Linwood Cemetery (Columbus, Georgia)

Historical reenactors decorating the grave of Lizzie Rutherford, on which is inscribed her role as the mother of Memorial Day.

Linwood Cemetery is an historic cemetery in the city of Columbus, Georgia, that is the resting place of many famous people as well as six hundred confederate soldiers from the American Civil War. It was from this cemetery that the annual Memorial Day commemoration emerged. Linwood was originally known simply as The City Cemetery. In 1894, the surrounding community adopted the name Linwood based on the novel Ernest Linwood by Caroline Lee Hentz. Notables who are interred at Linwood include John Pemberton, the inventor of Coca-Cola; Elizabeth Rutherford, the founder of Memorial Day; General Henry L. Benning, notable confederate general and namesake of Fort Benning; W.C. Bradley, chairman of Coca-Cola; General Paul Jones Semmes, who was mortally wounded on the second day at Gettysburg; and Dr. Francis Orray Ticknor, notable poet and physician.

Since many wounded confederate soldiers came to Columbus after battling General William Tecumseh Sherman's forces in and around Atlanta, many of those soldiers died in Columbus' hospitals. For that reason there are hundreds of confederate soldiers, known and unknown, buried at Linwood. Currently there are about 10,000 graves in the cemetery.

External links

• Linwood Cemetery
• People buried at Linwood

Coordinates: 32°28′39″N 84°59′00″W / 32.47750°N 84.98333°W