June 19, 2022

Arlington Cemetery

Debbie was recently in Washington DC for the induction of her brother into the “in memory” Vietnam Memorial honor roll.

My good friend, Laurette, came with me for moral support and we had time for sightseeing.  Together, we figured out how to ride the Metro and even purchased a multi-day pass. (This required quite a bit of consultation, but we were successful.)  We almost got on the wrong train a couple of times and once Debbie did jump on a train that was leaving without verifying where the train was going. It turns out it was the correct train which made Debbie says she knew all along. (We are somewhat doubtful of Debbie‘s truthfulness in her navigational skills ).

One of the places that they went was Arlington cemetery. It was an amazing place. Debbie also discovered some things she didn’t know. So be prepared for a lot of history here.

Historical Note: So just bear with the history lesson.  George Washington was Martha Washington’s 2^nd husband.  When her first husband died, Martha became the wealthiest widow in Virginia.  George ended up with two stepchildren from the marriage. One of which was John Parke Custis.  The step son had a son, George Washington Parke Custis (called Wash) who was raised by George Washington.   (We are getting there).  Wash built Arlington house and had a daughter named Mary Anna Randolph Custis who inherited all of Wash’s land.

Mary Anna married (Here is comes) Robert E. Lee.  She spent most of her time at Arlington House as she did not like the Army life.  When Robert E. Lee resigned his commission and became the Virginia commander, he told his wife that she needed to flee from Arlington House.  (We don’t think that she was very excited by this and that he probably didn’t discuss it with her. We would have been mad.).

The Union troops seized Arlington.  We spent a long time talking to one of the volunteers.  The volunteer told us that General Meigs had gone to West Point with Robert E. Lee and been to dinner at Arlington House.  Two of Meigs’ sons had been killed in the war.  Meigs wanted to punish Lee and did not ever want Lee to return to Arlington House so he buried Union officers around the house next to the garden so that Lee would see the tombstones.  Lee never returned to Arlington and his wife did once but did not go in the house. Eventually the Lee family sued the government and the courts awarded the family money for the land.

We never realized that Arlington was tied to George Washington or Robert E. Lee.  In case you were worried, we were able to successfully navigate from Arlington to the 911 monument at the Pentagon and then back to the hotel. Later that day we couldn’t navigate on foot but managed to return back to the hotel.

Here’s another fun fact. Amazon’s second headquarters is going to be located in Crystal City so lots of construction. We also found that you could get National Park passport stamps at Arlington House. Debbie also continued her hot dogs around the world quest from the food trucks in D.C.