GENERAL INFORMATION

Welcome to the Fort McPherson National Cemetery web page. We hope you will find the information you need and will visit us again. If you wish to contact our office, please refer to the numbers listed at the top of the page.

Families often contact us during a difficult time - after the loss of a loved one.

We’re here to make the burial process as comfortable as possible. We encourage veterans and their families to talk with us in advance for information or about any questions or concerns.

When the time comes, we will ensure the committal service and any other requests are handled respectfully. We pledge to honor the dignity and memory of each person and to provide excellent service to family and friends during this difficult time.

Visiting the Cemetery
Over 7,500 people visit Fort McPherson National Cemetery each year. Many come for a committal service or to visit the gravesite of a loved one, others to attend special observances or to enjoy the peaceful setting. We welcome all visitors to this shrine for our nation’s heroes.

The cemetery is open to the public daily from dawn to dusk for visitation of the cemetery grounds. Specific gravesite locations can be found using an automated gravesite locator kiosk located in the public information building.

General cemetery information is available in the administration building. Visitors may park along the curb near the gravesite they are visiting. Restrooms and a water fountain are located in the public information building.

Visitors attending committal services should gather at the committal shelter, or if arriving in procession, follow the directions of the cemetery staff. Roadway parking is available throughout the cemetery and near the committal shelter during services. Special observances and ceremonies are held at the main flagpole near the committal shelter.

A Memorial Day ceremony is held annually the last Monday in May. For the time and date of the ceremony, call the cemetery office at (308) 582-4433.

While we invite visitors to Fort McPherson National Cemetery, we remind them of the solemn purpose of these grounds and ask that they act accordingly. For this reason, sports or recreational activities are not permitted, including: bicycling, jogging, recreational walking, picnicking, public gatherings of a partisan nature, rollerblading and walking of pets.

Making Burial Arrangements
Burial arrangements can be made through a funeral home or by the next-of-kin directly with cemetery staff. The office is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., except for federal holidays.

Before we can approve burial of a veteran, spouse, or dependent, we must have proof of the veteran’s eligibility. The best way to prove eligibility is with documentation of service and discharge, such as the DD Form 214. Once eligibility is determined, we can schedule the burial.

National cemetery interment includes U.S. government-provided benefits including: a burial plot; assistance with a committal service; gravesite opening and closing; a headstone, gravesite marker, or columbarium cover with inscriptions; a United States burial flag; perpetual care of the gravesite; and a memorial certificate signed by the President. Funeral directors’ services are not covered.

Almost all veterans are eligible for military honors, which may be requested through the family’s funeral director and are provided by the Department of Defense.

Gravesites are assigned and cannot be selected in advance. Assignments are made without regard to rank, ethnic or religious background, branch of service or other factors. A husband and wife are interred in the same plot unless both were veterans. In that case, they may be buried side by side in separate plots. Cremated remains are buried in the ground in specially designated sections of the cemetery.

All veterans interred at a national cemetery are eligible for a headstone or marker. It normally takes less than 60 days following a burial for the headstone or marker to be completed and in place.

Burials and inurnments are scheduled at 30-minute intervals between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., Monday through Thursday, and 9 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. on Fridays, except for federal holidays. Out of respect for all persons buried that day, the cemetery’s main flag is lowered to half-staff 30 minutes before the first service, where it remains until 30 minutes following the last service.

Military Funeral Honors
The Department of Defense (DOD) is responsible for providing military funeral honors. “Honoring Those Who Served” is the title of the DOD program for providing dignified military funeral honors to veterans who have defended our nation.

Upon the family’s request, Public Law 106-65 requires that every eligible veteran receive a military funeral honors ceremony, to include folding and presenting the United States burial flag and the playing of Taps. The law defines a military funeral honors detail as consisting of two or more uniformed military persons, with at least one being a member of the veteran’s parent service of the armed forces. The DOD program calls for funeral home directors to request military funeral honors on behalf of the veterans’ family. However, the cemetery staff can also assist with arranging military funeral honors at Fort McPherson.

We are fortunate to have several volunteer Veterans’ organizations to assist in providing military funeral honors. When military funeral honors at a national cemetery are desired, they are arranged prior to the committal service by the funeral home. For more information on a local volunteer unit, call your local county Veteran’s Service Officer or the cemetery staff.

To arrange military funeral honors, contact your local funeral home.
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HISTORICAL INFORMATION

Built in 1863, Fort McPherson was established to ensure peace along the western frontier between the immigrants traveling along the Oregon Trail and the Native American inhabitants. The troops originally stationed at the post provided military protection from hostile Native Americans during the construction of the railroad.

To meet the burial needs of the soldiers stationed at the post, a cemetery was established early in its history. The old post burial ground was later moved to southwest of the post and some 50 remains were moved to this location.

Establishment of the 20-acre Fort McPherson National Cemetery in 1873 afforded the space to relocate remains from the cemeteries abandoned when the number of settlers decreased. Burial records testify that life on the frontier was full of hardships and dangers similar to battlefield camps during times of war.
The cemetery lodge was built in 1876 and rehabilitated in 1951 and 2000. About one mile southeast of the cemetery a monument marks the site of the flagstaff of the old military post. Another monument marks the route used by the Pony Express over the Oregon Trail, which passes through the cemetery.

The cemetery has a marble monument erected in memory of Lt. John Lawrence Grattan and 28 of his men who were killed in the Grattan Massacre on August 19, 1854.

Monuments and Memorials
The cemetery contains a marble monument erected in the memory of Lt. John Lawrence Grattan and 28 of his men who were killed in the Grattan Massacre. The Grattan Massacre took place near Fort Laramie, Wyo., on Aug. 19, 1854, during negotiations with Sioux Indians. Lt. Grattan is buried at Fort Leavenworth National Cemetery.

