As many of you know I live not very far from there; Maybe 5 miles at the most. I grew up in Boy Scouts and every year on memorial day Troop 144 would go down there on a Friday and put flags on every headstone. It was always something we enjoyed doing as it was a pretty big thing to see the cemetery decorated with a small US flag at each tombstone and know we helped decorate it. There was always a big picture on the front page of the Marietta Daily Journal. I remember one year that they asked us to go through the flags that were used and remove all that didn't have 50 stars. Somewhere I still have a couple of the flags that didn't. On a more personal note, one of the tombstones right behind the house to the left of the arch in the beginning of the article is my great uncle's headstone. While originally from Vermont he retired down here and eventually ended up in the cemetery being a D-Day paratrooper.
Nice article. Thanks for sharing. I see the cemetery quite often of course but haven't been in it for quite a number of years. This has prompted me to plan a visit.
As Mike mentioned there is a Confederate Cemetery about 1/2 mile away from the National Cemetery. It is a good visit too. It has a strong volunteer organization of which many members are in the local relic club: The North Georgia Relic Hunters Assoc. (NGRHA.com). They do a good job of keeping the cemetery maintained and interpretive. The NGRHA is who puts on the Marietta Relic Show and some of the proceeds go to the Confederate Cemetery. There are even a number of cannon on display there. This cemetery is basically across the street from the war time site of GMI (Georgia Military Institute).
