Aerial survey · USDA NAIP · public domainAn 1881 picturesque cemetery on Syracuse's north side — final resting place of more than 100 Civil War soldiers — where visitors describe orbs, EVPs, and a glowing white figure that chases late-night trespassers.
800 Grant Boulevard, Syracuse, NY 13208
Research updated May 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
Free
Free public access during posted daylight hours.
Access
Limited Access
Rolling cemetery grounds with paved drives and grass sections
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1881 · Civil War Veterans Burial Ground · GAR Lilly Post 66 Monument · Rural Cemetery Movement · Syracuse North Side Heritage
The Woodlawn Cemetery Association was incorporated in April 1881, founded by Syracuse citizens seeking a picturesque, non-denominational burial ground to serve the growing city's north-side neighborhoods. The cemetery's 160 acres on Grant Boulevard were laid out in the rural-cemetery style that dominated American cemetery design in the second half of the nineteenth century — gentle topography, winding drives, and family plots arranged for landscape effect rather than rigid grid efficiency.
Woodlawn is the final resting place of more than 100 Civil War soldiers. The Grand Army of the Republic (GAR) plot in Section 32 contains the cemetery's Civil War monument, erected in 1887 by the Lilly GAR Post 66 Monument Association and dedicated to local soldiers who served in the Union Army. The monument is a centerpiece of the cemetery's veteran-burial sections and is maintained by Woodlawn's preservation programs.
The cemetery added the Sunset Mausoleum Complex for above-ground entombment over the twentieth century and continues to operate as an active burial ground today. Woodlawn is a non-profit serving Central New York and offers traditional burial, cremation, and mausoleum services.
The cemetery has been included in the PocketSights 'Haunted History of Onondaga County' self-guided audio walking tour and appears in several regional paranormal directories, though tier-1 newspaper coverage of the cemetery's paranormal claims is limited compared to Oakwood Cemetery on the city's south side.
Sources
Woodlawn's paranormal lore is documented primarily in regional haunted-places aggregators — Haunted Places, GhostQuest — and in the PocketSights 'Haunted History of Onondaga County' self-guided audio tour. According to those sources, the most frequently reported phenomena are visual: orbs in photographs, white-light apparitions, and shadow movement among the older monuments and the GAR plot.
Auditory phenomena are also reported. Visitors describe disembodied voices, screams, whimpering, and crying — some captured as EVPs by paranormal investigators who have visited the grounds. Cold spots are reported near specific older mausoleums, though no source identifies a consistent named entity to anchor the activity.
The most repeated narrative — appearing on Haunted Places, GhostQuest, and in social-media retellings of the cemetery's lore — involves a 'glowing white ghost' said to appear and chase late-night visitors through the older sections of the cemetery. The cemetery is officially closed after dark, and the chasing-ghost story functions in part as a deterrent-folklore narrative. No historical incident is associated with the figure, and tier-1 reporting on the cemetery does not document the legend.
Woodlawn's lore is thinner than Oakwood's — there is no named ghost or anchored historical event — which is reflected in the cemetery's status as a 'medium-verifiability' site in regional listings.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
Walk the 160-acre grounds during daylight hours. Notable features include the GAR Civil War monument in Section 32 — erected in 1887 by the Lilly GAR Post 66 Monument Association — and the resting places of more than 100 Civil War soldiers.
Woodlawn Cemetery is a stop on the PocketSights 'Haunted History of Onondaga County' self-guided audio walking tour, which compiles local paranormal lore and historical context for the site.
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