MOUNT VERNON
WASHINGTON’S TOMB, MT. VERNON
Mount Vernon, Washington’s home and burial place, is in Fairfax County, Va., about fifteen miles below the city. It is in full view, standing among the trees on the top of a bluff rising about two hundred feet above the river. As the steamboat approaches, its bell is tolled, this being the universal custom on nearing or passing Washington’s tomb. The estate was originally a domain of about eight thousand acres, and Augustine Washington, dying in 1743, bequeathed it to Lawrence Washington, who, having served in the Spanish wars under Admiral Vernon, named it Mount Vernon in his honor. General Washington, in 1752, inherited Mount Vernon from Lawrence. After his death the estate passed to his nephew, Bushrod Washington, subsequently descending to other members of the family.
Congress repeatedly endeavored to have Washington’s remains removed to the crypt under the rotunda of the Capitol, originally constructed for their reception, but the family always refused, knowing it was his desire to rest at Mount Vernon.
In 1856 the mansion and surrounding property were saved from the auctioneer’s hammer, and secured as a national possession by the Ladies’ Mount Vernon Association, assisted principally by Edward Everett, at a cost of two hundred thousand dollars.
Washington, originally called Federal City, was named after Washington in 1791, and became the capital in 1800. In 1814 the Capitol, White House, and other public buildings, were burned by the British.