San Francisco National Cemetery
(aka Presidio Cemetery)
Dates of Existence: 1854 to 1883 (Presidio Cemetery), 1884 to present (National Cemetery).
Location: San Francisco Presidio.
Number interred: 15,369 (1936); 28,952 (2009).
Records: San Francisco Cemetery Records.
“By 1854 another permanent site had been established for the graveyard, which site became a national cemetery. … Another lieutenant prepared a list of interments at the presidio in 1879. He counted a total of 144 soldiers, women, and children who had been buried since 1854.”
Source: “Special History Study. Presidio of San Francisco, An Outline of Its Evolution as a U.S. Army Post, 1847-1990.” Presidio of San Francisco, Golden Gate National Recreation Area, California. U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. Page 157.
“Shortly after the United States assumed control of the Presidio, the Army established a post cemetery on the current site of the National Cemetery. The first known American burial at this location occurred in 1854. After a petition to the War Department by Presidio commander Lt. Col. George P. Andrews, General Order 133 established “a part of the reservation at the Presidio, including the post cemetery thereon…to be known as the San Francisco National Cemetery.” Originally less than ten acres large, it was placed under the control of the Quartermaster General's office in 1884 as the first National Cemetery on the west coast.
“The cemetery experienced a great increase in both interments and acreage over the next fifty years. It also sported a number of architectural changes. In 1915, a concrete rostrum was built to hold official services, and in 1921 the Quartermaster Department built a mortuary chapel on the premises. In 1928, the cemetery walls were repositioned and the original main entrance was relocated to the west. The current main entrance dates to 1931. During a five-year improvement plan finished in 1929, the Army remodeled the lodge to conform to the Mission Revival style architecture prevalent throughout the Presidio. The final expansion of the cemetery occurred in 1932, when it reached its current size of 28.34 acres. In 1973, the cemetery officially closed to new interments except in reserved gravesites.”
Source: San Francisco National Cemetery
“When the San Francisco National Cemetery was established in 1884, it was the first national cemetery on the Pacific Coast, and it remained the only national cemetery on that Coast for forty years. Since at least 1866, the cemetery site served as the Post Cemetery for the Presidio of San Francisco, a strategic military post established by Spain in 1776. The National Cemetery is located adjacent to, and has the same orientation as, the historic Main Post, and it fronts Lincoln Boulevard, one of the main historic roads through the Presidio. The National Cemetery nearly tripled in size during its first fifty years. The landscape has changed little since 1934, except for the loss of tree canopy, and is a major designed landscape component within the larger Presidio landscape. The northeast half of the National Cemetery is of predicted archeological interest for the period 1866-1889.”
Source: Library of Congress
“S.F. National Cemetery Gives 15,369 Haven. Final Resting Place for Military Men Established in 1884. Halfway up the slope on one of the Presidio hills, with a vista that sweeps down the tumbling terrain to the waters of the bay and beyond to the sheer cliffs of the Marin shore, stands the San Francisco National Cemetery, final resting place of 15,369 men of the United States military service.
Located in a grove of trees in the San Francisco Presidio, this hallowed ground was established December 12, 1884, by a general order signed by command of Lieutenant General Sheridan and Adjutant General R. C. Drum. At that time the ground space was 9 1/2 acres, but interments have caused the burial space to be increased to 30 acres.
On July 19, 1922, 38 bodies were unearthed in an isolated spot of the Presidio. The bones were believed the remains of early Spanish conquistadores who founded the local fortification. The bodies of 474 unknown dead sent here from early Western frontier camps and stations in the Phillipine islands have been buried in one grave. In all, the National Cemetery lists 510 unknown bodies.
SACRED INCLOSURE
In this sacred inclosure are shrouded men of all races, religions, ages and degrees of rank. From the highest ranking officers, Lieutenant General Hunter Liggett and Rear Admiral Oscar W. Farenholt, who rose from seaman to Rear Admiral in the United States Navy, to an unknown Indian guide whose headstone reads: “Two Bits.”
Here may be found the last early remains of Major General Irwin McDowell of Civil war fame, after whom the fort on Angel Island was named; Major General William R. Shafter, noted veteran of the Spanish-American war; Major General Frederick Funston, who endeared himself to the citizens of San Francisco by his policing of the city at the time of the fire; Ann Harding's father, Brigadier General George C. Gately; Willaim M. Caldwell, Lieutenant, 95th Pursuit Squadron, killed in 1930 escorting the Japanese instrument of ratification of the London naval treaty across the United States; Major Thomas Cowan Bell, 74th Ohio Infantry Volunteers, soldier, journalist, educator and founder of the Sigma Chi fraternity at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.
ONE OF 85 PLOTS
Service men holding honorable discharge certificates may be interred, provided that since leaving the service no crime has been committed which calls for a forfeiture of citizenship. The Presidio burial ground is one of 85 national cemeteries. In addition, the United States possesses six cemeteries in Europe and one in Mexico City. Marble headstones are furnished by the Government for all officers and enlisted men. Officers may still have private monuments if they are approved by the Government.”
Source: San Francisco Chronicle, 9 February 1936.
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