Ask Axios: Philly's existing Confederate monuments
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The Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument has stood at the Philadelphia National Cemetery for more than a century. Photo: Mike D'Onofrio/Axios
In another edition of Ask Axios, we're answering the question: Does Philly have any Confederate monuments?
The backstory: Many monuments and statues honoring Confederates were removed or renamed across the U.S. after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, which sparked a reexamination of public symbols regarding enduring legacies of racial injustice.
- Philadelphia removed the statue of former Mayor Frank Rizzo in 2020 but failed in its attempts to remove a monument to Christopher Columbus in South Philly.
State of play: A pair of Confederate monuments have resided in the Philadelphia National Cemetery in West Oak Lane for more than a century, per the National Park Service’s website.
The Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument was erected in 1911 by the U.S. government and stands more than 9 feet tall.
- The granite monument identifies 184 Confederates whose remains were reinterred at the cemetery from other areas after the Civil War, per the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.
- Among hundreds of upright white headstones dotting the cemetery, the Confederate dead are buried unmarked in a patch of grass next to the monument marked by small stone engraved with the letter "C."
In the field near the upright monument rests a tablet memorial dedicated to the Confederate dead.
- A chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) in Philadelphia placed the tablet there around 1900 after abandoning efforts to install a grand obelisk.
- The tablet honors 224 Confederate soldiers who died in the Philadelphia area.
The intrigue: It's unclear how the UDC arrived at that number of unknown dead, per the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Zoom out: Pennsylvania still has a handful of existing markers or monuments recognizing Confederate troops, while some were removed or relocated, per the Southern Poverty Law Center's online database.
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