Girish Mahajan (Editor)

Memphis National Cemetery

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NRHP Reference #
  
96001233

Phone
  
+1 901-386-8311

Area
  
18 ha

Added to NRHP
  
10 October 1996

Memphis National Cemetery

Location
  
3568 Townes Ave Memphis, Tennessee

MPS
  
Civil War Era National Cemeteries MPS

Address
  
3568 Townes Ave, Memphis, TN 38122, USA

Burials
  
George W. Grider, Michael Huskey, Winfield S. Cunningham, James H. Robinson, James Herman Robinson

Similar
  
Lincoln American Tower, Nicholas Gotten House, Magevney House, Oaklawn Garden, Memphis Railroad & Trolley M

Memphis national cemetery memorial day 2013


Memphis National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in the Nutbush neighborhood of the City of Memphis, in Shelby County, Tennessee. Administered by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs, it encompasses 44.2 acres (17.9 ha), and as of the end of 2007, had 42,184 interments.

Contents

Several Civil War battlefield cemeteries were transferred to the Memphis National Cemetery after the war.

Memphis national cemetery


Civil War

Memphis National Cemetery was originally established as Mississippi River National Cemetery when the Union Army forces took control of Memphis during the American Civil War. The cemetery served to inter veterans who died while in the many military hospitals in the delta region of the Mississippi River. After the war, several battlefield cemeteries were transferred to Memphis National Cemetery.

In 1867, about 250 bodies of both Confederate and Union soldiers, some of whom were casualties of the Battle of Fort Pillow in Lauderdale County, were moved from a battlefield cemetery south of Fort Pillow to Memphis National Cemetery to be re-interred in a designated field.

Steamboat Sultana disaster

On the night of April 26, 1865, the steamboat Sultana, overloaded with Union soldiers who had recently been liberated from Confederate POW camps, exploded due to a boiler rupture on the Mississippi River several miles north of Memphis. Many of the dead from that accident are buried in Memphis National Cemetery.

Notable monuments

  • The Illinois Monument, a granite and bronze sarcophagus by sculptor Leon Hermant, dedicated in 1929.
  • The Minnesota Monument, a granite monument erected in 1916.
  • Notable interments

  • Medal of Honor recipients
  • Private James H. Robinson (?–1864), for action during the Civil War, interred in Section H, Grave 4131.
  • Others
  • Winfield S. Cunningham (1900-1986), US Naval Officer, recipient of the Navy Cross for action at Wake Island.
  • George W. Grider (1912–1991), U.S. Representative
  • Ike Pearson (1917–1985), Major League Baseball player
  • References

    Memphis National Cemetery Wikipedia