reveal that the work yard
was screened from the formal carriage turn-about in front of the house by a row of cedar
trees.92

Much of the landscape of the Arlington estate actively used by people was molded into
a loose series of spaces, connected and separated from one another through vistas and trun-
cated views. Circulation routes also served to influence development-whether the formal car-
riage drive extending west up the hill, around the southern end of the flower garden to end in
a turn-about at the north end of the eastern facade of the mansion, or the narrow path to the

slave church on
the southern end
of the estate.
Within this
landscape, vari-
ous members of
the Custis and
Lee families and
the slaves had
different areas of
influence.
Though G.WP.
Custis was the owner of the property for all but four years of the Custis and Lee families’ lives

Arlington House Archives

there, other family members, hired employees, and slaves managed and influenced the devel-
opment of the estate in many ways. For instance, both Mary Custis and Mary Lee helped
manage various aspects of the property as the following quote reveals from a letter sent from
Mary Lee to Mary Custis,

As respects my mare Kate, I wish very much that Parkes [a slave] should use her during
his spare time in hauling out manure down to the corn field, not the garden, from those
heaps which are rotted, but when he can not be spared from Daniel’s [slave] side if the mare
is wanted at the garden, let Obahiah [slave] drive her but it must be under Austin Braum’s
[slave] especial supervision. I want Daniel to work up that large heap by the Georgetown
Road a little and keep it up so as to hold the slops which I hope they will all diligently empty

into it. . .93

27 The line of evergreen
trees (most likely cedars)
extending from the northern
wing of Arlington House
blocked the view into the
kitchen garden and yard area.
East facade of Arlington
House, detail of photograph,

6.1864

1802 - 1861 | 49


64 John Viach, Back of the Big House, The Architecture of Plantation Slavery, (Chapel Hill: The University of North
Carolina Press 1993):34-37.

65 1850 Agricultural Census, Alexandria County, National Archives, Washington, D.C.

66 G. W. P. Custis, “Banking with the Spade, ‘logether with a thing or two on the subject of wooden soled shoes-
reclaimed marshes, ete.” in American Farmer (May 6, 1825).

67 Ibid.
68 G.W.P. Custis to Mary L. Custis, September 16, 1839. ARHO.

6° G.W.P. Custis to Sain H. Smith. January 5, 1830. G.W.P. requested that the interest on $2500.00 which amount-
ed to $200.00 be lessened. ARHO.

70 Custis, "Banking with the Spade . . .”
71 National Intelligencer; May 7, 1811.

72 The wharf was built by Captain Page in 1852 at Arlington Spring. He also built the
“canny little sprite” (the G.W-P. Custis] the same year for trips to Arlington Spring. The Arlington Belle was owned
by Custis and began service in 1846. Daily National Intelligencer March 11, 1852.

73 Sarah Reed, A Romance of Arlington, (Boston, Mass. : The Chapple Publishing Co., Ltd. 1908): 181.

74B, Lossing, Harpers New Monthly Magazine. “Arlington House, the Seat of G.W.P. Custis, Esq.” September 1853.
ARHO.

75 Passage one way from Washington to Arlington Spring was 12 1/2 cents, a gentleman and two ladies 25 cents.
Lossing, B. in National Intelligencer, June 19, 1854.

76 Rev. R. R. Gurley, Morrison's Stranger’s Guide to the City of Washington, (Washington, D.C.: W. M. Morrison &
co. 1852),

77 For more information about the development of springs as medicinal, recreational and social spaces see: Henry
W. Lawrence’s “Southern Spas: Source of the American Resort Tradition” in Landscape (Volume 27, Number 2.
1983,) Carl Bridenbaugh, “Baths and Watering Places of Colonial America” in The William and Mary Quarterly
(April 1946).

78 Calvert, “Childhood Days at Arlington”,

79 For more information on the relationship between the social and economic aspects of slavery and the physical
development of plantation/farm landscapes see Viach’s Back of the Big House: The Architecture of Plantation Slavery.
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press 1993).

80 R.E. Lee to Mary Custis, March 20, 1839. Debutts-Ely Manuscripts, Library of Congress.

81 “Recollections of Emma Syphax, Sarah Wilson, Annie Baker and Ada Thompson.” These women were the
daughters of Selina and Thorton Gray who were “house” slaves of the Lee and Custis families during the 1850s.
Interviews and transcript dated 1929. ARHO.

82 Calvert, “Childhood Days . . .”

ENDNOTES | 187


ae

located near a large river—the Potomac. By the Late Archaic period, the climate was warm
and dry, supporting deciduous-dominated forests. While evidence is scarce, the first attempts
at horticultural production probably occurred late in the Archaic period. Crops most likely
cultivated were squash, sunflower and chenopodium." Anadromous fish probably played an
important role in the seasonal pattern of resource procurement as well.

The Woodland Period (c.1200 BC- A. D, 1600) is defined by a much greater reliance on
horticulture in subsistence economies than previously, though the resource procurement
strategies remained consistent with that of the Late Archaic period. In northeastern Virginia,
during the Middle Woodland period (AD 300-1000) permanent village sites along major rivers
and estuaries developed, signaling a shift away from the more transient sites along small
streams. “By late in the Woodland period, trade and exchange networks were established and

distinct cultural groups with boundaries and localized styles emerged.”" All of these groups
were Algonquian-speaking peoples of the Eastern Woodlands. In the Potomac drainage these
settlements, which relied on maize horticulture utilizing cleared fields, had highly organized
village structures. The possible locations of such villages in the vicinity of Arlington House
have been extensively discussed in previous studies, though no excavations have identified
exact village locations. One of the most well-known of these villages was that identified by
John Smith during his 1608 journey as Namoraughquend. The location of this seventeenth-
century village has been variously suggested as Theodore Roosevelt Island or the area of the
Pentagon today." Further archeological research is needed to determine the specific site.
According to an analysis of the locations of known Woodland period village sites, cer-
tain criteria have been developed to forecast the potential location of American Indian village
sites within non-excavated areas. The five attributes that would provide favorable environ-
mental conditions for a village are: broad necklands, proximity to a cove, bay or an estuary,
proximity to freshwater springs, soil type and the proximity to marshlands.'’ The landscape in
the vicinity of Arlington would have exhibited most, if not all, of these contributing conditions.
For instance, a marshland was formerly located in the vicinity of the Pentagon. In addition,
the soil was fairly conducive to horticulture and the freshwater spring, known as Arlington
Spring during the nineteenth century, was only one of many in the area. Transportation routes
by land and over water existed in the vicinity of these settlements. The exact locations of these
trade routes, however, are not known. As the woodland period progressed, the sociopolitical
complexity within the American Indian cultures increased. With European colonization, the

Late Woodland period came to a close.

4 ! PALEO-INDIAN PERIOD


Cemetery location was finally chosen, because as a cemetery, development of the lands was
completely restricted to burial. There would be no neighborhood encroachment upon the
grounds.'?. Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter, who died in 1891, was also buried on the slope
in front of Arlington House to the north of General Sheridan’s gravesite, as was General
Horatio Gouverneur Wright in the same year.!}_ The burying of “highly esteemed” Union
officers on the slope east of Arlington House was discontinued by the late 1890s.!4 General
George Crook, who passed away in 1890, was meant to be re-interred in this location at
Arlington National Cemetery in 1898. The policy had been recently changed, however, and
his monument was erected to the east of the flower garden within the officer's burial section.
Crook Walk, extending from the southern end of the flower garden down the southern slope,

was named after him.!>

George Washington Memorial Parkway Arc

73 The Custis Walk, built to
connect Arlington House with
the depot stop of the electric
rail line by the Sheridan
Gate, was constructed around
1893. Detail from a map,
Arlington, Virginia Military
Reservation Fort Myer and
the National Cemetery with
Annex Showing the Road to
Aqueduct Bridge, 1894.

1880-1929 | 123


PHY

BIBLIOGRAI

»)

MAI



xu | ILLUSTRATIONS

19 ....uenMary Fitzhugh Custis, painting, artist unknown, 1809, Arlington House Archives

20 ....uGeorge Washington Parke Custis, a crayon likeness by Charles Fevret de Saint Memin, 1805, Arlington
House Archives

21 wseueeArlington Spring, line drawing, Benson Lossing, Harpers Magazine, 1853,
Arlington House Archives

22 vesseeueuEnvirons of Washington Prepared from Original Surveys of the Engineer Department 1864-1866, sheet 5 and

8, National Archives II, Record Group (RG) 77. F99

Arlington House, east facade, illustration in Washington Guide by William P. Elliott, 1826

Stables, east fagade, c.1895, Arlington House Archives

Southern facade of northern slave quarters, 2001, NCR Cultural Landscape Program

26 ....eDrawing of northern slave quarters included in the scrapbook of one of the Lee daughters, c.1850,
Arlington House Archives
27 anemneEast fagade of Arlington House, detail showing row of evergreens, c.1861-1865, Arlington House

Archives

Arlington House, east fagade with Robert and Mary Lee portraits, 1831, Arlington House Archives

29....0eArlington House from southeast, c.1845, Museum Resource Conservation Center, Maryland.

30 ......+++Benson J. Lossing, "Arlington House, The Seat of G.W.P. Custis, Esq." Harper’s New Monthly Magazine,
October 1853, Arlington House Archives

3h. “Arlington from the Great Oak", 1864, Andrew Russell, photographer, Prints and Photographs, National

Archives II

Environs of Washington Prepared from original Surveys of the Engineer
Department 1864-1866. Sheet 5 and 8, RG 77, F99, National Archives II

33 .ssuseeeWatercolor painting done for article, "Arlington House, the Seat of G. W. P. Custis, Esq.” in Harper's New
Monthly Magazine, October 1853, Arlington House Archives

34....uenueFlower garden arbor, c.1870, stereoscopic card, Virginia Historical Society, vertical files, photographic
collection, "Arlington House", Richmond, Virginia

35 ssuneneDrawing of the gravesite of Mary Fitzhugh Custis, c.1853, artist unknown, Arlington House Archives

36 swuenneGraves of Mary and G.W.P. Custis, 1864, Andrew Russell photographer, Prints and Photographs
Division, National Archives IT

37 vanuene"View from the City of Washington... Taken from Arlington House, the Residence of George Washington
Parke Custis", drawn and copyrighted by Pleder] Anderson, 1838, The Mariners Museum, Newport
News, Virginia

38...sseuGraves of Mary Fitzhugh Custis and George Washington Parke Custis, c.1864, photographer, Andrew

Russell, Arlington House Archives


removed as well.? The
entire site was then plowed
up and regraded. New
entrances to the garden,
one each on the east, west
and south sides, augment-
ed the original entrance on
the north. A brief flight of
steps was constructed at
each of the east and south
side entrances to pass up
the short, steep slope to
the terrace level of the
garden. Small, fluted iron
ums sat atop pairs of con-
crete pedestals located at
the termination of each
stair flight. New walks,
crossing the garden from
north to south and east to
west, connected to the
existing walks around the
‘Tomb of the Unknown
Civil War Soldier. These
gravel walks met under the
dome of the new Temple
of Fame. Rusticated iron
benches with backs and
arms shaped like gnarled
twigs provided resting
spots under the Temple and on the portico of Arlington. As part of Rhodes’s design, a border
of hardy roses was established on the east and south sides of the garden as a backdrop for the
officers graves, now in clear view from the ‘Temple with the removal of the paling fence. About
fifty new flower beds were cut in the large expanses of turf around the Temple. Thousands of
annuals with exotic foliage and brightly-colored flowers were planted into the beds to provide
an exuberant show during the warm months. In some years, the plants were arranged to form

words—the number of war dead and the names of its northern heroes spelled out in blooms.8

71 The south end of the
flower garden, filled with car-
pet bedded annuals, was pho-
tographed for a tourist guide
book for Arlington National
Cemetery in 1903.

72. This detail of a map of
Arlington National Cemetery
from 1901 reveals a planting
bed design, similar, if not
identical to the design
installed by Rhodes.

