Port Hudson National Cemetery

Port Hudson National Cemetery is a United States National Cemetery located in Port Hudson, 20 mi north of the city of Baton Rouge in East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. It encompasses 19.9 acre, and as of the end of 2007, had 12,718 interments.

The Port Hudson Battlefield, including the cemetery, is a National Historic Landmark. It is also a designated site on the Louisiana African American Heritage Trail.

History
The cemetery is located on the site which was the main battleground of the Siege of Port Hudson, during the American civil war. Nearly 4,000 Union troops fell during the fighting, and most were buried in the cemetery, many as unknowns. After the war another 8.4 acre was appropriated to inter those who died in the local veterans' facilities. The Confederate soldiers who died were primarily buried in the trenches where they fell. There is however, a Confederate Cemetery in the Port Hudson area that is currently inaccessible to the public.

The battlefield at Port Hudson is one of the only naturally preserved Civil War battlegrounds. The breastworks, gun pits, and trenches remain today almost as they were during the battle. The area has never been developed.

Port Hudson National Cemetery was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1974 as part of the Port Hudson Historic Site.

Notable burials

 * Betty Heitman, co-chairman of the Republican National Committee from 1983 to 1987, buried with her husband, Captain Henry Schrader Heitman