page_title: Mount Vernon
section_title: Washington's tomb
hierarchical_section_title: Mount Vernon / Washington's tomb
caption_attribution_description: English: George Washington's tomb at Mount Vernon.
context_page_description: Mount Vernon is an American landmark and former plantation of George Washington, the first President of the United States, and his wife, Martha Washington. The estate is on the banks of the Potomac River in Fairfax County, Virginia, near Alexandria, across from Prince George's County, Maryland. The Washington family had owned land in the area since 1674. Around 1734, they embarked on an expansion of the estate that continued under George Washington, who began leasing the estate in 1754 but did not become its sole owner until 1761.
  The mansion was built of wood in a loose Palladian style; the original house was built by George Washington's father Augustine, around 1734. George Washington expanded the house twice, once in the late 1750s and again in the 1770s. It remained Washington's home for the rest of his life. Following his death in 1799, under the ownership of several successive generations of the family, the estate progressively declined as revenues were insufficient to maintain it adequately.
context_section_description: On December 12, 1799, Washington spent several hours riding over the plantation, in snow, hail and freezing rain. He ate his supper later that evening without changing from his wet clothes. The following day, he awoke with a severe sore throat (either quinsy or acute epiglottitis) and became increasingly hoarse as the day progressed. All the available medical treatments failed to improve his condition, and he died at Mount Vernon at around 10 pm on December 14, 1799, aged 67.
  On December 18, a funeral was held at Mount Vernon, where his body was interred. Congress passed a joint resolution to construct a marble monument in the United States Capitol for his body, an initiative supported by Martha. In December 1800, the United States House passed an appropriations bill for $200,000 to build the mausoleum, which was to be a pyramid with a base 100 feet (30 m) square. Southerners who wanted his body to remain at Mount Vernon defeated the measure.
  In accordance with his will, Washington was entombed in a family crypt he had built upon first inheriting the estate. It was in disrepair by 1799, so Washington's will also requested that a new, larger tomb be built.  This was not executed until 1831, the centennial of his birth. The need for a new tomb was confirmed when an unsuccessful attempt was made to steal his skull. A joint Congressional committee in early 1832 debated the removal of Washington's body from Mount Vernon to a crypt in the Capitol, built by Charles Bulfinch in the 1820s. Southern opposition was intense, exacerbated by an ever-growing rift between North and South. Congressman Wiley Thompson of Georgia expressed the Southerners' fears when he said:
  Remove the remains of our venerated Washington from their association with the remains of his consort and his ancestors from Mount Vernon and from his native State, deposit them in this capitol, and then let a severance of the Union occur and behold the remains of Washington on a shore foreign to his native soil.
  In 1831, the bodies of George and Martha Washington, along with other members of the family, were moved from the old crypt to the new family tomb.  On October 7, 1837, Washington's remains, encased in a lead inner casket, were transferred from the closed tomb to a sarcophagus presented by John Struthers of Philadelphia.  It was placed on the right side of the gateway to the tomb.  A similar structure was provided for Martha's remains, which was placed on the left. Other members of the Washington family are interred in an inner vault, behind the vestibule containing the sarcophagi.
caption: Sarcophagi of George (right) and Martha (left) Washington at the entrance to the Washington family mausoleum.
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