National Cemetery
Arlington, Virginia 1901

1880-1929 | 124


SS

CUSTIS-LEE MANSION MASTER PLAN

By the mid-1960s, no major alterations to landscape owned by the National Park Service
had occurred since the rehabilitation of the grounds in the late 1940s. With the increased vis-
itation generated by the introduction of the tour bus system to Arlington National Cemetery
in the early 1960s, something needed to be done to address issues of resource protection and
interpretation. In 1966 the National Park Service created a master plan for the Custis-Lee
Mansion. There were four major factors which contributed to the specific objectives of the
plan. The first was the increasing understanding and regulation of historic resources with the
passage of the Historic Preservation Act in 1966. This Act, which was spurred by the destruc-
tion in the wake of national urban renewal and highway construction policies of the postwar
era, formulated standards of preservation and called upon the National Park Service to create
the National Register of Historic Places. The passage of the 1966 act encouraged the NPS to
focus on historically significant properties through the allotment of additional funding towards
their preservation. The second factor was embedded in the National Park Service’s nation-
wide response to increasing visitation and limited funding during the war years, Mission 66.
Initiated in 1956, this ten year prograin was funded to upgrade park facilities and improve
resource management. Thirdly, across the country at both the national and local levels, the
theories of living history interpretation and their basis in the rise of material culture studies,
generated an increased focus on re-creating settings appropriate to telling specific stories.
Tours of house museuins and other sites, led by costumed guides became increasingly com-
mon, in parks both within the National Park Service and without. Finally, a master plan was
produced following the 1957 legislation that created the Custis-Lee Mansion as a permanent

memorial to Robert E. Lee. As the mission statement of the 1966 Master Plan read,

The interpretation and restoration programs at Custis-Lee National Memorial will pro-
vide the visitor with a moving personal experience leading to a clear understanding of R.

E. Lee and his place in American history.

In order to achieve this mission of “understanding the life and worth of Robert E. Lee”, the
“historic scene as it appeared in April of 1861” needed to be recreated. ‘This re-emphasis on
the place of Robert E. Lee in the interpretation of Arlington House was characteristic of the
1950s and 1960s—a time associated with a rebirth of southern patriotism in light of concur-
rent re-evaluations of the causes of the Civil War. A major portion of recapturing the scene
was the re-creation of the flower garden.

Now that the National Park Service clearly held jurisdiction over the land of the former
flower garden, the Temple of Fame was taken down in 1967, much to the delight of the

Commission of Fine Arts. A rectangular flower garden was recreated on the terrace south of

164 | 1929 - 2001


After completing his journey up the Potomac River, Smith returned to Jamestown and
spent the winter of 1608 before returning to England in October of 1609. Though Captain
John Smith returned only once to America (the northeastern shore in 1614), his publications
became very effective propaganda, forwarding the cause of colonization in Virginia and in
northeastern America.

In 1624, the year that Smith’s General History of Virginia was published in England, the
Court Kings Bench dissolved the charter of the Virginia Company of London. Soon after,
Virginia became a colony of the crown and a beneficiary of its military might. Active conflict
between the Indian tribes and the English settlers began to diminish. As the English gained a
foothold in Virginia, the Indian cultures became more destabilized—their demise advanced by
disease and displacement. Though the colonization process was still slow, the English began
planting tobacco in the open fields of many of the Algonquian village areas. For instance in
1626, Virginia produced 132,000 pounds of tobacco. Three years later the harvest was over
one million pounds."

‘Transportation systems of both American Indian tribes and European colonists consist-
ed primarily of water routes; therefore few, if any, roads were well delineated before the end
of the eighteenth century. An exception to this observation is the Potomac Path. What was
known as the Potomac Path prior to the mid 1740s, ran north to south along a natural ridge
or fall line between the Potomac and the Rappahannock rivers. Beginning at the Occoquan,
the path extended to Great Hunting Creek which would become the site of the city of
Alexandria in 1749. Continuing, the Potomac Path followed the eastern ridge of the fall line
to what was to be known as Falls Church in 1734, before going northward toward the
Shenandoah Mountains.'’ Between Pohick Creek and Accotink Creek, a road branched off the
Potomac Path and ran along the Potomac shore line. Though this road, created by the early
eighteenth century to connect the plantations located along the river, did not follow the orig-
inal Indian trail, it too became known as the Potomac Path. To prevent confusion the earlier
Potomac Path, that which did follow the Indian trail along the ridge to the west, became
known as Back Road. These roads, while primitive, aided in the development of land to the
north of the Tidewater.

During the mid-seventeenth century, with the price of available arable land rising in
southern Virginia due to its increasing scarcity, speculators moved their investments north-
ward—from the Tidewater into the Northern Neck and to the lands that would become the
Arlington estate. The main objective of these seventeenth-century investors was not the
immediate development of the land; expenditure of resources on such a risky endeavor was not
in their financial or personal interests. Though the threat to the settlers from the Algonquians
was abating due to the disruptive presence of the English, the fear of conflict remained.’* As
a result, the English proprietors patented or were granted large tracts of land with the hope of

future agricultural development or subdivision. The primary liability on ownership was the

1608 - 1802 | 9


146 |

1929 - 2001

the mansion surrounded by additional, unspecified plantings. Moore added that he hoped the
east slope of the mansion could be restored to its “original state,” which he realized would
require moving the L’7Enfant tomb to a site to the south side of the mansion, as proposed years
earlier by Greenleaf. In addition, the removal of the “unsightly signs” in and about the man-
sion was also suggested.!? Finally, the restoration committee decided that the exact for roads,
sidewalks and gardens should be made the subject of a separate study with “plans prepared by
a landscape architect.”!3

Of course there were some disagreements between the Commission of Fine Arts and the
Army. Colonel Bash wrote to General Horton, Chief of Engineering in the Quartermaster

Generals Office, commenting on the CFA’ rendition of the committee’s findings:

For his [Moore's] information . . .what actually happened was that I told Mr. Moore that
it would be a nice thing to restore the old garden north of the Mansion and remove the
greenhouse, but that I did not think there was any immediate prospect of getting authori-
ty to make the change. There was no proposition on my part to place a brick walk on the
east side of the mansion, but Mr. Moore himself made the recommendation that a carriage
driveway paved with brick be built. The proposition about removing “unsightly signs” was

the personal recommendation of Mr. Moore.'4

Meanwhile, research into the past was moving ahead. Major L.M. Leisenring was can-
vassing all local libraries and archives to gather information on the early days of Arlington
House. Louise P. Latimer, librarian for the District of Columbia, was contacted. Like many
others, she was interested in the developments occurring at Arlington and offered personal
opinions of the site. In April of 1929, the same month in which the professionals met to dis-
cuss the future development of Arlington, she wrote to Colonel Bash detailing many opportu-
nities for improvement to Arlington House and grounds. She suggested locating parking for
automobiles over the hill, “where the stables are.” She suggested planting myrtle below the
trees to the east of the wings—unknowingly solving the problems of growing grass in such a
highly used area, pointed out by both the CFA and the Army. She also believed that the cast
iron urns and cannas (annual flowers) were inappropriate to the site. She suggested that “early
style” benches be placed around the grounds and on the portico, instead of the current iron and
wooden ones. Bash assured her in his reply that the urns and flowers were going and that a
study was being undertaken of the grounds. He agreed the benches were an excellent idea. Like
Moore, Latimner emphasized the importance of restoring the slope in front of the mansion.
Politically savvy, she suggested concentrating on the importance of restoring the landscape
scene to the era of Custis, not to Lee, when recommending that the memorials and graves be
removed. Bash responded candidly, that their removal was wanted but that the process would

be slow.!5 All of her suggestions were eventually taken in some form or another.



108 Shortly after the flower
garden was restored the
enormous elm tree which
stood at the north entrance to
the garden in the first half of
the nineteenth century died.
photograph c.1971

166 | 1929 - 2001

the northern entrance to the garden since the days of Mary Lee died following the restoration
of the garden. Its stump, however, remained for several years. Around the kitchen garden
and yard, visitors still walked along the brick paths installed in the 1930s. Post and chain fenc-
ing was strung along the sides of every brick walk, except for within the flower garden, to pre-
vent visitors from wandering off the paths. Most of the vegetation from National Park
Service’s 1947 planting was now mature and large. In order to contain their size, the boxwood
and Japanese holly on the grounds were pruned into tight curving forms and hedges.

By 1970 the plantings of the flower garden had become established. In 1972, the name
of the Custis-Lee Mansion was legally changed to Arlington House: The Robert E. Lee

Memorial through legislation introduced by Representative Broyhill. In May 1975, pur-
suant to the Federal Property Administrative Services Act of 1949, the National Park Service
acquired 24.44 acres of land that had been set aside in 1964 by the Secretary of the Army in
perpetuity to provide an appropriate setting for Arlington House.6+ The National Park
Service agreed to assume the preservation and management of the forested area. With the
flower garden restored, the kitchen garden was replanted with vegetables. Fruit trees and
shrubs were also planted including raspberries, gooseberries, currants, pears, cherries, and

plums.®

2
&
g


_— oo ___aa
ttl A
a ,

43. These officer’s barracks
were probably located in the
vicinity of the Arlington
House stable, June 1864.

Yet, the simple fact was that in areas of encampment, wood and other resources needed for

food and shelter were scarce. The fence posts and trees that provided timber for housing or

fuel for fires most likely proved indispensable and irresistible.

After the long winter, in March of 1862 most of McClellan's army departed for Fort

Monroe to begin the advance up the Peninsula towards Richmond. The only evidence left

behind from the regiments were the “blackened circles of campfires” that dotted the hill-

sides.2?

44 “The Civil War—
Roughing it at Arlington”,
most likely drawn by a Union
officer late in the Civil War,
proves that even in war time
humor survived.

78 | 1861 - 1865

Arlington House Archives

Though several thou-
sand enlisted men
remained on the heights
to guard the federal cap-
ital after McClellan's
departure, with the shift
of the war campaign
south, the intensity of
activity at Arlington
slowed. Lower ranking
officers and their fami-
lies stationed at nearby

forts moved into the

mansion vacated by McClellan and his staff. Once again the walls of Arlington held children's

voices, Yet the departure of the highest ranking army officials, those personally connected to

General Lee and his family through shared social circles prior to the war, also affected the

‘National Archives


120 | 1880 - 1929

The design style of the cemetery landscape near Arlington House reflected the design begun
in the 1870s. Ornate iron urns sometimes filled with flowers and grasses, cast iron benches,
thick foundation plantings, and the ever increasing use of annuals in the flower garden all
reflected the aesthetic movements occurring elsewhere around the country in the latter half of
the nineteenth century. ‘Though many designers, artists and writers—such as America’s
Frederick Law Olmsted, and Englishmen John Ruskin and William Robinson—were stressing
the desirability of natural effects, curving lines and the removal of gardensque-styled orna-
mentation, others felt that only in masses of color, geometric shapes, and complicated orna-
mentation was true and appropriate garden beauty found. For as Peter Henderson, the famous
nurseryman and publisher, lamented in the 1880s (no doubt with an eye to his own nursery
sales) what a “pity it is that the bedding system has not been adopted in Central Park,” due -
he imagined - to “incompetency or lack of taste.”> The herbaceous flower garden as designed
by members of the Custis and Lee families remained in place after the end of the war, though
it underwent incremental changes with the development of the national cemetery over the
next ten years. Elsewhere around the country, carpet-bedded annuals, or the planting of
showy annual flowers in strict shapes cut into the surrounding turf became extremely popular.
Such colorful flower beds graced the lawns of many of the new federal buildings across the
Potomac River.

