The diverse committee members c comprised the first-ever biracial committee in the history of once KKK-dominated St. Augustine -- something Dr. Robert S. Hayling, D.D.S. and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. asked for in 1963, 55 years ago.
The Committee has written less than 500 words for contextualizing the monument.
I agree with the Committee. Wonderful work. Historic effort by diverse group, fully "woke."
But the draft design by Jeremy Marquis group is uninspired. Needs more work. Bronze is dull. Gray granite instead?
Confederate monument could get new additions
By Sheldon Gardner
Posted Jun 28, 2018 at 2:01 AM
St. Augustine Record
The seven people tasked with adding context to St. Augustine’s Confederate memorial have almost finished their efforts.
Appointed by the St. Augustine City Commission, members of the Confederate Memorial Contextualization Advisory Committee began meeting in February and had their final meeting this month. Committee members will meet again July 9 when they will make their proposal to Commission.
The Confederate Memorial is in the Plaza de la Constitucion and names more than 40 men who died while serving the Confederacy.
The committee’s recommendation is to add a plaque to each four sides of the memorial that would provide brief details about the monument, about St. Augustine during the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation, about men from the city fighting on both sides of the war, and about how the monument is perceived differently by people.
“I think we’ve done a very good job of trying to tell the story as truthfully and completely as we can,” committee Vice Chair Regina Phillips, who is director of the Lincolnville Museum and Cultural Center, said at the meeting.
Part of one plaque would read, “The obelisk honors local loved ones who gave up their lives in service of the Confederate states. Yet in all these Confederate state constitutions, black people were legally regarded as human property. This memorial is a reminder of the diverse legacies of the Civil War.”
The design of the plaques was still being finalized as of this month. The city hasn’t determined what the additions will cost, City Clerk Darlene Galambos said.
Adding information to the memorial is far from what some people in the community had asked for. A group led by the Rev. Ron Rawls, pastor of the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue, pressed the city to remove the monument from the public square.
Meanwhile, major opposition to the memorial’s removal also formed, including an online petition that gathered thousands of signatures.
The City Commission decided in October to keep the monument and instead appoint the committee to add context to the site. Rawls and others have continued to protest.
The committee has three black people and four white people, including educators, historians and museum officials. In addition to Phillips, committee members are Flagler College history Professor J. Michael Butler, retired St. Johns County educator Sharyn Wilson Smith Coley, Flagler College adjunct history professor and former naval museum director Elizabeth Dove, Flagler College emeritus history Professor Thomas Graham, St. Johns County Recreation Supervisor and committee Chair Thomas Jackson and historian Susan Parker.
Overall, committee members said they were pleased with the result of their effort, which delved into controversial and emotional topics.
“When signing up for the contextualization committee, I think my biggest fear was that if people want context, they are going to get it,” Butler told the committee. “And with a history like this, it’s not neat and tidy. That it would, for some, be raw, be emotional, but I think with what we’ve done we’ve been intellectually honest. We’ve been empathetic and inclusive, and in the process I think we’ve done something that many communities have not and may not ever be able to fully accomplish.
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Adding context …
The Confederate Memorial Contextualization Advisory Committee recommendation is to add a plaque to each four sides of the memorial that would provide brief details about the monument, about St. Augustine during the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation, about men from the city fighting on both sides of the war, and about how the monument is perceived differently by people. Below is the proposed wording for each of the plaques.
North Plaque: St. Augustine during the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation
FREEDOM: Our nation’s Civil War was fought from 1861 to 1865 between the Confederate States of America and the United States of America. Battles did not come to St. Augustine, but Union troops occupied the city in March 1862. They remained through the end of the war and Reconstruction.
President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation decreed that on January 1, 1863, “all persons held as slaves within any State ... in rebellion against the United States, shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.” The Proclamation formalized the freedoms that enslaved people had claimed for themselves since the arrival of Union troops. On New Year’s Day, 1864, the Proclamation’s first anniversary was celebrated in this Plaza, where the Confederate Monument would later stand.
The Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the U.S. Constitution brought new possibilities to St. Augustine’s black residents earlier than other areas of the Confederacy: to own property, to marry legally, to learn to read and write, and for men, to vote and hold public office.
South Plaque: St. Augustine Men Fought on Both Sides
SACRIFICE: White men in St. Augustine formed militias which joined the Confederate Florida regiments and fought in Tennessee, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and North Carolina. Only a handful remained to surrender in 1865. Many others were buried in graves far from home.
Black men in St. Augustine were among the first to join black fighting units in the Civil War as early as 1862. Local black men headed to Hilton Head, South Carolina, to join volunteer regiments. These forces were later designated the United States Colored Troops (USCT).
The USCT fought in segregated units led by white officers. They raided coastal areas, liberated thousands of enslaved persons, and in 1863 the Colored Troops led the way in occupying Jacksonville, Florida, and in 1865 restored the Stars and Stripes to Fort Sumter, South Carolina, where the war began.
East Plaque: The Monument as a Memorial
MEMORY: This 1879 obelisk replaces one originally built on South St. George Street in 1872. It is the second oldest Confederate monument in the state of Florida. The Ladies Memorial Association of St. Augustine raised private funds to construct the memorial to honor the town’s men who died in service of the Confederate States of America.
Its marble plaques were once attached to the 1872 Confederate memorial. The plaques list the names of forty-six men, many of whom were of Minorcan or Spanish descent, a reflection of St. Augustine’s diverse ethnic heritage.
For many years on Confederate Memorial Day, April 26th, the ladies of the Memorial Association decorated the monument with flowers. As decades passed, the memorial blended into the Plaza’s landscape. The City of St. Augustine respects the historical and emotional importance of this memorial.
West Plaque: Changing Viewpoints of the Monument
INTERPRET: The public’s response to the display of Confederate monuments from the 1870s through the Civil Rights era and beyond remains deeply personal, emotional, and divisive. Some view this memorial as a noble reminder of personal sacrifice; others interpret it as a painful reminder of the re-assertion of white supremacy.
Why are monuments and memorials important? They convey what a community feels and honors, and reflect the values of its people. Monuments and memorials reflect the social and political context of their time. Those perspectives and interpretations change over time, and this monument is no exception.
The obelisk honors local loved ones who gave up their lives in service of the Confederate states. Yet in all these Confederate state constitutions, black people were legally regarded as human property. This memorial is a reminder of the diverse legacies of the Civil War.
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Comment
Edward Adelbert Slavin
1. I agree with the Committee. Wonderful work. Historic effort by diverse group, fully "woke."
2. Design by Jeremy Marquis group is uninspired. Needs more work. Bronze is dull. Gray granite instead?
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