This paper is the result of the experimental and numerical research on the distribution of vertical earth pressure due to surcharge loads acting on cantilever retaining wall close to a rigid slope with a stiff angle. Centrifuge model experiments were performed with changing the roughness of adjacent slope to the wall, distance between the wall and the slope and gravitational levels. Vertical earth pressures were measured by earth cells embedded in the backfill of the wall. Test results of vertical earth pressures due to surcharge loads were compared with theoretical estimations by using two different methods of limit equilibrium and the numerical analysis. For limit equilibrium methods, the modified silo and the wedge theories, proposed by Chung(1993, 1997), were used to analyze test results. Based on those modified theories, the particular solution with the boundary condition of surcharge loads on the surface of backfill was obtained to find the vertical stress distributions acting on the backfill. FLAC with the hyperbolic constitutive model was also used for the numerical estimation. As a result of comparison of test results with theoretical and numerical estimations, distribution of vertical earth pressures obtained from centrifuge model tests is generally in good agreement with numerical estmated values by using FLAC whereas the wedge theory shows values close to test results in case the distance between the wall and the slope is narrow.