‘There were many reasons for the rise in popularity of this formal style of garden. New
plant material from abroad and from improved methods of hybridization, quicker and safer
transportation, and cheaper, better printing technology, such as the inexpensive chromolitho-
graph, all increased the marketability and availability of the plant varieties necessary for ornate
horticultural displays. ‘The heightened mechanization of horticultural activity with lawn mow-
ers and cultivators, and the availability of cheap labor with immigration also contributed to the
rise in popularity of the labor-intensive design style. The managers of Arlington believed that
the complicated landscape of Arlington, strewn with memorials and dotted with graves, would

be an appropriate palette for the floral designs.®

HONORING UNION HEROES OF THE CIVIL WAR

In 1885 the flower garden of Arlington House was completely redesigned, at the direc-
tion of Colonel R. N. Botchelder, the officer in charge of the cemetery and with the approval
of the Quartermaster General. The plan, which was designed by Rhodes, called for the
removal of the arbor that had been erected during the time of the Custises in the center of the
flower garden.

With the redesign in 1885, this arbor was removed, as was the picket fence that sur-
rounded the garden. In 1874, the additions to the original circa 1870 greenhouse in the north-
west corner had been torn down, though the main structure remained. The “limited boxwood

hedges,” and the trees within the garden, including the “magnolia and northern pine” were


1861 - 1865


35 Monthly Report, April 1871, NARA. I, RG 92,Consolidated Correspondence File

36 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden south of Arlington Mansion by D. H. Rhodes, Landscape
Gardener at Arlington. Where he has been employed since 1873.” Office of the Quartermaster Supply Officer,
Washington, D.C. , Undated, Circa 1930.

37 Monthly Report, August 1868, Monthly Report, April 1869, Monthly Report, Nov 30, 1872. Thompson R. East, supt.
NARA I, RG 92. Entry 576. Box 132.

38 Monthly Report, November 30, 1872, Monthly Report of the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington Virginia
_for the months of September and of October 1870. RG 92. Entry No 576, Box # 132. NARA I.

39 Rhodes, “Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden . . .”, 2.

40 Ibid. see also Monthly Report, November 30, 1872, Monthly Report of the Condition of the National Cemetery at
Arlington Virginia for the months of September and of October 1870. RG 92. Entry No $76. Box # 132. NARA I.

41 During this time, the eastern room of the southern slave quarters was occupied by building materials, the center
section tools and the far room by the watchman and laborer. (1873 and for 7-8 years after.) From 1885 until 1930
this building was home of J. H Marcey and family in order that he might oversee the greenhouse and stock of plants
in the absence of the Landscape Gardener, who for many years, had extensive detached duties at other points to
perform. D. H. Rhodes, “Historic Memories of Arlington ..., 1.

42 Monthly Report of the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington, Virginia August 1874. NARA I, RG 92. Entry
576 Box 132.

+3 Monthly Report of the Condition of the National Cemetery at Arlington Virginia, November 1874. Frederick
Kauffman, Supt. NARA I RG 92. Entry $76 Box 132.

44 Major Myers to Quarter Master General, May 25, 1874. NARA I RG 92.

45 These trees were purchased, in six inch pots, from the John Saul Nursery at 7th Street Washington, D.C.
Rhodes, “Memories”: 10, ARHO.

46 Mongomery Meigs to Captain A. F, Rockwell, Assistant Quartermaster General, Washington, D.C., October 3,
1874. NARA I RG 92. Consolidated Correspondence of the Quartermaster General. ARHO.

47 History of Government Provided Headstones and Markers. http://www.cem.va.gov, 11/30/1999.

48 “The Day of Decoration: The Grand Army Ceremonies at Arlington Today.” National Republican. May 30, 1874.
Washington, D.C.

49 Report of the Inspector of National Cemeteries for the Year 1874. Executive Document #28, Sen. 43d Congress 2nd
Session.

50“Decoration Day” Washington Chronicle. Tuesday, May 30, 1876.

51 Rhodes defined the area as that north of a line drawn from Fort Myer’s gate to Sheridan Gate.

52 Decker and McSween, 68.

53 Annon. Three Visits to Arlington, Ca 1870. Virginia Historical Society. Richmond Virginia. Call Number: I 234

A7 T45.

eNDNoTES | 199


ENDNOTES



..Sketch of Arlington Heights with military tents, 1861, Harpers Magazine, Summer 1861, Arlington
House Archives

..Slope east of Arlington, looking east, June, 1864, Andrew Russell photographer, Prints and Photographs,
National Archives II

Selina and Thorton Gray, no date, Arlington House Archives

‘oldiers cutting trees at Arlington in Harper’s Magazine, autumn 1861, Arlington House Archives

Officers barracks in vicinity of stables, June 1864, Andrew Russell photographer, Arlington House
Archives

..”" The Civil War-Roughing it at Arlington", a sketch done by a Union officer stationed at Arlington,
c.1863, Arlington House Archives

.-Destruction of Arlington Mill, south of the Arlington estate, Harper's Magazine Autumn 1861, Arlington
House Archives

..Yard area, west of Arlington House, June 1864, Andrew Russell photographer, Prints and Photographs,
National Archives Il

AT voesssssses Arlington Park Stables. 1865, RG 92, F-110 sheets 1-9, Cartographic Division National Archives II

Arlington Stables, June 1864. Andrew Russell photographer, Prints and Photographs, National Archives
1

rreedmen’ Village, 1865, RG 92 F-110, Cartographic Division, National Archives IL
SO ceereene Residents of Freedmen’s Village, c.1865, Prints and Photographs, National Archives I

ST cress Perspective of Freedmen’s Village in The Children’s Paper, December 12, 1864, 1, Arlington National
Cemetery, Horticultural Files

S2 vases Meigs, Montgomery C. Part of Arlington, Virginia, 1864, U.S. Coast Survey, Register No. 1065,
Cartographic Division, Library of Congress, also George Washington Memorial Parkway Archives

53 vesceee Northeast corner of National Cemetery at Arlington, June 1864, Andrew Russell photographer,
Arlington House Archives

..Civil War era graves along eastern border of flower garden, 2001, National Capital Region Cultural
Landscape Program

55...

Monument to the Unknown Civil War Soldier, in "Soldiers Cemetery at Arlington Heights," Harpers
Weekly March 27, 1869, Arlington National Cemetery Archives, Horticultural Department

‘Unknown Soldiers’ Monument at Arlington," Harper’s Weekly, June 20, 1868, Arlington House Archives

ssseee “Tomb of the Unknown Civil War Soldier, c.1866, Prints and Photographs Division, National Archives IT

Arlington House, south facade, c.1865, Arlington House Archives

SD recsscsee Arlington House, west facade, c.1865, Arlington House Archives

ILLUSTRATIONS | xu


Your old home if not destroyed by our enemies has been so desecrated that I cannot bear to
think of it. I should have preferred it to have been wiped from the earth, its beautiful hill
sunk, and its sacred trees buried, rather than to have been degraded by the presence of those
who revel in the ill they do for their own selfish purposes . . 24

One month earlier Lee, as the executor of G.W.P. Custis's will, had received a court
decree requiring that the slaves at Arlington, Romancock and White House, one hundred and
eighty-eight total, be given their freedom by January 1, 1863. General Lee abided by this deci-
sion, as he had planned to do, and freed the slaves on December 29, 1862, giving them the
option to depart or remain on the various estates.’> At Arlington it is difficult to determine
which of the slaves remained on the estate at the time of their manumission.26 Many slaves
did continue living on the estate after attaining their freedom; for in Freedmen's Village, a fed-
eral settlement for freed slaves established on the southeastern section of the estate in May of
1863, there were former Custis and Lee slaves.27 At least a few individuals remained for the

rest of their lives at Arlington, working for the cemetery and in old age providing priceless

insight to visitors curious about
the appearance of the property
before the war.

During the winter of 1861-
62, thousands of soldiers camped
on Arlington Heights. According
to an Englishman who had visited
the military installation on the old

Arlington House Archives

estate in early spring, much of the

park and forest in the eastern sec-
tion of the property had been damaged. In his book, Six Months in the Federal States, he

explained the rather eager attitudes of the soldiers to his foreign readers,

The greatest difficulty was experienced in hindering the soldiers from cutting down the
trees; and when at last Western regiments were stationed at Arlington Heights, it was
found impossible to protect the timber. To soldiers from the backwoods settlements it seemed
simply absurd to suppose that any man could object to having his ground cleared for him;
and no amount of argument or expostulation could persuade them that it was not one of
the rights of man to cut down any trees he came across. Hence, by this time the park had
been sadly devastated. It had, too, that dreary deserted look which a park always has when
there is nobody to look after it. The ground was so covered with stumps of trees and bro-
ken fences that it was with difficulty we could pilot our horses through the brushwood.?8

42 Soldiers cutting trees at

Arlington in the first year of
the Civil War as published in
Harper's Magazine, autumn

1861

1861-1865 | 77


pe Progra

LANDSCAPE SIMPLIFICATION AND INTERPRETATION

The landscape areas not within the flower or kitchen garden were gradually simplified.
As the brick walks continued to heave with the freeze thaw cycles, the brick paving was
removed intermittently. The Peace rose bed, planted in honor of the end of WWII was most
likely removed in the late 1970s. Gravel was used as a replacement material where planting
beds and brick walks were removed. With the increased use of gravel, most of the post and
rope, and post and chain fencing that had outlined the brick paths to prevent visitors from
walking on the planting beds or the grass were removed. The flower garden, which had been
reconstructed in the late 1960s with gravel paths dividing many curving flower beds, had in its
center an open grassy area, set to someday receive the arbor or summer house. The con-
struction of the summer house, though proposed, had been denied by the Commission of Fine
Arts and other regulatory planning boards under which the Arlington House grounds fell.
Instead interpretive signs were added around the grounds to help describe the appearance of
the Arlington landscape in 1861.

During the 1980s the varied jurisdiction of the site continued to affect its development.
In 1981 the lavatory building, or comfort station, north of the northern slave quarters was

transferred to the National Park Service.6¢ The land upon which the comfort station build-

109 The south facade of
Arlington House and the
flower garden, 2001

1929 - 2001

| 167


Whether President Lincoln's motivations in acquiring clear title to Arlington included its
potential as the site of a national cemetery is unknown. The use of the property during
wartime was unquestioned. But in January of 1864 an end to the war was becoming clearer. By
purchasing the property out-right by authority of a Presidential Executive Order, a clearer title
was established and the standing of the Lee family in a potential law suit to restore their prop-
erty was diminished, though not forever. The legality of the initial federal confiscation of
Arlington would be called into question for the next twenty years.3” In the meantime, how-

ever, Arlington was put to a variety of uses.

ESTABLISHMENT OF FREEMEN'S VILLAGE

Freedmen's Village was established under the authority of the Department of Army in
May of 1863.38 The village was located on the southern portion of the Arlington estate, west
of the Alexandria-Georgetown Turnpike. Of the many freedmen’s camps that would be estab-
lished on both sides of the Potomac River by the end of the Civil War, Freedmen's Village at
Arlington was by far the ost famous. The first camps constructed to deal with the influx of
former and fugitive slaves into Washington were located downtown near the Capitol. These
temporary camps quickly became over-crowded and proved unhealthy. Moreover, only mini-
mal protection could be offered against the Maryland slave owners attempting to regain their
“property.” Danforth B. Nichols of the American Missionary Association and Lieutenant
Colonel Elias M. Green, Chief Quartermaster of the Department of Washington, were
charged with the task of finding a new site—preferably on high ground, outside the confines
of the city, but near enough to ease communication and to be within the protective confines
of the Army installation’? As a result of their search, in the spring of 1863 one hundred indi-
viduals, many of them the former slaves of the Custis’ and Lees’, formed a new community on

the Arlington Estate. Billed to Congress, who funded the resettlement, as a model of charita-

49 Plan of Freedmen’s
Village, 1865

82 | 1861 - 1865

ble housing, the

GENS, PLAN ND. Rew Plow M0 Var

village plans were
rendered in water-
color conveying a
clean, _ pleasing
image of the com-
munity complete
with central lake
and fountain.40
While not quite
aspiring to the
graphics of the

National Archives,

plans, most build-



36 Charles Moore to Colonel Penrose, Quartermaster General, Oct 5, 1922. Penrose responds that it will be done
as money allows. ARHO.

