Grafton National Cemetery Grafton National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in Grafton , Taylor County , West Virginia . It encompasses a total of . Along with West Virginia National Cemetery , it is one of the two national cemeteries in the state of West Virginia , both of which are located in Grafton . The first interments took place in 1867 for casualties of the American Civil War in West Virginia . The Grafton cemetery is closed to most new interments due to inadequate space . Interments are made at nearby West Virginia National Cemetery since it was dedicated in 1987 . History . In 1867 , the United States Department of War directed Major R . C . Bates to find a location to bury remains of Union casualties of the American Civil War throughout West Virginia . West Virginia was a member of the Union , after seceding from the rest of Confederate Virginia and forming a new state in 1863 . Bates found a site adjacent to the town of Grafton ' s Maple Avenue Cemetery , where many soldiers had already been buried . The terrain was also relatively level , unusual for the mountainous region . The 39th Congress appropriated a site that same year . The cemetery was dedicated in 1868 by Arthur I . Boreman , the first Governor of West Virginia . Boreman was key in the two - year campaign for a cemetery in the state . The first interments were held in the lower two terraces : 1 , 252 Union soldiers , 613 of which were unknown , were buried . Remains from temporary graves in Clarksburg , Grant County , Fayette County , Kanawha County , Marion County , Rich Mountain battle site , and Wheeling , as well as several Union dead from Kentucky were relocated to the National Cemetery . Additionally , some Confederate soldiers were buried . The cemetery contains the burial site of Thornsberry Baily Brown , believed to have been the first Union casualty of the Civil War . Brown was believed to have been killed on May 22 , 1861 when he refused to acknowledge a Confederate sentry . Brown is said to have shot the Confederate in the ear , and was then shot in the heart . Brown was reinterred at Grafton in 1903 in Section F , Grave 1226 . In 1904 , the Grand Army of the Republic dedicated a memorial marble obelisk . The three - acre site sits along Grafton ' s Walnut Street . It is surrounded by a stone wall approximately high , with entrance gates on three of the sides . A walkway and series of stairs divides the site in half , running from the Walnut Street entrance to the rear entrance . Smaller walkways are laid out perpendicular to the central path , dividing the cemetery into six sections on three leveled terraces . A large flag pole sites in the middle of the central terrace , while next to it is a plaque containing wording from a 1875 act of Congress regarding the preservation of the cemetery . On the lower terrace are two more plaques that contain the wording of Theodore O ' Hara ' poem , " Bivouac of the Dead " . Along the edges of the cemetery are five additional memorial sites dedicated to cenotaph s for service men whose bodies were not recovered , either from sea or elsewhere . The grave markers on the two upper levels are uniform small , white , rectangular stones with arched tops , while the bottom level contains private , individual markers . Two buildings have stood on the cemetery grounds . A Superintendent ' s Lodge designed by General Montgomery C . Meigs stood until it was demolished in 1957 . The modern caretaker ' s house , a - story stone building , was constructed c . 1900 and later served as an administrative building . By the 1960s the Grafton cemetery had limited free space for burials . West Virginia veterans groups began lobbying for a new national cemetery after a 1975 study determined the limited remaining space at Grafton was too steep or costly to use . The West Virginia United Veterans National Cemetery Committee was established and sought to pressure the governor and federal government representatives to seek a new national cemetery . In 1987 , the West Virginia National Cemetery opened nearby . The Grafton cemetery closed to most new interments . The cemetery offers interment for veterans or eligible family members in existing gravesites . Grafton National Cemetery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on February 2 , 1982 . In addition to the two cemeteries , Grafton holds the longest ongoing annual Memorial Day celebration in the country , first decorating the graves of soldiers in 1867 .