Oak Hill Cemetery
Italianate gatehouse, Oak Hill Cemetery
Interactive map of Oak Hill Cemetery
Details
Established	1848
Location	30th and R Streets, NW Georgetown,Washington, D.C., U.S.
Country	United States
Coordinates	38°54′46″N77°03′33″W / 38.9127°N 77.0592°W /38.9127; -77.0592
Type	private
Size	22 acres (8.9 ha)
Website	www.oakhillcemeterydc.org
Find a Grave	Oak Hill Cemetery
The Political Graveyard	Oak Hill Cemetery

Oak Hill Cemetery is a historic 22-acre (8.9 ha) cemetery located in theGeorgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., in the United States. It was founded in 1848 and completed in 1853, and is a prime example of arural cemetery. Many famous politicians, business people, military people, diplomats, and philanthropists are buried at Oak Hill, and the cemetery has a number ofVictorian-style memorials and monuments. Oak Hill has two structures which are listed on theNational Register of Historic Places: theOak Hill Cemetery Chapel and theVan Ness Mausoleum.

The cemetery's (temporary) interment of"Willie" Lincoln, deceased son of presidentAbraham Lincoln, was the inspiration for theMan Booker Prize-winning novelLincoln in the Bardo byGeorge Saunders.^[1]

Oak Hill began in 1848 as part of the rural cemetery movement, directly inspired by the success ofMount Auburn Cemetery nearBoston, Massachusetts, whenWilliam Wilson Corcoran (also founder of theCorcoran Gallery of Art) purchased 15 acres (6.1 ha) of land.^[2] He then organized the Cemetery Company to oversee Oak Hill; it was incorporated by act of Congress on March 3, 1849.

Oak Hill's chapel was built in 1849 by noted architectJames Renwick, who also designed theSmithsonian Institution's Castle onWashington Mall andSt. Patrick's Cathedral, New York. His one-story rectangular chapel measures 23 by 41 feet (7×12 m) and sits on the cemetery's highest ridge. It is built of blue gneiss, inGothic Revival style, with exterior trim in the same red Seneca sandstone used for the Castle.

By 1851, landscape designer Captain George F. de la Roche finished laying out the winding paths and terraces descending intoRock Creek valley. When initial construction was completed in 1853, Corcoran had spent over $55,000 on the cemetery's landscaping and architecture.

On October 4, 2022, historic preservationist Paul K. Williams became the cemetery's 14th Superintendent in residence and COO of the Oak Hill Cemetery Historic Cemetery Foundation.

• Dean Acheson
• Madeleine Albright
• Gamaliel Bailey
• Margaret Lucy Shands Bailey
• James G. Blaine (formerly interred)
• Ben Bradlee
• William P. Burch
• Adolf Cluss
• Lorenzo Dow
• Peggy Eaton
• Roberta Flack
• Katharine Graham
• Joseph Henry
• Herman Hollerith
• Willie Lincoln (formerly interred)
• Myrtilla Miner
• Francis G. Newlands
• Edwin P. Parker Jr.
• Paul J. Pelz
• Charles Anthony Schott
• Mark Shields
• E. D. E. N. Southworth
• Edwin M. Stanton
• Cornelius Stribling

• The cemetery is the setting of the 2017George Saunders novelLincoln in the Bardo.
• The cemetery was a part of the plot in theDavid Baldacci novelThe Camel Club.^[3]
• A tomb in the cemetery is described as the site of adead drop in theJohn Le Carre novelThe Perfect Spy.^[4]
• The cemetery was a part of the plot in theBrad Meltzer novelThe Inner Circle
• The cemetery released a history book, "Oak Hill Cemetery" by Laura Lavelle (nee Hackfeld) with Arcadia Publishing on January 22, 2024.

• 
  Memorial stone ofEdwin M. Stanton, lawyer and politician
• 
  Memorial stone ofGeorge Hughes Revercomb, judge
• 
  Memorial stone forDean Acheson, lawyer, politician and former Secretary of State
• 
  Memorial stone forStefan Osusky, lawyer, diplomat, politician and co-founder of Czechoslovakia
• 
  Memorial stone forHerman Hollerith, mathematician and inventor
• 
  Memorial stone ofJesse L. Reno, general
• 
  Memorial stone ofJoseph Edward Willard, diplomat and politician
• 
• 
  Memorial stone ofMaxwell Van Zandt Woodhull, soldier
• 
  Memorial stone ofNathan Loughborough, Comptroller of the Treasury
• 
• 
• 
• 
  Memorial stone ofJohn Howard Payne, poet, writer, playwright and actor
• 
  Unknown Revolutionary War soldier marker
• 
  Memorial stone ofWilliam McKee Dunn, lawyer, judge and politician
• 
  Memorial stone ofWilliam Pinkney, Episcopal Bishop of Maryland
• 

• List of burial places of justices of the Supreme Court of the United States

• Dodge, Andrew R. (2005).Biographical Directory of the United States Congress: 1774–2005. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.ISBN 9780160731761.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toOak Hill Cemetery.

External videos
Oak Hill Cemetery, Dave Jackson, October 4, 2016

• National Register of Historic Places Travel Itinerary*"Washington, DC – Oak Hill Cemetery".National Park Service. Archived fromthe original on December 14, 2012.

• 1848 establishments in Washington, D.C.
• Botanical gardens in Washington, D.C.
• Cemeteries in Washington, D.C.
• Georgetown (Washington, D.C.)
• Burials at Oak Hill Cemetery (Washington, D.C.)
• Rural cemeteries
• Cemeteries established in the 1840s

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