37 For instance, in February 1926 a bill was proposed outlining the use of Arlington House as a museum for tro
phies and emblems of the Union Army and Navy of the United States during the Civil War. Feb 17, 1926. (69th
Congress, Ist Session. $3180).

38 “Plan to Restore Home of Gen Lee.” Washington Post. N.D. Copy ARHO.
39 Frances Parkinson Keyes, “Letters from a Senator's Wife,” in Gond Housekeeping Magazine. August 1921.

40 The cornerstone for Arlington Memorial Amphitheater was laid in 1915 and dedicated in May of 1920, follow-
ing World War I. Report of the Arlington Memorial Amphitheater Commission. (Washington, D.C.: Government
Printing Office 1923): 19 and 47.

41 Charles Moore to Mrs. Henry Keyes, Aug 5, 1921. NARA 66, Records of the Commission of Fine Arts.
42 Charles Moore, Chairman CFA to Quartermaster General, March 12, 1923. ARHO.

43 Restoration of the Lee Mansion, Hearing before the Joint Committee on the Library, Congress of the United States 68th
Congress, First Session Pursuant to the HJ. Res. 264, Authorizing the Restoration of the Lee Mansion in the Arlington
National Cemetery, Virginia, May 28, 1924. (Washington, D.C., 1925): 5.

+ Public Resolution-No 74. 68th Congress (H. J. Res. 246.)

45 “225,000 To Restore Lee Home Asked by Army After Survey,” Evening Star, Washington, D.C. August 15, 1925.
“The total costs were $160,000 for restoration and furnishing of buildings, $92000 for new buildings to house work-
ers and office space. according to those listed in the official Quartermaster Generals Office report. NARA I RG 92,
Entry 1891, Box 67, File 600.13

46 Cost estimates for Restoration July 9, 1925. ARHO
47 “Lee Memorial Plans to be Dropped.” New York Times. October 26, 1925. ARHO
48 Historic Structure Report, Data Section, 162.

49 L. M. Leisenring, The Restoration of Arlington Mansion. An unpublished lecture given with slides at Archives
Auditorium for Thomton Society. April 16, 1945. ARHO. See also, Historic Structure Report, Data Section Volume I:
165.

50 Mariette M. Andrews, George Washington's Country, (New York, F.P. Dutton & Co., Inc. 1930): 144.

51 War Department Bulletin No 6, March 18, 1929, and an act making appropriations to supply deficiencies in cer-
tain appropriations for the fiscal year ending June 30 1929, and prior fiscal years, to provide supplemental appro-
priations for the fiscal years ending June 30, 1929, and June 30, 1930 and for other purposes. As cited in Historic
Structure Report, Data Section Volume I: 165.

52 “Arlington House will be Restored” Sept 14, 1929. Washington, D.C., Washington Evening Star.

53 ‘The construction of Arlington Memorial Bridge, designed by the architectural firm McKim, Mead and White,
occurred between 1926 and 1932.

54“Arlington House will be Restored” Sept 14, 1929. Washington, D.C., Washington Evening Star.

ENDNOTES

| 203


72 To further explain, while the percentage of slaves in the total population in 1749 was twenty-eight percent, their
numbers had grown until in 1782 slaves made up forty-one percent of all tithables in Fairfax County. Netherton,
Nan et al., 28-36.

73 Stevenson, 174.

74 Pawlet Nathaniel Mason Pawlett, A Brief History of the Roads of Virginia 1607-1840 (Charlottesville, VI: Virginia
Highway and Transportation Research Council, 1977):4-7. A History of Roads in Virginia “The Most Convinient
Ways”. (Richmond Virginia: Department of Transportation, 1992): 3-7.

75 For further information on the history of canal development in the area see, Thomas Swiftwater Hahn and
Emory L. Kemp's The Alexandria Canal: Its History and Preservation. Volume 1, Number 1, (Morgantown, WV: West
Virginia University Press, 1992) and Chesapeake and Obio Canal: Official National Park Handbook (Washington, D.C.:
Department of the Interior, 1991).

76 Albert Mathews Ed. Journal of William Loughton Smith-1790-1791 (Cambridge: The University Press, 1917) as
reprinted in T. Michael Miller. Pen Portraits of Alexandria Virginia, 1739-1900. (Bowie, MD: Heritage Books Inc.,
1987): 37-38.

77S, M. Hamilton, The Columbia Mirror and Alexandria Gazette, October 27, 1796: 2 Mathews, Albert, Ed. Journal
of William Loughton Smaith-1790-1791 (Cambridge: The University Press, 1917) as reprinted in Michael T. Miller.
Pen Portraits of Alexandria Virginia, 1739-1900. (Bowie, MD: Heritage Books Inc., 1987): 39-40.

78 Nelligan, 55.

79 Washington purchased 378 acres from Stephen Grey and 790 acres from Gabriel Adams. Washington surveyed
the property many times, the last time in 1785. Stetson, 49, 51,60. See Also, Letters to Washington by S.M. Hamilton,
Vol. TV: 286.

80 Alexandria Gazette. (June 16, 1807).

81 W. W. Abbott, Editor. The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, Vol. 6., 202-209. The other children did
not inherit because the common law canon of descent gave preference to males over females. This law remained
active until 1785, so that G.WP. became sole owner at his mother’s death. The name of the Romancock estate was
changed to Romancoke sometime in the mid-nineteenth century.

82 From the will and estate accounts of Martha Washington as related in Joseph Field’s. Worthy Partner: The Papers
of Martha Washington. (Westport, CN: Greenwood Press 1994), 406-417.

83 Nelligan, 58. This agreement was recorded April 4, 1803 in Records of Alexandria County, D.C. Deed Book E, pp.
127-132, 133-135.

84 Nelligan, 74. See also, Custis, George Washington Parke. Memoirs of Washington . .. (New York: Union Pub.
House, 1859): 52.

ENDNoTES | 181




58 Arlington House, south
facade, ¢.1865

98 | 1865 - 1880

ARLINGTON AFTER THE WAR

In 1865 with the Civil War over, the primary objective of the Quartermaster General's
department, and therefore the principal duty of the cemetery staff, was to bury the dead. An
ambitious federal program was initiated to locate, recover and re-inter thousands of deceased
soldiers from battlefields and temporary burial sites associated with the military hospitals and
posts. Within three years over fourteen thousand deceased soldiers, from many different bat-
tles and many different backgrounds, lay at Arlington—over three times as many as at any of
the other thirty-three national cemeteries.” In the early development of the national ceme-
tery, the desire for an organized design of grave plots and an efficient and aesthetic road sys-

ae | = a; tem gave way to the need
to accomplish interments
quickly. But even such
pragmatic development
was expensive. By 1867,
the expenditure _ for
Arlington, at over one hun-
dred and seventy thousand
dollars, was over three
times as much as the next
largest expenditure report-
ed in the accounts of the
Secretary of War.8

Though a battle never
occurred on the soil of
Arlington, the use of the

estate to house and train

Z
4
5
E
:
E

Union soldiers throughout the four and a half years of the Civil War caused the destruction of
fences, forests and buildings, and the deterioration of gardens, fields and roads. The domes-
tic carriage drives and footpaths of the Custis and Lee households were altered, in some cases,
beyond recognition. By 1865 the drive which had linked the horse stable west of the house to
the work yard when the property was a residence, had been divided into many distinct, adja-
cent routes. Thousands of soldiers had simply followed the path of least resistance from the
Union officers’ quarters near the stable to the west entrance of the house or headquarters. The
portion of the carriage drive which had wound around the southern end of the flower garden
and passed in front of the mansion to a turn-around east of the northern wing had also lost its
strict borders. Its once graveled surface had eroded into the slope to the south and east of the

house. In the yard area west of the house, the ground had become so trampled that little veg-


Indeed, the slave’s cabins, barns, fields and orchards illustrated the prosperity of the Custis and
Lee families clearly to the visiting public.”? However, as revealed in Robert E. Lee’s comments
about the affect of the Alexandria Canal on the work habits of the Arlington Farm slaves, this

proximity to public environments may have affected the lives of the slaves.

The whole place will be exposed to the depredations of the public, his [Custis’s] own people
[slaves] will have more opportunity for gossip and idleness and greater temptation and
inducement to appropriate the small proceeds of their labor to themselves.80

More likely such proximity resulted in less autonomy in the slaves lives, not greater. Custis
too, as the owner of Arlington, spent a relatively large portion of his time on the farm or at
Arlington Spring, thereby diminishing the autonomy of the slave community on the farm and
their ability to arrange their own environment. In any case, Robert E. Lee’s words suggest the
nature of the relationship between slave and owner. Yet the slaves did appropriate land for their
own use. According to oral history, the cemetery which held the ancestors of the Arlington
slaves was located to the north of Arlington Spring, east of the farm, near the Alexandria Canal
culvert.8!

The arrangement and design of the landscape of the Arlington estate reflected not only
the aesthetic taste of the time and the pragmatic necessities of a southern slave economy, it also
revealed the individual natures and desires of the Custis and Lee families. As a niece of Custis
wrote, remembering her childhood visits to Arlington,

One evening all were at the spring when on climbing the steep bank of the canal, I saw
G.WP. standing, wrapped in contemplation of the western sky robbed in all its gorgeous-
ness of color. I asked him if he was enjoying nature’s painting, he replied “I am studying
the effect for my picture.”®

G.W.P. Custis was an artist and writer, in addition to a plantation owner. For although
he never referred to Arlington as a plantation, his other properties were run as such and direct-

ly supported his endeavors at Arlington. His primary objectives in composing his paintings

22 Though many of the
buildings on Arlington Farm
are not shown immediately
east of the Alexandria Canal,
Arlington Spring is seen
clearly next to the Potomac
River on this detail from the
Environs of Washington
Prepared from original
Surveys of the Engineer
Department 1864-1866.
The field work for this map
was probably completed prior
to or early into the Civil War. |

OO

1802-1861 | 45


222 | MAP BIBLIOGRAPHY

Twentieth Century

1901 National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, Quartermaster General’: Office, map files Arlington House
Archives, original RG 92, NARA II.

1908 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

1908 J. Jarvis Pictorial Map of Washington D.C., enlarged and improved edition for the Sunday Star, copyright
1907 by J. Jarvis, map files, Arlington House Archives.

(1907] Stable for Arlington Cemetery, Quartermaster General's Office, map files Arlington House Archives.
1911 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.
1911 Plan of the Arlington Farm, U.S. Department of Agriculture, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1912 Map of the Arlington Virginia National Cemetery, Quartermaster General’s Office, Washington, D.C.,
August 14, 1912, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1914 United States Geodetic Survey Map, Cartographic Division, Library of Congress.

1917 Map of U.S. Government Roadways leading to Fort Myer and Arlington, 2 sheets, TIC files, NCR Archives,
855/81050.

1918 Map of the Arlington National Cemetery, sketch map to accompany estimate of funds for improvements E.Y,
1920, Zone Supply Office, Washington D.C. GWMP Archives, Turkey Run, Virginia.

1921 Arlington National Cemetery Virginia Plan for Remodeling Grounds about Lee Mansion, plan February 23,
1921, approved by CFA March 21, 1921, TIC files, NCR Archives, 855/41900,

1921 Arlington National Cemetery Arlington Virginia, Preliminary Plan for Improvement of Grounds prepared under
direction of National Commission of Fine Arts, September 1921, George Gibbs, Jr., Landscape Architect, map files,
Arlington House Archives.

1922. Map of the Arlington Virginia National Cemetery showing drives, Quartermaster General Office,
Washington, D.C., May 10, 1922, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1923 Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia, General Plan for North Half, Cartographic Division, RG
77, NARA IL.

1923 Arlington National Cemetery Virginia, Plan for Work to be Done at Lee Mansion, August 16, 1923, Arlington
House Archives.

