Cemeteries are usually restful, peaceful places to go on a summer's day. One can walk for long stretches, sit on benches and watch the world go by. The inhabitants will never bother you and you could stay until closing time without anyone caring. One such place is the Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York, where one could wander for hours and still keep finding famous names on the tombstones.
Military Personnel
There are 38 Union and 2 Confederate generals buried at Green-Wood. The first general to be a casualty of the Civil War was Confederate General Robert Selden Garnett, who died at Corricks Ford, Virginia, on July 13,1861. His body was buried in Baltimore, but his wife, who was in Brooklyn, wished him to be near her. So the body was disinterred and moved to Greeen-Wood. In recent years there has been a study and they have discovered that there are 3,000 Civil Ward veterans buried here, and more are expected to be found.
In relation to the soldiers buried here, there is a book available titled Final Camping Ground: Civil War Veterans at Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery, In Their Own Words, by Jeffrey I.Richman, which also includes an illustrated biographical dictionary on CD.
Half a Million Bodies
There are over 500,000 bodies buried at Green-Wood, and some of the more famous are DeWitt Clinton,Governor of New York State; Henry E.Steinway, the piano manufacturer; Leonard Bernstein, pianist, composer and conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and Lola Montez, mistress of Franz Liszt ...her involvement with music!... Alexandre Dumas and Mad King Ludwig of Bavaria.
Some interesting graves include that of Henry Chadwick, inventor of the baseball scorebook. The tombstone has a two-foot marble baseball, crossed bats and a catcher's mitt with four cement bases in the form of a diamond at the head of the grave.
Famous Americans
Others who were famous in there day and perhaps are still remembered are Elias Howe, inventor of the sewing machine; Henry J.Raymond, a founder of the New York Times newspaper; Henry Bergh, founder of the A.S.P.C.A. (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals);Currier and Ives are both buried here, as is Laura Keene, the actress who was performing on stage the night Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. You will also find members of the Roosevelt family, Horace Greeley, Rev Henry Ward Beecher, Louis Comfort Tiffany and the Scribner family.
It is well worth while to take an afternoon in nice weather and go to the cemetery... you will find yourself in the middle of one of the most beautiful and historic places in America. Green-Wood Cemetery was designated a National Historic Site on September 20,2006.
Source
Available public information about Green-Wood Cemetery
For further reading see New England Cemeteries Henry Ward Beecher
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