Oak Hill Cemetery is a historic 22-acre cemetery and
botanical garden located in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It
includes the Oak Hill Cemetery Chapel and Van Ness Mausoleum which are listed
on the National Register of Historic Places.
Oak Hill began in 1848 as part of the rural cemetery
movement, directly inspired by the success of Mount Auburn Cemetery, when
William Wilson Corcoran (also founder of the Corcoran Gallery of Art) purchased
15 acres of land. 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 architect James Renwick, who also designed the
Smithsonian Institution's Castle on Washington Mall and St. 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 black
granite, in Gothic 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 into Rock Creek valley. When initial construction was
completed in 1853, Corcoran had spent over $55,000 on the cemetery's
landscaping and architecture