1924 Proposed Treatment of Government Experimental Farm as a Part of Arlington National Cemetery with suggest-
ed boulevard to connect Key Bridge Memorial Bridge and Military Road with possible extension to Mount Vernon, original
Quartermaster General’s Office, Cartographic Division, RG 92, NARA II, map files, Arlington House Archives.

1929 Map of Arlington National Cemetery to Accompany Estimate of February 28-1929 for Propased Drives, TIC files,
NCR Archives, 855/81047.

[1929] Arlington National Cemetery Restoration of Arlington Mansion Study for Drives, Walks and Planting around
Mansion on sites of Old Flower and Vegetable Garden, Quartermaster General's Office, original, Arlington House
Archives


eral economy of the
area, for as Custis
emphasized through-
out his life, his for-
tunes and his ability to
improve his properties
were controlled by the
general agriculture
state of affairs.
During the 1830s, the

agricultural situation

had not improved,
therefore financial resources for much of this decade were limited. As Custis’s brother-in-law
acknowledged in his address to the Colombian Institute in 1830, real estate values had fallen
in the area thirty to fifty percent as the staple crops of Virginia—cotton, wheat and tobacco—
were reduced in price thirty to forty percent.95 However, by the 1840s things began to change
for Custis, as well as for many local land owners. In typical style, Custis related his own agri-

cultural experiences to the United States Agricultural Society and was met with great applause:

At length things arrived at their lowest state of depression, when the crops upon my two
great estates [Pamunkey River plantations] amounted to 700 bushels of a trash undeserv-
ing the name of wheat; and it was at this period of universal gloom that better destinies
suddenly dawned upon Southern Virginia. My long agony was over. By the use of marl,
oyster-shell, clover and plaster of Paris, together with improved tillage and the very able
management of the gentleman who has charge of my estates in the south-150 miles from
my residence-my old patrimonial acres have shook off the garb of barrenness and desolation
and now flourish and blossom as the roses.96

Perhaps he was spurred to use fertilizers through his knowledgeable farm manager of the
Pamunkey estates, William Nelson.97 Or perhaps he was simply responding to the increas-
ingly available transportation routes which brought down the price of the fertilizer.
Regardless, the lands of the area were improving and thereby so were the crops, the monetary
returns and the property values. The profit on the fisheries increased as well, for as Custis

wrote to his farm manager:

Fisheries are becoming of increasing value-the demand owing to facilities of rail road and
canals. . . Fish will never be low priced again8

29 Arlington House from
southeast, 1845

—_

1802-1861 | 51


180 | ENDNOTES

59 This inventory is from the inventory of Daniel’s properties at his death, as inherited by his wife Martha
Dandridge Custis in 1758, Abbott, 201-265; Stetson, 26.

60 Between the births of Elizabeth Parke Custis in 1776 and Martha Parke Custis in 1777 they lived at the White
House plantation in New Kent County. Nelly oversaw the raising of the children and domestic tasks while John
was elected to the General Assembly in Richmond.

61 John Fitzpatrick, Ed. The Writings of Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745-1799. (Washington,
D.C.: US Government Printing Office, 1931): Volume 11: 457.

62 Smith, “The Abingdon of Fairfax County.” Daughters of the American Revolution Magazine Vol. LXT. No 2.
(une, 1929), 325-330, The archeological remnants of Abingdon were incorporated in the design of the expansion
and rehabilitation of National Airport of Washington, D.C. in the late-twentieth century.

63 Eleanor Parke Custis, known as Nelly, was born on March 21, 1779 and died in 1852. She married Lawrence
Lewis (1767-1839) in 1799. Lewis, Nelly Custis. George Washington's Beautiful Nelly: The Letters of Eleanor Parke
Custis Lewis to Elizabeth Bordley Gibson, 1794-1851. Edited by Patricia Brady. (Columbia, S.C.: University of South
Carolina Press, 1991).

64 George Washington Parke Custis. Memoirs of Washington. (New York: Union Publication House, 1859): 254f.

65 The ownership of Abingdon was transferred back to the Alexanders in 1792 because Eleanor Custis Stewart and
her husband Doctor David Stewart could not make payments according to John Custis’s real estate agreement. A
suit was brought in which a court settlement was made whereby General Washington paid Robert Alexander for
the years of the Custis occupation and the Custises moved to Hope Park, twenty miles from the city of Alexandria.
Walker, Mark, et. al. Phase II Archaeological Study: Abingdon Plantation Site, Washington National Airport
(Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, Parsons Management Consultants). August 1989; Jackson, Donald,
editor and Dorothy Twohig, assistant editor. The Diaries of George Washington, 1732-1799. (Charlottesville:
University Press of Virginia, 1976-1979): 219.

66 For a detailed account of the childhood and education of G.W.P. Custis see, Murray Nelligan’s “Old Arlington.”:
The Story of the Lee Mansion National Memorial. (United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service,
National Capital Region, 1954).

67 Nelligan, 39.

68 George Washington to Dr. James Anderson, April 7, 1797. As quoted in Mac Griswold’s Washington's Gardens at
Mount Vernon: Landscape of the Inner Man (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1999): 131.

6 Nelligan, 40-41. The Reverend Stanhope Smith was very forward thinking concerning the equality of races. He
advocated the end of slavery, stating that all races had a common genetic origin and equal abilities. These beliefs
may have influenced the young G.W.P. Custis in his own beliefs concerning slavery.

70 Brenda E. Stevenson, Life in Black and White: Family and Community in the Slave South, (New York: Oxford
University Press): 130.

71 For further discussion of George Washington’s relationship with his slaves and attitudes towards slavery, see
Dorothy Twohig’s paper to be included in ‘The Papers of George Washington, upon their publication. “That Species
of Property”: Washington's Role in the Controversy Over Slavery. Originally presented at a Conference on Washington
and Slavery at Mount Vernon, October 1994. See http://viginia.edu/gwpapers.html


INTRODUCTION

This first volume (Part 1) of the Cultural Landscape Report for Arlington House: The Robert

E. Lee Memorial documents the development of the landscape of the Arlington estate from

pre-history to 2001 through narrative, historic period plans, photographs and drawings. The

volume is divided into seven chapters denoting periods of physical development within the

chronology of the site. The probable social, political and economic determinants of those

physical modifications and transformations are also explored.

Location

The landscape of Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial is owned and administered

by the National Park Service. Approximately 27 acres, the property is located in Arlington

1 Arlington House is
Jocated within Arlington
National Cemetery in
Arlington County, Virginia.

XVITE | INTRODUCTION

MIRGINIA

} ACERAGE: 27.91 acres

LOCATION MAP

NATIONAL PARK SERVICE [I]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY [7]

County, Virginia. Bordered
on the north, south, and east
by Arlington —_ National
Cemetery, and on the west by
Fort Myer, the lands of
Arlington House are sur-
rounded by property under
the administration of the

Department of the Army.

Scope

Tn order to fully comprehend
the factors affecting the phys-
ical development of the orig-
inal property during the first
five development periods—
from the Paleo-Indian period
to 1883—the boundary of the
1100-acre
estate of Arlington House is

approximately

used as the contextual bound-

ary for the history section of

the Cultural Landscape Report. For the chapters covering the time between 1883 and 2001,

the contextual boundary for the history narrative narrows gradually in scope, to allow for a

more detailed discussion and analysis of developments on the National Park Service adminis-


86 The Tomb of the
Unknown Civil War Soldier
is in the foreground, with the
Temple of Fame in back.
postcard c.1910

tanto sasa sani

hile Chairman Charles Moore was trying to influence legislation pursuant to
the restoration of Arlington House, other members of the Commission of Fine
Arts were serving as design consultants, recommending modifications to the
landscape. As early as 1919, CFA member and landscape architect James Greenleaf reviewed
the development ideas of Major Lemly, then in charge of Arlington Cemetery. Intent on sim-

plifying the memorial grounds, Greenleaf recommended that all flower beds and cast iron
planting urns be removed immediately, believing their showiness ill-suited to the solemnity of
the cemetery. He proposed planting low-growing boxwood instead, as the dark green, deli-
cate foliage of boxwood would be more subdued than the brightly colored annual plantings
remaining from the 1880s design of Rhodes. After reading Greenleaf’s comments on his pro-
posal, Major Lemly requested from the Commission a full and “frank” report on the grounds.!
The CFA agreed and quickly offered further suggestions regarding proposed planting schemes
for the Memorial Amphitheater, to the west of the flower garden, in addition to the landscape
immediately around Arlington. Nevertheless, much to the Commission members’ frustration,
few if any of their suggestions were taken by the Quartermaster Generals Office. Ever deter-
mined, ten years later Chairman Moore was still pushing for the demolition of the Temple of

Fame and the removal of the flower beds south of Arlington House.

. +. cannot means be taken to remove the tin top arrangement, known as the Temple of

Fame? I told Abraham Garfield that he must be prepared to see the name of his father

3
2
2
H
a
A
Hy
ES


212 | BIBLIOGRAPHY

Green, Constance M, The Secret City: A history of race relations in the Nation's Cupital.Princeton, N. J., Princeton
University Press, 1967.

Griswold, Mac, Washington's Gardens ut Mount Vernon: Landscape of the Inner Man, Boston and New York:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 1999.

Hahn, Thoinas Swiftwater and Emory L. Kemp, The Alexandria Canal: Its History and Preservation, West Virginia
University Press: The Institute for the History of Technology and Industrial Archaeology, Volume 1, Number 1,
1992.

Handy, Levin C., United States National Military Cemetery, Arlington, Virginia, Washington: L.C. Handy, 1903.

Hanna, Jennifer, Ornamental Garden Design: The Rise of Floricultural Publications and the Role of James Vick, Rochester
Seed House Owner, unpublished, Masters Thesis Ithaca, New York: Cornell University 1997.

Harwell, Richard, Lee An Abridgement in one Volume of the Four Volume R.B. Lee by Douglas Southall Freeman with a
new foreword by James M, McPherson, New York: Touchstone 1961, 2nd edition, 1991.

Henderson, Peter, Gardening for Pleasure: A guide to the Amateur in the Fruit Vegetable and Flower Garden, New York:
©, Judd Company, 1875.

Hine, Thomas, Capability Brown: The Story of a Master Gardener, New York: Norton, 1986.
Hinkle, John Vincent, Arlington: Monument to Heroes Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1965.

History of the George Washington Bicentennial Celebration, vol., II, Literature Series, United States George
Washington Bicentennial Commission Washington, D.C., 1933.

Historical Interpretation and the National Park Service at Robert E, Lee Mansion National Memorial, The American
Studies Department, George Washington University, July 1, 1996.

James, Felix “The Decline of and Fall Freedmen’s Village in Arlington Virginia,” Negro History Bulletin 37, no. 3,
1974: 247-250.

Jarvis, J. E, Jarvis’ Mount Vernon and Arlington Album, Washington, D.C.: J.F Jarvis, 1893.

Jennings, Francis, Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America, New York:
Norton, 1988,

Karson, Robin and Charles Birnbaum, Editors, Pioneers of American Landscape Design, New York: McGraw Hill,
2000.

Kaye, Ruth Lincoln, “Lost Heritage: Early Homes that have Disappeared from Northern Virginia,” Northern
Virginia Heritage, February 1987:11-17.

Keyes, Frances Parkinson, “Letters from a Senator’s Wife,” Good Housekeeping Magazine, August, 1921.
Kohler, Sue A., The Commission of Fine Arts: 1910-1995, Washington, D.C.: The Commission of Fine Arts, 1995.

Kolikoff, Allan, ‘Tobacco and Slaves: The Development of Southern Cultures in the Chesapeake, 1680-1800, Chapel Hill:
Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Virginia by the University of North Carolina
Press, 1986.


upkeep of the site. The increased neglect may have also resulted from the departure of the
slaves when Freedmen's Village was established. In any case, “all the boundaries, garden plats
and smooth reaches of green turf... were swept away and even the gradually descending ter-
races were broken down and became but ragged embankments.”30 In fact, after the Union
defeat at the Second Battle of Manassas in late August 1862, General McClellan ordered the
Arlington mansion burned if the Confederates moved on Washington. But the southern

forces came no closer and

the estate was spared. As a
result of the defeat, howev-
er, construction of Fort
Whipple was begun to the
northwest of the house
necessitating the removal of
a large swath of trees.3!

