Established in 1865, Fredericksburg National Cemetery is the final resting place for more than 15,000 Union soldiers who died in the major Civil War battles that occurred between Washington, D.C. and Richmond, Virginia. Today the cemetery is a component of the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County Battlefields Memorial National Military Park, a National Park Service unit preserving and providing access to the battlefields of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Wilderness and Spotsylvania Court House. The battlefields’ visitor centers feature exhibits, films, and tours interpreting and commemorating the battles in the larger context of the Civil War and American history.  Fredericksburg National Cemetery is one of 14 national cemeteries managed by the National Park Service.

During the Civil War, the forests, farms, and towns between the rival capital cities of Washington, D.C. and Richmond saw brutal and repeated conflict. The lands around Fredericksburg, which is equidistant between the cities, witnessed four major battles: Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Wilderness, and Spotsylvania Court House.  More than 100,000 casualties occurred within a 20-mile radius of Fredericksburg.

After the region’s bloody confrontations, the remains of approximately 20,000 Union and Confederate soldiers were buried in shallow, hastily dug, and often unmarked graves around the battlefields.  Shortly after Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, the U.S. Congress authorized the establishment of a national cemetery at Fredericksburg to provide a proper burial place for Union soldiers who died at the four major battles, numerous smaller skirmishes, and from illness while camped in the region.  War Department officials chose a site called Marye’s Heights, located southwest of Fredericksburg’s historic downtown.  During the Battle of Fredericksburg, Confederate troops held Marye’s Heights and successfully repelled numerous Union attacks on the strategic location.

Monument to the 127th Pennsylvania, Fredericksburg National Cemetery Courtesy of the National Park Service

Construction of the cemetery and the interment of remains began in 1866. All the burials of the dead from the Civil War were interred in the cemetery by 1869.  The Marye’s Heights location influenced the cemetery’s general plan, which follows the natural contours of the landscape to the south and west.  At the completion of the burials of the Civil War dead, 15,243 Union soldiers lay in the cemetery, with only 2,473 identified.

The cemetery closed to further interments in 1945.  Between 1869 and 1945, an additional 300 interments took place of veterans of the Spanish-American War, World War I, and World War II.

The grounds of Fredericksburg National Cemetery contain a number of monuments dedicated to Union soldiers and officers.  Dedicated in 1901, the Fifth Corps Monument honors the service of the corps.  The monument to Colonel Joseph Moesch commemorates the officer who was killed while leading his regiment of 83rd New York Volunteers in the Battle of Wilderness.  At the center of the cemetery stands the Humphrey’s Division Monument.  The monument is dedicated to General Andrew Humphrey’s Division of the Pennsylvania Infantry, Fifth Corps.  The men under Humphrey’s command led an unsuccessful attack on Confederate troops holding Marye's Heights, with more than 1,000 soldiers killed or wounded in the engagement.