| Denton Confederate Soldier Monument | |
|---|---|
 The monument c. 2000 | |
 | |
| Completion date | 1918 |
| Location | Denton, Texas, United States |
| 33°12′53″N97°07′59″W / 33.2146°N 97.1331°W | |
The Denton Confederate Soldier Monument was an outdoor Confederate memorial installed in downtown Denton, Texas, in the United States. [1]
The statue depicts an armed Confederate soldier standing on an arch with the inscription, "Our Confederate soldiers". On the left pillar it read:
Erected by the Daughters of the Confederacy in memory of our Confederate soldiers, who in heroic self-sacrifice and devoted loyalty gave their lives to the South in her hour of need. [2]
On the right pillar it read:
"Their names graved on memorial columns are a song heard far in the future, and their examples reach a hand through all the years to meet and kindle generous purpose and mold it into acts as pure as theirs." [3]
The monument was funded and erected in 1918 by the Katie Daffan Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, [4] and unveiled on June 3, the anniversary of Jefferson Davis's birthday. [2] At the unveiling ceremony, Texas State Senator James Robert Wiley told onlookers:
Historians do not do them [Confederate soldiers] and their work justice. They have been forced to submit to teachings and doctrines unfavorable to themselves. I hope in the future a history will be written that will tell of their deeds as carefully and truthfully as it should be told. The Confederate soldiers were not traitors—the men who went out from the South were God-fearing, patriotic men who believed their cause was just. [2] [5]
The monument was named a Texas Historic Landmark in 1970, a National Historic Registry landmark in 1977, and a Texas State Archeological Landmark in 1981. [6] [7]
One local resident, Willie Hudspeth, a Vietnam War veteran and the president of Denton's NAACP, campaigned to remove the memorial since 2000. [8] The monument was vandalized with the words "This Is Racist" in 2015. [9] On February 1, 2018, Denton County leaders voted 12–3 to keep the statue, but to add a plaque denouncing slavery and a video kiosk explaining the city's racial history and progress, which was never added or completed. [10] A standalone plaque was erected nearby to provide a rationale for the monument. It read:
The Denton County soldier memorial was erected in 1918 by the Daughters of the Confederacy. The monument stands as a reminder of historic events and is intended as a memorial to Denton County citizens who sacrificed themselves for the community.
Now let this be a testimony that God created all men equal with certain inalienable rights.
We are all one, citizens of Denton County. [11]
On June 9, 2020, in the wake of the protests following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Denton County commissioners voted to remove the memorial. [12] [13] On the morning of June 25, 2020, removal of the statue began just before dawn. [14]
The Confederate War Memorial was a 65 foot (20 m)-high monument that pays tribute to soldiers and sailors from Texas who served with the Confederate States of America (CSA) during the American Civil War. The monument was dedicated in 1897, following the laying of its cornerstone the previous year. Originally located in Sullivan Park near downtown Dallas, Texas, United States, the monument was relocated in 1961 to the nearby Pioneer Park Cemetery in the Convention Center District, next to the Dallas Convention Center and Pioneer Plaza.
The Denton County Courthouse-on-the-Square is the former courthouse of Denton County located in the county seat Denton, Texas. The Denton County Courthouse-on-the-Square was constructed in 1896. In addition to county offices, the "Courthouse-on-the-Square Museum" also calls it home. The courthouse is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Confederate monuments and memorials in the United States include public displays and symbols of the Confederate States of America (CSA), Confederate leaders, or Confederate soldiers of the American Civil War. Many monuments and memorials have been or will be removed under great controversy. Part of the commemoration of the American Civil War, these symbols include monuments and statues, flags, holidays and other observances, and the names of schools, roads, parks, bridges, buildings, counties, cities, lakes, dams, military bases, and other public structures. In a December 2018 special report, Smithsonian Magazine stated, "over the past ten years, taxpayers have directed at least $40 million to Confederate monuments—statues, homes, parks, museums, libraries, and cemeteries—and to Confederate heritage organizations."
Appomattox is a bronze statue commemorating soldiers from Alexandria, Virginia, who had died while fighting for the Confederacy during the American Civil War. The memorial was located in the center of the intersection of South Washington Street and Prince Street in the Old Town neighborhood of Alexandria.
Florida's Tribute to the Women of the Confederacy, also known as A Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy and the Monument to the Women of the Confederacy, was an outdoor Confederate memorial installed in Jacksonville, Florida's Springfield Park.
The Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument was a large granite monument that sat at the south entrance of Garfield Park in Indianapolis for nearly a century, before being removed in 2020. It commemorated the Confederate prisoners of war that died at Camp Morton. At 35 feet (11 m) tall and located in the city's oldest public park, it had been the most prominent of the very few Confederate memorials in the Union state of Indiana. It was dismantled and removed by the city of Indianapolis in June 2020 after a yearslong debate, part of a national wave of removal of Confederate memorials during the Black Lives Matter movement.
There are more than 160 Confederate monuments and memorials to the Confederate States of America and associated figures that have been removed from public spaces in the United States, all but five of which have been since 2015. Some have been removed by state and local governments; others have been torn down by protestors.
The Tuskegee Confederate Monument, also known as the Macon County Confederate Memorial and Tuskegee Confederate Memorial, is an outdoor Confederate memorial in Tuskegee, Alabama, in the United States. It was erected in 1906 by the United Daughters of the Confederacy to commemorate the Confederate soldiers from Macon County, Alabama. The monument is in Tuskegee Square in front of the Macon County Courthouse.
Spirit of the Confederacy, also known as the Confederacy Monument, is an outdoor bronze sculpture depicting an angel holding a sword and palm branch by Louis Amateis, installed in Houston's Sam Houston Park, in the U.S. state of Texas. It was erected in 1908 by a local chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The statue was removed from the park in 2020 and relocated to the Houston Museum of African American Culture.
Robert E. Lee on Traveller is a bronze sculpture by Alexander Phimister Proctor depicting the Confederate general of the same name, his horse Traveller, and a young Confederate States Army officer, formerly installed at Dallas' Turtle Creek Park, in the U.S. state of Texas. The statue was unveiled by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1936, removed in 2017, and sold by the city for $1,435,000 to a law firm. It now stands on a Texan golf course.
The Monument to Confederate war soldiers was an outdoor Confederate memorial located outside of the Tarrant County Courthouse in Fort Worth, Texas. The memorial was funded by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1953.
The Confederate Soldier Memorial, or Confederate Monument, is located in the Maple Hill Cemetery in Huntsville, Alabama.
