English: Looking north across the front lawn of Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee Memorial, at Arlington National Cemetery. To the left is the carriage driveway in front of the house. The brick path leads to the flagpole east of the house. The monument just visible behind the trees is the grave of General Horatio Wright.

Horatio Gouverneur Wright was an engineer and general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He served as Chief of Engineers for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. After the war, he became a civil engineer and helped build the Brooklyn Bridge and complete of the Washington Monument. Wright ied in 1899, and his family and supporters argued that his accomplishments merited placement of his grave not only in a spot of honor at Arlington National Cemetery but directly in front of Arlington House itself. Their wishes were honored. Wright was the third officer to be buried here; General Phil Sheridan and Admiral David Dixon Porter were also buried on the east lawn of the house as well.

Wright's burial on the east lawn quickly became controversial. Burying officers there was banned by cemetery officials shortly after his interrment. In 1931, the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts argued that the graves of Wright and Pierre Charles L'Efant (buried on the east lawn in 1911) should be relocated. This remains the official policy of Arlington National Cemetery, although the decision has never been implemented.