Arlington National Cemetery, one of the world's most famous burial places of soldiers, politicians and astronauts stretched near the Washington side of the river Potomac.

The need for such a memorial country felt during the Civil War. The development of military equipment has resulted in an unprecedented number of victims - more than 600 thousand. During the War of Independence of the fallen were buried in the village graveyard, but with its Civil mass armies such an order did not come. In 1862 the US Congress passed a law allowing the government to purchase land for the burial of the soldiers of the North.

Arlington National Cemetery was founded then. The land belonged to General Robert E. Lee, who commanded the army of the southern states. Northerners have placed a military camp here, but the wife of Robert E. Lee, Mary, who fled from the estates had to pay property taxes. The money ($ 92 7 cents), the Government has not adopted from a cousin, Mary, put up for auction, and the manor itself is bought it.

In 1874, the eldest son of General won a lawsuit against the government returned the land itself. A year later, he again sold it to the government, but is six times more expensive.

May 13, 1864 the first soldier buried here - the former worker of William Henry Kristmena, provoevavshego only five weeks. This day is considered the founding date of the cemetery. To date, there honorably interred more than 400 thousand people. The cemetery was expanded several times now it takes almost three square kilometers. Burial traditions United States and Russia are different: at Arlington - no fences, manicured lawns with neat rows of tombstones.

At first, there were buried soldiers of the North and the veterans of the Civil. However, US involvement in the war has changed the character of the cemetery: Here were buried the fallen in the Spanish-American War of 1898, then the First and Second World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, the global war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan. There memorials Tomb of the Unknown Soldier with a huge amphitheater of Memorial, a monument to 266 sailors who died in 1898 aboard the cruiser "Maine" exploded space shuttle astronauts monuments "Challenger" and women soldiers.

The right to burial in Arlington Cemetery has awarded a medal, war participants and their family members, retired military, Chairman of the Supreme Court. In the cemetery lie the John F. Kennedy and his widow, Jacqueline, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, the composer and musician Glen Miller, the writer Dashiell Hammett, General John Pershing, boxer Joe Louis, polar explorer Robert Peary and many celebrities, the glory and pride of the United States.

Funeral ceremonies are held daily, except for weekends of 27-30 ceremonies a day. Tomb of Unknown Soldier in any weather guard of honor guards. Time - only volunteers. The guard changes every half hour in summer, beautiful and complicated ritual: Soldiers marching, stops for exactly 21 seconds, perform a sharp turn. Twenty-one seconds of immobility represents twenty-one artillery salvo, the highest military honor.