The flag of our Nation flies in silent vigil 24 hours a day over the orderly rows of white marble monuments here at Fort McPherson National Cemetery. The flag is lowered to half-mast ½ hour before the first service of the day and remains there until ½ hour after the last service of the day. On Memorial Day, the flag is lowered to half-staff until noon in respect to all our honored dead. All graves are decorated with a small U.S. flag the day before Memorial Day and removed the day after the holiday. Many of our veteran’s families have donated the burial flags of their loved ones to be flown with pride on our Avenue of Flags. The Avenue of Flags is on display during Memorial Day, Flag Day, 4th of July, and Veterans Day.

The cemetery has a beautiful digital carillon system, which was donated to the cemetery through the caring and generosity of the State of Nebraska American Legion, Nebraska Legion Auxiliary, and the Nebraska Sons of the American Legion. This beautiful carillon is yet another enhancement of the cemetery in which the great people of Nebraska offer thanks to our veterans for their service to America.
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NOTABLE BURIALS

Medal of Honor Recipients
Private Daniel A. Miller, (Indian Campaigns) Company F, 3rd. U.S. Cavalry. Whetstone Mountains, Ariz., May 5, 1871 (Section A, Grave 380).

Sergeant Emanuel Stance, (Indian Campaigns) Company F, 9th U.S. Cavalry. Kickapoo Springs, Texas, May 20, 1870 (Section F, Grave 1040).

Sergeant George Jordon, (Indian Campaigns) Company K, 9th U.S. Cavalry. Fort Tularosa, N.M., May 14, 1880 (Section F, Grave 1131).

Private First Class James W. Fous, (Vietnam) U.S. Army, Company E, 4th Battalion, 47th Infantry, 9th Infantry Division. Kien Hoa Province, Republic of Vietnam, May 14, 1968 (Section G, Grave 685).

Other Burials
Fort McPherson National Cemetery is the final resting place for 63 Buffalo Soldiers of the 9th and 10th Cavalry. The soldiers were all buried at Fort Robinson, Nebraska, and were relocated to Fort McPherson National Cemetery in 1947 when Fort Robinson was deactivated.

Fort McPherson National Cemetery has served as the final resting place for American men and women who have served their country at many different times in many wars throughout the years. In some instances positive identification has been impossible due to the circumstances of the deaths. There are 81 group burials at Fort McPherson National Cemetery, which represent 350 Americans who gave the supreme sacrifice.

Twenty-three cemeteries from abandoned frontier forts located in Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho, and Nebraska have been moved to Fort McPherson National Cemetery for proper care and maintenance of those graves. These moves took place between 1881 and 1947. Many of these graves account for the 541 unknowns that are interred here.

Section A, Graves 384-389 contains the remains of 6 members of Company F. 3rd U.S. Cavalry, Edward Doe, Louis Cohn, Theodore Froendle, Dennis Mahony, Daniel Taylor and William Mars who were drowned on May 31, 1873 in a flash flood which swept through their campsite on Blackwood Creek in the Republican River Valley.

Pvt. Cyrus Fox, a member of Company C, 7th Iowa Infantry. Pvt. Fox was the last of the Lincoln County Civil War Veterans to die in 1942. Coincidentally, Pvt. Fox had served under General McPherson for whom the Cemetery is named (Section C, Grave 1270).
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FLORAL/GROUNDS REGULATIONS

We welcome and encourage fresh-cut flowers throughout the year and provide flower containers for gravesite display. Cemetery visitors are free to use the containers located in receptacles placed throughout the grounds. Once the blooms are spent or damaged by weather, they are removed. They may also be removed for routine mowing or other maintenance.

Artificial flowers are only allowed at the end of mowing operations in the fall after October 10 and must be removed when mowing operations resume in the spring on March 15, with the exception of Easter and Memorial Day.

On Easter and Memorial Day, potted plants and artificial flowers may be placed on gravesites on the Friday before the holiday. Items will be removed by cemetery staff one week after the holiday. During the Christmas season, from Thanksgiving through January 10, potted plants, wreaths less than 18 inches in diameter and not higher than the marble headstone and grave blankets not larger than 2 X 3 feet are permitted. Potted plants are permitted only on these holidays, on the specified dates due to possible turf damage.

To preserve the dignity of the cemetery we ask that items left at grave side be floral in nature. Flags or commemorative items, balloons, pinwheels, breakable or glass objects of any kind, vigil lights, statues, shepherd’s hooks and permanent plantings, grave markers, among other items, are not permitted on graves in National Cemeteries. Items placed on gravesites may not stand taller than the headstone. Graves are decorated with small United States flags by the cemetery staff before Memorial Day and are removed immediately after the holiday. Flags are not permitted on graves at any other time.

No item or object, including floral items, may be attached to a headstone or marker in a National Cemetery. The headstone may not be altered in any form. Wildlife may eat fresh flowers and arrangements. Due to the often windy conditions, items may be blown off the gravesite. Items that are tagged with the section and grave number will be returned to the gravesite as found. Anything left on gravesites that violates the intent of the floral regulations or the dignity of our cemetery, or is a threat to the safety of personnel will be removed. Fort McPherson National Cemetery assumes no responsibility for items left at graveside. Due to the open nature of the grounds, we cannot guarantee against theft, vandalism or the effects of nature.

Our cemetery floral regulations exist only to reflect the honor and respect we hold for our Nation’s Veterans, by preserving the dignity and solemnity of their final resting place. The staff of Fort McPherson National Cemetery thanks you for assisting us to provide upon these hallowed grounds, a National Shrine to honor the patriotic Americans who selflessly answered their Nation’s call to arms and of their family members who took on the burdens of daily life while their loved ones were away.
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