Veterans' Cemetery at San Diego's Fort Rosencrans Reaches Full Capacity

Overlooking the ocean and the city of San Diego sits beautiful Fort Rosecrans Cemetery, home to 110,000 military and select family-member gravesites. Now that cemetery site is at capacity with scarce exceptions for veterans and eligible family members who wish to be buried in an existing gravesite.

“After Miramar National Cemetery opened to casket burials in April 2011, VA officials in Washington, D.C., chose to abandon a plan to build more walls for ashes on Point Loma” reports the Union-Tribune.

Men and women of great valor and bravery, who have served our country in defense of the freedoms enjoyed by the citizens of America, lay resting at Fort Rosecrans. The first burials at the site occurred in 1882, as remains from the Battle of San Pasqual were moved to the location.

The cemetery was established as a National Cemetery on October 5, 1934, according to statements on the cemetery’s website. Multiple memorials mark the grounds at Fort Rosecrans. At the 2013 Memorial Day service, I watched as a group of young servicemen paid respects to their recently fallen brothers in arms and placed written notes and flowers to honor those laid to rest there.

Memorial Day Ceremonies will be held at 10am, Monday, May 26, 2014 on the Fort Rosecrans Cemetery grounds. Saturday morning, local Boy Scouts and volunteers will place American flags at each gravesite, as they do each year through the Fort Rosecrans Memorial Day Flag Placement Service Project.

Fatalities from Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation New Dawn, and Operation Enduring Freedom combined for a total of 6,801, according to the March 7, 2014 DOD casualty report.