Who owned Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial after Sep 1883?
Arlington House , The Robert E . Lee Memorial Arlington House , The Robert E . Lee Memorial , formerly named the Custis-Lee Mansion , is a Greek revival style mansion located in Arlington , Virginia , United States that was once the home of Confederate Army General Robert E . Lee . It overlooks the Potomac River and the National Mall in Washington , D.C . During the American Civil War , the grounds of the mansion were selected as the site of Arlington National Cemetery , in part to ensure that Lee would never again be able to return to his home . The United States has since designated the mansion as a National Memorial . Although the United States Department of the Army controls Arlington National Cemetery , the National Park Service , a component of the United States Department of the Interior , administers Arlington House . Construction and early history . The mansion was built on the orders of George Washington Parke Custis , the step-grandson and adopted son of George Washington and only grandson of Martha Custis Washington . Custis became a prominent resident of an area that was then known as Alexandria County , at the time a part of the District of Columbia . Arlington House was built at a high point on a 1,100-acre ( 445 ha ) estate that Custiss father , John Parke Custis , had purchased in 1778 and named Mount Washington ( Jacky Custis died in 1781 at Yorktown after the British surrender ) . The younger Custis decided to build his home on the property in 1802 following the death of Martha Washington and three years after the death of George Washington . After acquiring the property , Custis renamed it Arlington after the Custis familys homestead on the Eastern Shore of Virginia . Almost immediately , Custis began constructing Arlington House on his land . Hiring George Hadfield as architect , he constructed a mansion exhibiting the first example of Greek Revival architecture in America . Custis intended the mansion to serve as a living memorial to George Washington and a place for his collection of George Washington artifacts . Its design included elements similar to those of George Washingtons house , Mount Vernon . Construction began in 1803 , eleven years after LEnfants Plan for the future Federal City ( later called Washington City , then Washington D.C. ) had designated an area directly across the Potomac River to be the site of the Presidents House ( later called the Executive Mansion , now the White House ) and the Congress House ( now the United States Capitol ) . Custis located the building on a prominent hill overlooking the Georgetown-Alexandria Turnpike ( at the approximate location of the present Eisenhower Drive in Arlington National Cemetery ) , the Potomac River and the growing Washington City on the opposite side of the river . The mansion was built using materials on site , though the building was interrupted by the War of 1812 ( and material shortages after the British burned the American capital city ) . The Custis mansions exterior was completed in 1818 . The north and south wings were completed in 1804 . The large center section and the portico , presenting an imposing front 140 ft ( 43 m ) long , were finished 13 years later . The house has two kitchens , a summer and a winter . The most prominent features of the house are the 8 massive columns of the portico , each 5 feet ( 1.5 m ) in diameter . Guests at the house included such notable people as Gilbert du Motier , Marquis de Lafayette , who visited in 1824 ( see : Visit of the Marquis de Lafayette to the United States ) . At Arlington , Custis experimented with new methods of animal husbandry and other agriculture . The property also included Arlington Spring , a picnic ground on the banks of the Potomac that Custis originally built for private use but later opened to the public , eventually operating it as a commercial enterprise . Custis married Mary Lee Fitzhugh . Their only child to survive to adulthood was Mary Anna Randolph Custis . Robert E . Lee , whose mother was a cousin of Mrs . Custis , frequently visited Arlington and knew Mary Anna as they grew up . Two years after graduating from West Point , Lieutenant Lee married Mary Anna Custis at Arlington on June 30 , 1831 . For 30 years Arlington House was home to the Lees . They spent much of their married life traveling between United States Army duty stations and Arlington , where six of their seven children were born . They shared this home with Marys parents . After their deaths , Marys parents were buried not far from the house on land that is now part of Arlington National Cemetery . The Custises extensively developed the Arlington estate . Much of the steep slope to the east of the house became a cultivated English landscape park , while a large flower garden with an arbor was constructed and planted south of the house . To the west of Arlington House , tall grass and low native plants led down a slope into a natural area of close-growing trees the Custises called the Grove . About to the west of the flower garden , the Grove contained tall elm and oak trees which formed a canopy . An informal flower garden was planted beneath the trees and maintained by the Custis daughters . It is not clear when the Grove began to be developed , but it was under way by at least 1853 . Upon George Washington Parke Custiss death in 1857 , he left the Arlington estate to Mary Custis Lee for her lifetime and thence to the Lees eldest son , George Washington Custis Lee . The estate needed much repair and reorganization , and Robert E . Lee , as executor of Custiss will , took a three-year leave of absence from the Army to begin the necessary agricultural and financial improvements . Civil War . In April 1861 , Virginia seceded from the United States . Robert E . Lee resigned his commission in the United States Army on April 20 , 1861 , and joined the Confederate States Army . With Arlington House on high ground overlooking the capital , the government of the United States knew it must occupy the mansion or be left in an untenable military position . Although unwilling to leave Arlington House , Mary Lee believed her estate would soon