"It is ordered that a National Cemetery be founded at this place, in commemoration of the battle of Chattanooga fought Nov. 23, 24, 25, 26 and 27, and to provide a proper resting place for the remains of the brave men who fell upon the fields fought over upon those days, and for the remains of such as may hereafter give up their lives in this region in defending their country against treason and rebellion."
The ground selected for the cemetery is the hill lying beyond the Western and Atlantic railroad, in a southeasterly direction from the town. The reservation consists of 128 acres. The cemetery proper comprises the entire hill with an area of seventy-five and one-half acres surrounded by a stone wall. The summit of the hill is eighty-three feet above the level of the base. Since the war forest trees two feet and over in diameter cover the ground. The number of soldiers interred here up to April, 1903, was 13,364, and of this number 8394 are known and 4970 unknown. The dead of Chickamauga, some 2000, were removed to this cemetery soon after the Union army gained possession of the field. Of these 154 were identified and the balance unknown. Each grave has a headstone which gives when known the name, rank and state, but when unknown the number of the grave only. Quite a number of private headstones have been erected but the only large monuments are the Ohio monument to the Andrews Raiders and that of the Fourth Army Corps. The Andrews monument consists of several blocks of granite surmounted by a bronze locomotive, a peculiar emblem of peace amid so many signs of war, but this monument commemorates the names of a few brave men who lost their lives for taking part in a very daring though unsuccessful raid within the enemy's lines.
The entrance to the cemetery has a handsome arch erected by the Government. The grounds have been adorned and made beautiful with trees, shrubs and flowers, and are carefully kept by the superintendent. Few cities add to such wealth of scenic and historic attractions such a site in the midst of the highways of trade as Chattanooga, such store of coal, iron and timber, such busy industry. The first charter of the town was given Dec. 20, 1839. By the second charter passed in November, 1851, the town became officially the city of Chattanooga. In the spring of 1862 the city was occupied by the Confederates. On the 21st of August, 1863, a few shells from Wilder's guns on Stringer's Ridge on the north side of the Tennessee came into the city, and on the 19th of September the last troopers in gray rode out and the men in blue came in, and the stars and stripes went up on the Crutchfield House. By the census of 1860 Chattanooga had a population of 2545. At the close of the Civil War there was less than that number, which soon grew by the return of refugees and by the addition of new citizens. The geographical situation attracted new railroads, among them the Alabama Great Southern; Central Georgia; Chattanooga Southern; Cincinnati Southern; Southern Railway, Memphis, Knoxville and Atlanta Divisions; Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis; and Western and Atlantic. The Tennessee river is navigable from Knoxville to its junction with the Ohio at Paducah in Western Kentucky. The population in 1905 including suburbs was estimated from 64,000 to 70,000. The city has six libraries, the Public Library being a Carnegie building. It contains two hospitals and five homes for the needy. It has 111 church organizations, seven banking institutions, and 258 factories, employing in 1904, 10,487 hands.
In the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park many grand and beautiful monuments have been erected by several of the states of the North and South in honor of their fallen soldiers. The Park contains 6965 acres, mostly at Chickamauga, but also at Orchard Knob, at different points on Missionary Ridge, at the battlefield on the slope of Lookout Mountain, at the Point Park on the summit, in Lookout valley and at Ringgold, Georgia. It contains one of the finest cavalry posts in the United States: Fort Oglethorpe. The improved roads in the Park are eighty miles in extent. On the Chickamauga battlefield are 170 monuments erected by different states and 323 markers, and in the National Park outside of this battlefield 51 monuments and 113 markers, among these seven monuments by the state of New York. Besides these there are many shell and marble monuments erected by military organizations and private individuals. In addition fifty-five Union batteries with 135 guns, and sixty Confederate batteries with 141 guns have been mounted, some of them outside the Park. All the Confederate batteries which were faced in storming Missionary Ridge are again in position.
Point Park on the summit of Lookout Mountain includes eleven and eight-tenths acres and here are placed cannon of the Confederate artillery of the war time. In this Park the state of New York is erecting a monument which will be the largest and most costly of any in the National Park. It is to be of granite and bronze, rising to the height of about 100 feet, the lower part in the form of a Grecian temple. On its tablets will be information about both armies. On a clear day seven states are within the range of vision from Point Rock; Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee are close at hand, to the east are the mountains of North and South Carolina, and to the north the mountains about Cumberland Gap in Kentucky and Virginia. The fine monument erected on Orchard Knob by the state of Maryland is dedicated to the memory of her sons of the Blue and the Gray. The beautiful monument in Chickamauga Park near the La Fayette road, erected by the state of Kentucky in memory of her sons of both armies who fell on that field, bears these patriotic words: "As we are united in life and they united in death, let one monument perpetuate their deeds, and one people forgetful of all asperities forever hold in grateful remembrance all the glories of that terrible conflict which made all men free and retained every star in the Nation's flag."
The neighing steed, the Bashing blade,
The trumpet's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout are past;
No war's wild note, nor glory's peal.