Abigail Englert –
From North Carolina to Nashville, Tennessee, you might recall the vandalism and removal of Confederate statues. BSB/22-1-12, a bill by Shay Oliphant and Houston Hughes, states in section two, “The legislation amends article one of the 2013 Tennessee Heritage Protection Act to allow the relocation of historical items with racist or hateful meanings.” If we were to relocate these monuments, there would be no immediate cost, also stated in the bill. In this article, we will be looking at both sides. Ever since the death of George Floyd two years ago, more than two hundred Confederate monuments have been removed. Two examples of the removal and vandalism, both in Tennessee, are the Nathan Bedford Forrest and Jefferson Davis monuments.
We will first examine Nathan Bedford Forrest, what his life was like, and how the Ku Klux Klan originated. It’s stated on history.com that “Nathan Bedford Forrest was a Confederate general during the Civil War.” Forrest never had any form of training, but he went from being a private to lieutenant general and even a cavalry officer during numerous wars. Transferring to his childhood, Forrest was born in Chapel Hill, TN and was rather poor. He had little to no formal education as a young child until he went into his uncle’s business. As an adult, Forrest became a planter and owned a stagecoach company. In the year 1852, he moved him and his family to Memphis, TN. He then became involved in the Civil War and the rest was history, literally. In his later life, Forrest became involved in the Ku Klux Klan society. He is noted as the first grand wizard in history. In 1998, the well known Nathan Bedford Forrest statue was erected. The statue stood twenty-five feet tall with Forrest placed upon a horse with a gun in one hand and sword in the other. In 2017, almost twenty years after the monument was placed, the monument was vandalized with hot-pink paint. This caused the removal of the Confederate monument. It was soon put in storage, after being removed by a helicopter.
Now, moving onto the Jefferson Davis monument. Also stated on history.com, “Jefferson Finis Davis, the first and only president of the Confederate States of America, was a Southern planter, Democratic politician and hero of the Mexican War who had represented Mississippi in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate and served as U.S. secretary of war.” Unlike Forrest, Davis was not born into a poor family. Davis was born in Kentucky and raised in Mississippi. He was the tenth and last child his parents bore. His older brother, who was a wealthy lawyer and planter, was an influence to him. Davis joined the Military Academy in 1824, and four years later he graduated. Davis then began working at a cotton plantation in 1835 after he and his wife became ill with malaria. His wife sadly passed away from the illness right after they got married. Eight years later, Davis began his political career. He was known to support state rights and slavery, and also served as a delegate to the Democratic Convention. In 1865, Davis won the election to the House of Representatives from Mississippi. In the year 1846, he resigned and served as colonel of the First Mississippi rifle reignment. In August of 1847, Davis filled a spot in the senate. The article on history.com also states, “A strong supporter of Manifest Destiny, Davis advocated for the extension of slavery into the new Western territories and the protection of slaveholders’ property rights. He opposed letting the Oregon territory bar slavery, and battled against the Compromise of 1850, especially the admission of California to the Union as a free state.”
Through the next few years, Davis struggled to balance leadership during the Civil War with challenging domestic tasks involved with running a country. Critics charged him with neglecting rights in his efforts to form a more effective central government, favoring certain military leaders despite their shortcomings, and sidelining those who opposed him, one being Joseph E. Johnston. Later in his life, David was imprisoned, most likely due to treason. In 1909, Jefferson Davis’s monument was dedicated. One hundred and ten years later, in 2019, blood-red liquid was discovered on the monument along with the phrase, “They were racists.” The incident took place in Centeral Park, located near Vanderbilt University.
While researching, I have realized that we are going through a cultural and political battle, and it needs to be stopped. If we completely stopped judging others based on appearance, race, and gender, we would come to realize that we are all one people. We all have different emotions and views, but we were all made by the same divine creator. So what side will you choose?
Learn more:
https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/jefferson-davis
https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/nathan-bedford-forrest
https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2021/12/07/nashville-forrest-confederate-statue-removed/
Department of Public Information 