be occupied by federal soldiers and left to stay with relatives on May 14 , having been warned by her young cousin William Orton Williams , then serving as aide to General Winfield Scott . Union Army troops seized and occupied Arlington without opposition on May 24 . In June 1862 , the 37th United States Congress enacted legislation that imposed a property tax on all land in insurrectionary areas of the United States . The 1863 amendments to the statute required these taxes to be paid in person . But Mary Lee , afflicted with severe rheumatoid arthritis and behind Confederate lines , could not pay the tax in person . The Arlington estate was seized for nonpayment of taxes . It was auctioned off on January 11 , 1864 , and the U.S . government won the property for $26,800 ( $ today ) . During the war , Union Army troops cut down many of the trees on the Arlington estate , especially those to the north and east of Arlington House in and near Fort Whipple ( north of the house ) and Arlington Springs ( near the Potomac River ) . However , a number of large trees remained , particularly those in a forested area ( now known as Arlington Woods ) west of the house . By early 1864 , the military cemeteries of Washington , D.C. , and Alexandria , Virginia , were rapidly filling with war dead . Quartermaster General of the United States Army Montgomery C . Meigs proposed using of the Arlington estate as a cemetery . United States Secretary of War Edwin M . Stanton approved the establishment of a military cemetery on June 15 , 1864 , creating Arlington National Cemetery . Meigs believed that since Lee had committed treason in deciding to fight against the Union , denying Lee use of the mansion after the war was a rough form of justice . Meigs decided that a large number of burials should occur close to Arlington House to render it unlivable . Officers were to be buried next to the main flower garden south of the house , and the first burial occurred here on May 17 . Meigs ordered that additional burials commence immediately on the grounds of Arlington House in mid-June . When Union officers bivouacked in the mansion complained and had the burials temporarily stopped , Meigs countermanded their orders and had another 44 dead officers buried along the southern and eastern sides of the main flower garden within a month . In September 1866 , the remains of 2,111 Union and Confederate soldiers who died at the First Battle of Bull Run , Second Battle of Bull Run , and along the Rappahannock River were buried on the former site of the Grove , southeast of the mansion , beneath the Civil War Unknowns Monument . Post-Civil War . Robert E . Lee made no attempt to visit or restore his title to Arlington before his death in 1870 . Mary Lee died in 1873 , having visited the house only one more time , a few months before her death . Too upset at its condition , she refused to enter and left after just a few moments . In April 1874 , Robert E . Lees eldest son , George Washington Custis Lee , filed suit against the United States government in a Virginia circuit court to regain his property . Custis Lee was a major general in the Civil War and was captured by Union forces at the Battle of Sailors Creek on April 6 , 1865 ( see David Dunnels White ) . A jury found in favor of Custis Lee , leading to extensive appeals by both parties . In 1882 , the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in favor of Lee in United States v . Lee , 106 U . S . 196 . The court , by a 5–4 majority , found that the estate had been illegally confiscated in 1864 and ordered it returned . But Lee was less interested in obtaining the estate than he was in a cash compensation for its value . After several months of difficult negotiations , Lee and the federal government settled on a sale price of $150,000 ( $ in dollars ) . Congress enacted legislation funding the purchase on March 3 , 1883 ; Lee signed over the title on March 31 ; and the title transfer was recorded on May 14 , 1883 . In 1920 , the Virginia General Assembly changed the name of Alexandria County to Arlington County to end ongoing confusion between Alexandria County and the independent city of Alexandria . The name Arlington was chosen to reflect the presence of the Arlington estate . On March 4 , 1925 , the 68th United States Congress enacted Public Resolution 74 , which authorized the restoration of the Lee Mansion in the Arlington National Cemetery , Virginia . The War Department then began to restore Arlington House , and the Department of the Army continues to manage over half of the original plantations , as Arlington National Cemetery . However , for several years after Congress enacted the authorizing legislation , the War Department , which was responsible for managing the house and grounds , largely ignored the legislation . Contradicting the authorizing legislation , the Department , largely at the insistence of Charles Moore , the director of the United States Commission of Fine Arts , furnished and interpreted the Mansion to “the first half of the republic.” This decision was based , in part , on the popularity of the Colonial Revival movement which was still popular in 1925 . The Mansion was restored to the period of George Washington Parke Custis , and no furniture manufactured after 1830 was accepted . This approach negated Lees role and presence at Arlington . In 1955 , the 84th United States Congress enacted Public Law 84-107 , a joint resolution that designated the manor as the Custis-Lee Mansion as a permanent memorial to Robert E . Lee . The resolution directed the United States Secretary of the Interior to erect on the premises a memorial plaque and to correct governmental records to bring them into compliance with the designation , thus ensuring that the correct interpretation of its history would be applied . Gradually the house was furnished and interpreted to the period of Robert E . Lee as specified in the original legislation . The National Park Service received jurisdiction over the building and some of adjacent gardens ( distinguished from the cemetery ) beginning June 10 , 1933 . In 1972 , the 92nd United States Congress enacted Public Law 92-333 , an Act that amended Public Law 84-107 to