“Flags in” is observed the week before Memorial Day each year. The members of the Old Guard place a flag at each of the approximately 230,000 graves within Arlington National Cemetery – in 4 hours!

As we approach Memorial Day it is important to remember why this holiday exists. This is from an email I received from the VA and sums it up nicely:


As a kid, I grew up not far from what is probably the best known cemetery in the country, if not the world – Arlington National Cemetery. We would visit periodically and when I was old enough to drive I used to enjoy visiting. Few people see the entirely, or the “back 40” but the entire area is beautiful. In the old days people could drive onto the cemetery without passes. I am able to continue to do so as my father is buried at ANC. If you have never witnessed the changing of the guard at The Tomb of the Unknowns you have missed out on a piece of history, a tradition carried out day in and day out by the members of the Army’s Old Guard.

Visiting any national cemetery can be an experience that is humbling as well as incredibly interesting. Walking through the headstones is like walking through the history of our country. Depending on where the cemetery is, it can contain graves for soldiers from the Revolutionary War to the War of 1812, Civil War, and up to today’s current conflicts. You can see where the soldier was from, and how old they were. You will see how young many of these men were when they gave their life in service to their country. I keep saying “men” because up until recent conflicts it was rare for a woman to be killed in the service though several did serve in various capacities. Actually, women were not able to actually enlist until WWI.

If you have visited the Point Loma lighthouse, you drove right through a very beautiful national cemetery, the Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. Fort Rosecrans was also recently identified as one of the world's most beautiful cemeteries.

Sometime, if you happen to visit a national cemetery or a veteran’s section of your local cemetery, you might notice coins placed on top of headstones. There is actually a guideline associated with this tradition. Should you just be visiting or if you knew the person, you would leave a penny. If you went to boot camp or trained with the person you would leave a nickel. If you served with the person you would leave a dime, and if you were with them when they were killed, a quarter. Periodically the cemetery caretakers will collect the coins and use them to help pay for upkeep or pay for the funerals if indigent veterans. At some national cemeteries various groups will periodically walk through the grounds placing pennies on tombstones. Placing coins on a tombstone is a way for someone to tell the person’s family that you have visited and also serves as a way to pay your respect to the dead.

Not every cemetery is able to be as well maintained as places like Arlington or Fort Rosecrans. When I am in New Orleans I always try to visit the Chalmette National Cemetery. This cemetery in now under the care of the National Park Service as it is at capacity. The headstones were often tilting as they had been in place for many, many years. They needed to be cleaned. In an email from the National Trust, they indicated that the trust and the National Park Service had joined together in a project to clean headstones to bring back the names of the deceased, reset the headstones and clean up the cemetery. The pictures show it looking much nicer than the last time I visited several years ago.

Even though I said you do not find many women in the older cemetery sections, at Chalmette you will find one from the Civil War:


Other interesting articles:
From the Washington Post:
At Arlington Cemetery, reflecting on the cost of our freedom

From US News & World Report:
Put Memorializing Back in Memorial Day