By 1863 according to
Anthony ‘Trollope, an

English novelist who visited

Arlington House Archi

the estate:

the whole place was then one camp. The fences disappeared. The gardens were trodden into
mud. The roads had been cut to pieces and new tracks made everywhere through the
grounds. But timber still remained.32

45 In addition to the damage
done during the Union occu-
pation of Arlington,
Arlington Mills, the custom
mill begun by George
Washington Park Custis in
the early nineteenth century,
«also suffered. Harper's
Magazine, autumn, 1861

During the time
between the removal of the
headquarters of the Army of

the Potomac and the cre-

ation of the national ceme-
tery, the landscape  sur-
rounding Arlington House
changed. The white paling
fence surrounding the
flower garden and the last of
the post and rail and board
fences from other locations
on the estate were most
likely removed for lumber.

During the Custis and Lee

46 During the war, the yard
west of Arlington House was
pounded dirt, broken only by
scattered trees preserved for
their valuable shade, June
1864.

1861 - 1865 | 79


ae

eae

—__, ~~ PALEO“INDIAN PERIOD
Me) * TO POINT OF
“hy EUROPEAN CONTACT
IN 1608



30 | 1802 - 1861

Manure, another fertilizer, made it taste bad.!5 Most importantly, tobacco required large plots
of land, and Mount Washington had only a limited supply of tillable soil. In contrast, the pic-
turesque slopes of the property dotted with the cedars of secondary forest growth did provide
pasture land—an agricultural use that would conform perfectly to the design ideals of the nat-
uralistic English Landscape School, and the “Park” that was eventually created on the slopes
of Mount Washington.!6 The design of Mount Washington, later renamed Arlington House,
was in many ways to exemplify this connection between the pragmatic necessities of an agri-
cultural slave economy and the picturesque aesthetic sense of the antebellum period.

Custis, like Washington, began promoting agricultural improvement as a very young
man. In the spring of 1803, the same year that Custis began construction on the classical man-
sion that was to become Arlington House, he placed an advertisement in the Universal

Gazette, a Washington D.C. newspaper:

For the encouragement of an American breed of sheep I will give a premium of forty dol-
lars, for the finest ram lamb that can be produced in the month of March 1805...the lambs
to be inspected by four gentlemen of judgment and respectability...in addition to the premi-
um, the breeder of the fortunate lamb will be entitled to demand a ram of the improved

breed, at any time within ten years.'7

The “improved breed” to which Custis referred was from Mount Washington, a ram born of
the sheep of Mount Vernon. Custis expounded in local and national newspaper articles on the
value of agricultural improvement and on the benefits resulting from a reliance on American
soil and ingenuity for goods, instead of those of Europe. Such a federalist and agrarian polit-
ical inclination was not surprising considering the heritage of Custis. George Washington had
exemplified the gentleman farmer and throughout his life strove to improve the agricultural
condition of the American Colonies and later that of the new nation. Custis had adopted his
concern about the lack of an adequate breed of sheep that would provide a fine-grain wool
which could compete with the merino wool coming out of Europe. During the years that
Custis lived at Mount Vernon, Washington worked hard to develop a breed of sheep that
would survive in the climate of Virginia and produce a warm thick wool. He was only partly
successful. In the early nineteenth century, with the wars in Europe, American domestic prod-
ucts were increasingly lucrative. Custis’s interest in the development of a manufacturing
industry, through his promotion of sheep husbandry, was a direct link with the beliefs of
Washington that arose out of the American Revolution, substantiating Custis as the true inher-
itor of the legacy of George Washington. To rely on England’s exports was, to Custis and to
Washington, dangerous to the political autonomy of the country. Like his adopted grandfa-
ther, Custis believed that America was only as strong as her agricultural practices. As an edi-
torial in the Boston Patriot stated in 1809, “Among the most distinguished patrons of


on the Confederates at Bull Run (officially named the First Battle of Manassas) on July 21,
McDowell recognized the need for a better defense system adequate to protect Arlington,
thereby preventing at least one way of attack on the capital city. Fort Corcoran to the north
and Forts Albany and Runyon to the south had to be connected. Therefore a chain of lunettes
was constructed, including Fort Tillinghast, Fort Cass and Fort Woodbury west of Arlington
House.!?_ Fort DeKalb to the northwest of the estate property line and Fort Craig to the
southwest were also built as part of this continuous defensive line in advance of the heights of
Arlington.!8 To link the new forts, many roads were cut through the woods and a belt of trees
both large and small was felled through the forest in front of Arlington to allow for passage
and communication.!?

Another primary purpose of the new road construction was to ensure that the head-
quarters, Arlington House, had more than one entry or egress in case of invasion by enemy
forces. During [RQ TES
the life of
G.W.P. Custis,
and later under
the manage-
ment of Robert
E. Lee, the
Arlington estate
had only one
carriage drive which connected it to the main roads and the Potomac; that which extended
west from Arlington Spring, through the farm and up the slope through the Park to the man-
sion, stables and yard. This situation of limited egress and entry was dangerous, for if the
Confederate forces advanced, there was only one method of retreat for the Union Army. To
solve this problem, the drive to the estate was extended to the west through the woods, imme-
diately west of the yard, down into the ravine behind the house and back up again before turn-
ing east and continuing down the slope to meet the turnpike at the northeastern corner of the
property.

Throughout the former estate to the north, south and east of the mansion thousands of
soldiers bivouacked in the forest and fields.20 In early July of 1861, a young soldier described

the scene,

through the green forest leaves gleams the white canvas of the tents and on the highest ridge
westward rises an imposing structure with a portico and colonnade in front, facing the
river, which is called Arlington House . . . a large United States flag floats from the roof
which shames even the ample proportions of the many stars and stripes rising up from the

camps in the trees. . 2!

40 The placement of arma-
ments and tents are shown as
crosses and triangles on this
detail of a map of the land-
scape of Arlington House.
Topographic Survey of
U.S. Coast and Geodetic
Survey, Washington, D.C.
1864

1861-1865 | 75



218 | BIBLIOGRAPHY



‘George Washington Memorial Parkway Archives

absorb moisture, thereby, increasing the longevity of the buildings. As a timber house with
brick chimneys instead of wood, Alexander’s house was characteristic of the elite architecture
of the mid-eighteenth century. As a plantation Alexander's farm estate most likely included
outbuildings such as a dairy, smokehouse, icehouse, granary, kitchen, slave quarters and barns
to shelter the tools, tasks and produce agricultural products.” By the 1750s Gerrard Alexander
also had a brick residence in Alexandria, Virginia.

In 1750 the land of the Howsing ‘Tract was surveyed again—this time by Jeremiah
Hampton, Ferdiando O’Neal, and Joseph Dorsey—in accordance with a suit between the
Alexander bothers and Henry Awbry, an adjacent landowner to the north of Gerrard's tract.”
According to this land survey, Gerrard Alexander had quarters, most likely slave quarters,
located on Holmes Island (now called Daingerfield Island), in addition to his home near Four
Mile Creek. North of Holmes Island, Rick Wheeler, a tenant farmer of Gerrard Alexander,
had a house with two outbuildings. Continuing north along the edge of the Potomac, William
Griffin, also a tenant of Gerrard Alexander, was seated with a single structure located near the
mouth of the Wampakam Branch. Although the exact appearance of these tenant farm struc-

tures is not known, one or one-and-a-half story frame dwellings or log houses covered with

unpainted riven clapboards, often of post in the ground construction (earthfast), were typical
of tenant farms in northern Virginia during that time period.” In 1760 Captain Awbry still
owned the land north of Gerrard Alexander. Upon his property he appears to have con-
structed two relatively large structures and two small ones. At this time, the road leading from

9 In this detail from the
1750 land survey of a portion
of the Howsing Tract, the
structures associated with the
tenants of Gerrard Alexander
are clearly visible. The house
of Rick Wheeler, conforms
most closely to the location of
George Washington Parke
Custis’s first home at
Arlington.

1608 - 1802 | 13



—- el
si

out of New York City and member of the CFA.!8 A letter from Quartermaster General J. L.
DeWitt accompanied the plans. General DeWitt explained to the Commission that “though
the present appropriations were not sufficient to cover the entire cost of the proposed restora-
tions of the surrounding gardens it was desired to have a definite plan upon which to base any
work now possible.” He outlined the proposed restoration of the flower and vegetable gardens,
assuring the Commission that careful research had been made as to the location and general
plan of the gardens. Ever conscious of the limited budget, he suggested that the presence of
the lattice summer house, “a central feature of the old fashioned garden” during the period of
Lee’s departure from the estate, might be suggested through the planting of vines around the
existing Temple of Fame. As did all the prior restoration plans, DeWitt proposed replacing
the concrete drives and walks adjacent to the buildings, this time with gravel or brick walks.
He was concerned as well that the outbuilding immediately north of the northern slave quar-
ters, “used for a guard house and toilet room,” be screened more completely from public view.
In addition, he pointed out that in the proposed plan the vehicular traffic was rerouted from
the rear of the mansion to a parking area near the Memorial Amphitheater. He also assured
the Commission that, regardless of what was accomplished, the intention of the Quartermaster
General’s Office was not to remove any of the “old forest trees,” for their “preservation was of
great importance.” Finally, he informed them that he had not submitted the plans to the
Secretary of War or any other authority but had counted on the prior involvement of the
Commission before he went forward.!?

The Commission, with the comments of Vitale, approved the 1930 landscape plan for
Arlington with the following stipulations. Eager to reinforce the importance of the nine-
teenth-century landscape, they recommended that the walk currently leading to the Sheridan
monument be removed, and that vegetation be used to screen the monument from the man-
sion, The Commission, returning to the plans of 1923, proposed that, if possible, the drive on
the east front should be eliminated and a study made for a simple brick terrace in front of the
mansion so as to accommodate sightseers gathering to enjoy the view over the city. They con-
curred in the ultimate removal of both the L’Enfant and Wright monuments to another part
of the cemetery. They approved the creation of a screened parking area to the east of the
memorial amphitheater with the provision that this parking area not be brought too near the
old amphitheater. Again members of the Commission reiterated their belief that the landscape
would be more pleasing without the Temple of Fame. In fact they suggested that, if possible,
the Monument to the Unknown Civil War Soldier could be re-erected in place of the Temple-
for they felt that the significance of the monument had been inappropriately minimized. This
sentiment would inform the future design of the flower garden, which was left for further
study, Once the Commission approved the plan for the grounds immediately surrounding the
house, an estimate of $17, 508.25 to “raze greenhouse, remove concrete paving, put in grav-

el roads and walks, and brick walks” was submitted.

148 | 1929 - 2001



been. The former slaves of Custis, unlike the other Freedmen's Village residents, did not have
to pay rent. The disbanding of Freedmen's Village began around 1888. A sum of fifteen thou-
sand dollars was appropriated by Congress to reimburse the renters for the buildings and other
improvements and to cover the estimated cost of removal of the buildings and improvements
if desired. Many of the buildings were relocated, as were trees and other vegetation.‘?
However, in the 1930s landscape gardener Rhodes described the fruit trees long ago planted
by the residents of Freedmen's Village scattered among the graves of Arlington Cemetery.
New lands gradually opened up for the expanding development of the cemetery. With the
removal of the last resident-around ten years later, the oldest government-run Freedmen's

Village in the country disappeared.

CONCLUSION

The disbanding of Freedmen’s Village was only one step in the long process of convert-
ing Arlington National Cemetery from a relatively small burial ground, to one of the largest
and most significant federal cemeteries in America. Once the landscape was restored from the
effects of the Civil War and the first monuments to the war's heroes constructed, the work of
expanding the cemetery to contain the ever increasing number of deceased veterans began.
Following the decision of the Supreme Court in 1883, the United States government held the
title to the Arlington estate free and clear. Through the last two decades of the nineteenth cen-
tury, drastic changes would take place on the landscape of Arlington House.