designate the manor as Arlington House , The Robert E . Lee Memorial . Gray family . One of the lesser known histories about Arlington House concerns the Gray family , who helped to preserve the legacy of George Washington Parke Custis as well as the Lee family . Selina Norris Gray , the daughter of Leonard and Sally Norris , was a second-generation Arlington slave . In 1831 , Selina married Thornton Gray , a fellow Arlington slave , and eventually had eight children who grew up at Arlington . With the onset of the Civil War , the Lee family had to evacuate their home before the Union troops came and occupied the property . Even though Selina was a personal maid to Mrs . Lee , she and her family were left behind ; however , before leaving , Mrs . Lee left the house keys to Selina and the responsibility to protect the treasures of the home . Several of these treasures included cherished family heirlooms that had once belonged to Mrs . Lees great-grandmother , Martha Custis Washington , and President George Washington . Within months of Union Army General Irvin McDowell occupying the home in 1861 , Selina realized that several precious heirlooms were missing due to soldiers looting the property . When she discovered that some of the Washington relics had also disappeared , she promptly provided a list of the missing objects to General McDowell and convinced him that the significance of the collection required his involvement . He first secured the attic and basement areas to prevent further theft , then had the remaining Lee heirlooms shipped to the Patent Office in Washington , D.C for safekeeping . While Selina is credited with saving the heirlooms and treasures of Arlington House , her children later on are credited with helping to restore the home as well as provide accurate details about the layout of the home , personal stories of the Lee family , and help preservationists in the early twentieth century . During major restorative efforts to Arlington House from 1929 to 1930 , the Gray family made another important contribution to the history of Arlington County and the nation . Four of Selina and Thorntons daughters provided crucial details about the house and its furnishings , and their input proved vital to the authenticity of the project . In 2014 , the National Park Service acquired a rare photograph of Selina . Recent history . Arlington National Cemetery expansion . In 1995 , officials of the United States Department of the Interior and the United States Department of the Army signed an agreement to transfer from Arlington House , The Robert E . Lee Memorial , to the Army a part of Arlington Woods , which was located in Section 29 of the NPS at Arlington National Cemetery between Arlington House and Fort Myer . The property transfer , which involved of NPS land , was intended to enable the Cemetery to increase its space for burials . Environmentalists expressed concerns that the agreement would result in the partial destruction of the remnant of an historically important stand of native trees . Nevertheless , Congress enacted legislation in September 1996 authorizing the transfer . On June 5 , 2013 , after reviewing 100 public comments that it had received on a draft environmental assessment ( EA ) for the Cemetery expansion project , the United States Army Corps of Engineers released a final EA and a signed Finding of No Significant Impact ( FONSI ) for the project . The final EA stated that , of the 905 trees to be removed , 771 trees were healthy native trees that had diameters between 6 and 41 inches . The project would remove approximately 211 trees from a less than area containing a portion of a 145-year-old forest that stood within the property boundaries of a historic district that a National Register of Historic Places nomination form for Arlington House had described in 1966 . About 491 trees would be removed from an area of trees that was approximately 105 years old . At a public hearing on July 11 , 2013 , the National Capital Planning Commission approved the site and building plans for the project . Studies , damages and restorations . From 2003 to 2007 , the National Park Service conducted an archeological excavation of two outbuildings that once held Arlington Houses slave quarters . In 2009 , the Park Service published reports that described the history of the slave quarters and the findings of the excavations , as well as proposals for the restoration of the quarters . From 2007 through 2013 , Arlington House underwent its first renovation since 1925 . During that period , the National Park Services placed the Houses furnishings on display at the Friendship Hill National Historic Site near Point Marion , Pennsylvania . The Park Service held a rededication ceremony after it had completed the renovation and returned the furnishings to the House . Arlington House suffered significant damage in the 2011 Virginia earthquake , requiring the closure of the back halls and upper floor pending an architectural assessment . On July 17 , 2014 , philanthropist David Rubenstein donated $12.5 million to the National Park Foundation ( the arm of the National Park Service which raises funds through private contributions ) to rehabilitate Arlington House , its outbuildings , and grounds . The 30-month project is intended to restore the mansion , buildings , and grounds to the way they looked in 1860 . The project will repair the earthquake-damaged foundation , and add new interior lighting and a modern climate-control system . National Park Service officials said they are likely to close Arlington House and the slave quarters for several months in 2016 , during which most of the work will be done . Replicas . In 1919 , a replica was built for the short-lived Lanier University in Atlanta , designed by architect A . Ten Eyck Brown . It is still standing at 1140 University Drive NE , and houses the Ben H . Zimmerman Religious School and the Canterbury School . Arlington Hall , a two-thirds scale replica of Arlington House , was built in 1939 in Robert E . Lee Park in Dallas , Texas . The façade of the Old Administration Building in Arlington National Cemetery resembles that of Arlington House . The building is west of Arlington House .