1865-1880 | 113


tered property. Adjacent

government land, including

Arlington National Cemetery,
Freedmen’s_ Village, Fort
Myer, and the Government
Experimental Farm, is
addressed only where the
evolvement of that property
affected the land now
managed by the National

Park Service.

Methodology

This document is based
chiefly on the study of primary
resources. Graphic materials

included maps, drawings, and

i i Ram CUSTIS FAMILY OWNERSHIP
historic photographs. ‘Textual care ii ate Om
resources included official and GM 10 Hosaceo 84 NaTIONAL Pan SeRUce aPPRORMATE, 2001

(mT Estate Bounoannes OUR THE CusTIS-LEE PEROD

familial correspondence, agri-

cultural and census records,

2 Contextual boundaries
map

Office of the Quartermaster

General Cemetery Reports, National Park Service memoranda and reports, oral history
accounts and historical narratives. Secondary sources, including books and National Park
Service reports written recently, were utilized primarily to provide additional context

where beneficial.

The historic period plans were computer generated. Historic maps were scanned into a graph-
ics program, digitized, and rectified to existing conditions maps. Then the historic period

plans were created through comparison of the historic information to existing conditions.

The primary historic, graphical documentation of the site dates from the Federal occupation
of the property beginning in 1861. Though drawings of the estate prior to the Civil War exist,
no maps illustrating the estate under the ownership of the Custis and Lee families have yet
been discovered. In addition, only limited archeological excavation has occurred. Thus the
discussion of the property prior to the Civil War is based chiefly on written documentation
and the photographs and maps executed after the war had begun.

INTRODUCTION | xix


Custis’s own experiences—both successes and failures—in developing the Arlington estate
often mirrored the economic and agricultural cycles of the larger environment of northern
Virginia and Maryland.

ARLINGTON FARM AND SPRING

Though the main purpose of Arlington was as a family seat and decorative landscape
used to convey the status of both the Custis and the Washington families, Arlington Farm was
an integral portion of the estate. The farm was located at the eastern edge of the property
along the Potomac River and contained the market garden, crop fields, pasture, a fishery, and
the homes or quarters of approximately fifty slaves at any one time. By late in the tenure of
the Custis and Lee families, the slaves were living in five log cabins, each one ranging from
270 to 350 square feet in size, but the exact appearance of the cabins is unknown. Two of the
cabins were located along the road which led west from Arlington Spring at the edge of the
Potomac River to the main gate of the Arlington Estate off of the Alexandria and Georgetown
Turnpike. The other slave quarters were located amongst the farm buildings which included
at various times, a wheelwright’s shop, a blacksmith, a saddlery, a poultry yard, a carriage shop,
a granary, a large feeding barn, and a pump house.®} Cattle, chickens and hogs were kept in
and around these buildings. The structures may also have contained housing for some slaves.
‘Two large outdoor sinks, either of stone or wood, were also located here. These hollowed out
logs or soap stones were often used for washing or the preparation of food.6+ The wide vari-
ety in the types of farm buildings was not unusual for the first half of the nineteenth century.
Though Arlington was not a self-sufficient plantation, the more jobs fulfilled by the slaves, the
less cash outlay required by the Custis and Lee families. Therefore, slaves on the estate were
not solely agriculturists. Some had to be skilled in blacksmithing, animal husbandry, and the
working of leather for saddles and other products. ‘To supplement their diets, the slaves most
likely had family vegetable plots near their cabins. By the 1840s, a fenced orchard stretched to
the south of the road which ran from the Alexandria Canal west to the overseer’s house. The
overseer’s house, the original home of Custis when he moved to Arlington, was one of the only
non-log structures on the farm. It was two stories with a porch that stretched across the back
overlooking a work yard and slave quarters. Fields with crops such as corn and rye were locat-
ed to the north and south of the farm buildings. In 1850, the farm produced 200 bushels of
rye, 900 bushels of Indian corn, 150 bushels of oats, twenty bushels of peas, fifty bushels of
Trish potatoes, and thirty tons of hay.65

Land use and production levels on Arlington Farm were never constant. Crops were
rotated, new crops were grown, new land cleared for cultivation, and old fields allowed to lie
fallow. For instance, in a letter to the American Farmer in May of 1825, Custis described his
efforts in reclaiming the marsh land located south of Arlington Farm, along the Potomac
River:

1802-1861 | 44



10 Dan Sealy, Resource Manager, George Washington Memorial Parkway to Jennifer Hanna, Historical Landscape
Architect, April 20, 2001.

11 Historic photographs dating to 1864 and 1865 suggest that the fence around the kitchen garden may have been
both post and rail and a wood board fence. A drawing from the 1850s shows an entrance gate with vertical pickets.

!2 Thompson R, Fast to Quartermaster General Rucker. “Report in Regard to Condition of Cemetery.” Aug 31,
1867, NARA I Consolidated Correspondence File, Old Military and Civilian Records. http://www.va.gov.

13 For detail of Arlington farm building use by Federal Army during the Civil War see map, “Arlington Corral
Arlington Virginia, July 25, 1865.” NARA II. RG 92. Cartographic Division. F-110 sheets 3 & 4 of 9; For refer-
ences to trees being cut at Arlington Spring see Dicey, Edward. Six Months in the Federal States (London 1863):16-
18. Karl Decker and Angus McSween. Historic Arlington (Decker and McSween Publishing Company: Washington,
D.C. 1892): 70, D. H. Rucker to M.C. Meigs. Washington, D.C. June 24, 1863. NARA I RG 92. Series:
NMBI1E225, Consolidated Correspondence File.

John F. Trowbridge, The South: A Tour ofits Battlefields and Ruined Cities. (Hartford, Conn.: L Stebbins, 1866): 82.
15 Bobbi Schildt, “Freedmen’s Village.” Northern Virginia Heritage, February 1985: 10-20.

6 Annual Report of the Secretary of War for 1866. Congressional Serial #1285. Series of House Executive Documents.
NARA I. “Freedmen’s Village, Arlington Virginia” in Harper's Weekly (New York) May 7, 1864. See also Joseph P.
Reidy “Coming from the Shadow of the Past: The Transition from Slavery to Freedom at Freedmen’s Village,
1863-1900.” In The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography. October 1987: 403-428.

17 “Inventory of Residents and Valuation of the Buildings and Improvement at the Freedmen’s Village in Arlington
1868.” Freedmen’s Village Vertical File. ARHO.

18 William Syphax to Secretary of War, William W. Belknap. Washington City, January 27, 1876. Original NARA
1. Copy in the Neligan Date Files. ARHO.

9 William Syphax, Messenger at the Department of Interior, to President Andrew Johnson, May 11, 1865. Records
of the Department of Justice (RG NARA I. Copy in Date Files, ARHO.

20 Cornelius Syphax also worked for the federal government in the Arlington National Cemetery and lived with his
mother on the Syphax “interference” as it was known by the Quartermaster General’s office. William Sypahx to
William Belknap, Secretary of War. January 27, 1876. NARA I, copy ARHO.

21 Act to Establish and to Protect National Cemeteries. February 27, 1867.

22According to D.H. Rhodes, in the late 1890s there were only four small iron gates for entrance; at Ord and
Weitzel, Sheridan, McClellan and the Fort Myer gate . . .also a small service gate known as the Gravel pit gate locat-
ed in the south wall ata point about 200 yards east of what is now the west or Confederate gate. See David Rhodes.
“Notes Pertaining to the Old Flower Garden south of Arlington Mansion by D. H. Rhodes. Landscape Gardener
at Arlington. Where he has been employed since 1873.” Office of the Quartermaster Supply Officer. Washington,
D.C.,, Circa 1930, ARHO.

23 The replacement of all wooden headboards with the specified headstones was completed nationwide in 1877 at
a total cost of $786,360. A balance of $192,000 remained and it was then recommended to Congress that this money
be used to mark those graves in national cemeteries not included by the Act of March 3, 1873, and for the erection
of permanent markers at all known soldiers’ graves outside the national cemeteries. An act, approved February 3,
1879, authorized these expenditures and the second gravestone program was undertaken, Though Arlington was

ENDNoTES | 197



110 | 1865 - 1880

graves of Union officers. The tools and buildings of maintenance and management—the tem-
porary sheds, greenhouses, and cisterns—as yet discrete, nonetheless muddled the appearance
of the hallowed grounds. The farm fields and homes of the newly freed African Americans
appeared quite prosperous as a result of the hard work and dedication of Freedmen's Village
residents. Yet frictions between the Department of Army and the Freedmen's Villagers living
on federal land continued to flare. To some, the contrast between the past and the present was
so painful that they suggested that Arlington House be destroyed. The Lee Mansion, so
named by Union soldiers as they stared towards Arlington heights from their camps down by
the Potomac during the Civil War, was an acute reminder of both past injustices and honorif-

ic events.5+ As an article in a local newspaper suggested,

The best thing that can now be done in view of the actual possession of the place [Arlington
House] by the government is to take the house down... . by sweeping away the contrast-
ing element one will not be led, while wandering among the rows of graves-those holy ranks
to which we owe everything—to remember that the grief he feels has been calculated to
inflict a sting upon those who once called this place their own.55

The polarized convictions concerning what should be done to the landscape of Arlington
simply reflected the sectionalism of the country, and the politics of division and reconciliation

in all its hidden forms.

THE LEES AND THE LEGALITY
OF FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ARLINGTON

After the war ended, the Lees settled in Lexington, Virginia where General Lee assumed
the presidency of Washington College, later named Washington and Lee University. The
properties of White House and Romancoke (whose name had been changed from the earlier
spelling Romancock) were returned to William Henry Lee (Rooney) and Robert E. Lee, Jr.
respectively. Smiths Island was regained through a court action in 1868. Arlington, however,
remained in federal possession. The property, which had been willed to Mary Lee by her
father George Washington Parke Custis for use during her lifetime, would have been inherit-
ed by her oldest son George Washington Custis Lee at her death, had not the federal govern-
ment taken the property in lieu of back taxes. The property therefore had been a life estate,
in Mary Lee's name only. There were many reasons for the Lee’s reluctance to publicly fight
to regain Arlington. First, both Mary and Robert E. Lee felt strongly that the bitterness
caused by the war needed to be healed. Public scrutiny of the federal government's action was
sure to foster anger. Secondly, Mary Lee's ownership of Arlington was in life only, therefore
her legal standing may have been less secure than that of her son who was due to inherit the

property in fee simple at her death. Finally, the futility of the fight may have been clear to her




56 Decorating the Tomb of
the Unknown Civil War
Soldier, 1868. “Unknown
Soldiers’ Monument at
Arlington,” Harpers Weekly
June 20, 1868

O64 | 1ecc. 1200

fter Brigadier General James Garfield's Memorial Day speech ended, his audience of
officials, soldiers, and mourners gathered at the ‘Tomb of the Unknown Civil War
Soldier to the south of the mansion. ‘Two years prior, at the order of Quartermaster
General Montgomery Meigs, a large granite sarcophagus had been placed here in what had
been the grove or woodland garden of Mary Custis and Mary Lee.! By then evidence of the

grove, adjacent to and west of the more formal flower garden, had almost disappeared. Its nat-

uralistic design hid-
den in luxuriant
weeds. Its once dis-
tinct paths lost
among the beaten
tracks of Union sol-
diers. A white-
washed fence, erect-
ed by the newly com-
missioned army staff,
surrounded only the
eastern half of the
flower garden. As the

£
2
4
i

assembled mourners
gazed past the rectangular granite monument towards Washington, spring flowers were visi-
ble through the fence’s narrow palings.? If the war had not destroyed the woodland grove,
this solemn monument, through its shear size, most certainly did. A local newspaper

described its creation in vivid detail:

A more terrible spectacle can hardly be conceived than is to be seen within a dozen rods of
the Arlington mansion. A circular pit, twenty feet deep and the same in diameter, has been
sunk by the side of the flower garden, cemented and divided into compartments and down
into this gloomy receptacle are cast the bones of such soldiers as perished on the field and
either were not buried at all or were so covered up as to have their bones mingle indis-
criminately together. At the time we looked into this gloomy cavern, a literal Golgotha,
there were piled together, skulls in one division, legs in another, arms in another, and ribs

in another, what were estimated as the bones of two thousand human beings.

The vault was sealed in September of 1866 with the remains of 2111 unknown soldiers
from the battlefields of Bull Run and the Rappahannock River inside.4 A single, well-worn
Rodman gun was mounted on each corner of the monument and a pyramid of round shot

crowned its top. To allow for close contemplation of the monument's inscription, a gravel path




District of Columbia. He established his divisional headquarters at Arlington House. Instead
of moving into the mansion, he had three large tents erected between the house and the flower
garden. The next day he issued a proclamation stating that all property taken for use by the
federal forces in Fairfax County, in which Arlington was then located, would be protected and
used only for suppressing unlawful acts against the Union.® Yet control of vandalism over the
1100 acres of the Arlington estate would prove more difficult. Down at the farm, the
Arlington overseer, John McQuin, protested that a few soldiers of the thousands of troops that
traversed the estate had “shot his chickens and rabbits and scared his wife.”? For the most part,
however, during the first year of Federal occupation, the promise of preservation of the house
and gardens was upheld.

Yet the difficulties of being separated from her home were no less acute for Mary Lee.
She had departed around May 18th, leaving the majority of the Arlington slaves behind.
Concerned for their welfare and for her own, she wrote to General Sandford only a few days

after the Federal advance into Virginia:

It never occurred to me, General Sandford, that I could be forced to sue for permission to
enter my own house and that such an outrage as its military occupation to the exclusion of
me and my children could ever have been perpetrated by any one in the whole extent of this
country. . . I intended to have obtained a permit and have returned to make some further
arrangements for the comfort of my servants many of them old and infirm, but was told
by a gentleman who had made the same attempt that none could be given, so | am home-
less... You have a beautiful home and people that you love and can sympathize perhaps
even with the wife of a “traitor and a rebel.” I implore you by the courtesy due to any
woman and which no brave soldier could deny, to allow my old coachman by whom I send
this letter to get his clothes, to give some letters to my manager relative to the farm @c., to
give my market man a pass that will enable him to go and return from Washington as
usual, where his family reside. My gardener Ephraim also has a wife in Washington and
is accustomed to go over there every Saturday and return on Monday. My old cook has also
4 wife in the neighborhood, to allow the servants to go on with their usual occupations
unmolested by the soldiers and protected by your authority, also to allow my boy Billy whom
I only left at home to complete some work in the garden to come to me with his clothes as
I can not use my carriage without his aid & to permit my maid Marcellina to send me some
small articles that I did not bring away. She and the woman in the yard, Selina, can get
what I want out of the house. I will not trouble you with any further requests-only
pray that God may ever spare you and yours from the agony and inconvenience I am now

enduring.8

A reporter from the New York Tribune, there on the heights the first day with General

Sandford, interviewed some of the slaves, but unfortunately wrote little of their responses.?

1861-1865 | 73



» > Daa

gi

11 “The Washington
Family” by Edward Savage,
©. 1796, included from left to
right, George Washington
Parke Custis, George
Washington, Martha Parke
Custis and Martha
Washington.

18 | 1608 - 1802

belonging to a third brother, Philip Alexander, which Custis had hoped to eventually acquire,
though he never did. John Custis and his wife Eleanor moved into Robert Alexander’s former
house located near the mouth of Four-mile Creek, renaming the estate Abingdon. According
to accounts of the property, remnants of ornate gardens, including boxwood and lilac shrubs
and jonquil bulbs remained into the twentieth century. Whether these plants truly dated to
the time of the Custises, as was suggested in the 1929 article in the Daughters of American
Revolution Magazine, is uncertain.” John and Eleanor Custis and their four children, Martha,
Elizabeth, Eleanor (Nelly) and George Washington Parke (G.W.P), continued to live at
Abingdon until John’s death.”

In September 1781, a few months after the birth of George Washington Parke Custis,
John Custis traveled to Williamsburg to serve as a volunteer aide to General Washington. In
the city swarming with French and American troops Custis celebrated the British failure to
force its way into the Chesapeake Bay. The end of the Revolutionary War was certain. Yet
only a few days later, sick with camp fever, John Custis died, never to return to Abingdon.
According to family tradition, it was as George Washington attempted to comfort his wife and
daughter-in-law that he promised to care for the two youngest children, Nelly Parke and
George Washington Parke Custis, “as his own” for the remainder of his life. In turn, after
John Custis’s death G.W.P. Custis came to regard George Washington as a father.

With the war over, the family returned to Mount Vernon. In 1783 Eleanor Custis mar-
ried Doctor David Stuart, a well-respected, highly educated man of relatively little fortune.
The two young children, Washington and Nelly, spent time at both their mother’s house,
Abingdon and at Mount Vernon with their grandparents.” As the children grew, they began

to spend more and more time at Mount Vernon and the Washingtons gradually took over their

j
a
hy
'
a
&




platforms are pierced with gentle sprays of green, and in the beds of the moats are found
flowers, and shrubs that bear berries. The wind and the sun are trying hard to obliterate
the remaining proofs of the days of sorrow; and in some cases they have so far succeeded that

an entrenchment is merely to be traced by a line.28

In addition to the pragmatic elements of a burial ground—access roads, enclosure to pre-
vent theft and to establish permanency, and thousands of wooden grave markers—elements
were added to the landscape immediately surrounding Arlington House to support its use as a
center of mourning and memorialization. At first, this honor was almost entirely focused on
the glory and sacrifice of the Union Civil War soldiers. Union officers were buried along the
white fence of the flower garden. ‘Though the first memorial to Unknown Civil War soldiers
was not inscribed with the names of victors or vanquished, the first few “Decoration Day” cel-
ebrations held in the memorial's shadow were to honor Union soldiers only. The American
flag, first attached to a staff on the peak of the pediment of Arlington's portico in 1861 by
Union soldiers, now flew from a pole directly in front of the portico stairs.2? Yet gradually this
focus would broaden, as economies improved, and as the myth of the Lost Cause took hold.
Visitors came to Arlington every month out of sadness, pride, nationalism, and curiosity. By
the end of the century, their numbers would increase tenfold.

As the burials continued through the 1860s, improvements to the grounds proceeded
apace. The house, including the west fagade which had been covered in stucco for the first
time after the war, was repainted a light yellow in 1867.39 The volunteer saplings growing
from the base of the building foundations were cut till only a few vines, honeysuckle and win-
ter jasmine, remained.3! A white sign with black lettering reading “Superintendent” was hung
above the central door on the west fagade. In the early 1870s, when the landscape gardener
was hired, he too would have his home and office inside the Arlington mansion.32 Behind the
main house, the old summer kitchen and slave quarters were decaying rapidly.3> These struc-
tures were used for storage and to house cemetery workers, some of whom were former slaves
of Custis. Around the flower garden and on the slopes to the east and south of the house, the
lawn had been resodded. ‘The grass was half as tall as the white headboards which quickly rot-
ted in the warm damp climate of Virginia. In 1869, one hundred cedar trees were planted
“around the officers graves and the main drives.”34+ The paling fence that had been rebuilt
around the flower garden and the fence around the kitchen garden were newly whitewashed.35
‘The flower garden, neglected during the war, had regained its beauty, though it was different

in content.

FLOWERS IN THE GARDEN

After the war, except for several rather “poor trees” including one or two Norway spruce

and a white-leafed poplar, several clumps of hardy ivy growing on dead tree stumps, and the

1865 - 1880

1105



ownership, the landscape immediately surrounding the mansion had been defined by areas of

forest and meadow, turf and gravel, footpaths and carriage drives, and of course gardens. But

by 1863 the demands of war had broken down these defined areas, mixing them into one

another, resulting in a homogeneous landscape of pounded dirt interspersed with trees pre-

served for their valuable shade. Foot and horse trails created by army troops, gullied by rain,

criss-crossed the park east of the house, though much of the slope was still covered in

long grasses.

47 When the Civil War
began, the former agricultur-
al buildings of the Arlington
estate were used by the Union

army in the construction of

Arlington Stables. This map
‘was created as part of an
army inventory following the
war, 1865.

ARLINGTON_CORRAL.
es \
anittraton

VA.
vulvanion.

youn

48 This large Union army
horse and mule corral was
built near the near former

gate into Arlington Park, at
the junction of the carriage
drive to Arlington House and
the Alexandria and
Georgetown Turnpike.

80 | isei- 1865

‘National Archives

Down on the former
Arlington farm, mas-
sive alterations were
also made to meet the
requirements of war.
Whole regiments of
soldiers had bivouacked
just west of the
Alexandria and
Georgetown Turnpike,
across from the former
farm and slave quarters
of the Arlington estate.
During the war, the
barns, slave cabins and
other structures associ-
ated with the agricul-
tural pursuits of G.W.P.
Custis were taken over
by the federal forces
and utilized in support
of the — Arlington
Stables. This facility
was set up by the gov-

ernment to care for the

mules and horses of the Union army. Large corrals and stables were constructed to supple-

ment the existing early nineteenth-century buildings. To provide more space and visibility, the

trees by Arlington Spring were eventually cut.33


of universal suffrage and felt that only land-owners could be trusted to defend American soil.
He lost by a wide margin.

Throughout the later half of the eighteenth century, the agricultural economy of north-
ern Virginia was in a state of flux. The population of slaves had increased exponentially.”
While the slave populations grew, the land became increasingly barren. Washington saw this
in his own estate. Though he practiced soil conservation policies, he was a relatively cash poor
individual when he died in 1799; as many were in the county. In response to the nutrient
depletion in the soils and the expected population increases with the creation of the federal
city, the markets shifted to less labor intensive grain crops and smaller market gardens. In addi-
tion, domestic slave trade was beginning to increase. By the late eighteenth century, the inven-
tion and widespread marketing of the short-staple cotton gin, the availability of land in the
southwestern territories for cotton production, the shift in the Upper South from tobacco cul-
ture to large-scale grain production, and the closing of the international slave trade, left the
domestic slave trade booming.”

Improving transportation systems, such as turnpikes and toll roads, facilitated this
increased level of trade in the ports of Georgetown and Alexandria. In 1785 the Assembly in
Richmond appointed commissioners to improve roads from Alexandria to Vestals’ and
Snicker’s Gaps and to convert them into tolled turnpikes; the fee collected would generate
funds for road maintenance. Previously most roads had been marginally maintained by coun-
ty governments or private individuals. With the increasing traffic around the major port cities,
the old method of road funding was simply not adequate. By 1795, the Assembly enfranchised
private companies to build and oversee a number of turnpikes. Among these was the
Alexandria to Little River Turnpike Company which, by 1811, had constructed a twenty-foot
wide road from Alexandria thirty-four miles west to Little River in Fairfax County. The pos-
sibility of a water route inland was also suggested through the incorporation of the Potowmack
Company and the James River Company in 1784." Yet even with George Washington as a
strong proponent, the canal companies of Virginia, Maryland and the new federal city would
not complete the construction of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal extending from
Georgetown to Cumberland, Maryland until over fifty years later.’ With the improving trans-
portation routes, the port cities were expanding. As always, however, views of the urban devel-
opment were colored by the biases of the individual recorder as the following two quotes illus-

trate. Around 1790, William Loughton Smith wrote of his journey to Alexandria,

A noble view of Georgetown from the heights on the Virginia side . . . . The road being
chiefly through the woods, you have only now and then a view of the river. . . Alexandria
is a considerable place of trade. . . It suffered under the old constitution, but is now thriv-
ing rapidly; the situation of the town, a capital one, a fine eminence, plain level and bound-
ed by a pretty range of bills, an excellent, sage and commodious harbor. . . there are about

1608 - 1802 | 21