This week has been a contentious one around the Confederate Monument in Forest Park. Protests calling for the memorial’s removal or destruction have continued throughout the week, along with counter-protestors who want to keep the memorial to defenders of chattel slavery in the park.
On the evening of Tuesday, May 30, small clumps of people surrounded the “Confederate Angel” statue, which bore graffiti reading “End Racism,” “Nat Turner Lives” and “Black Lives Matter.” This was the second week in a row that vandals tagged the monument with anti-racist messages. The writing on the statue, however, motivated those who want to keep the statue in Forest Park to come out.
By twilight, less than a dozen protesters calling for the statue’s removal, and about twice as many in support of keeping it, remained in the park. Five policemen stood off to the side, watching – there had been two altercations earlier that day, and multiple protestors had climbed on top of the monument. By 9 p.m., though, both sides had stopped threatening each other. They were debating.
“This statue is about memorializing people who died for their country, I mean, you know, it was brothers fighting brothers,” one young man said.
“Yes, fighting for the right to enslave people,” a woman responded.
“It wasn’t just about that, it was about states’ rights,” someone countered.
“The right of states to keep people as property, yeah,” another summed up.
In another part of the park stood a man holding a sign that said, “Isis destroys statues too, Mayor Krewson!” When someone pointed out to him that ISIS also kills people, he conceded the point.
“Honestly, I’d be okay if they just moved it,” he said.
Mayor Lyda Krewson has said she is finalizing plans to move the monument.
In the midst of the protests, the GoFundMe online fundraiser started by city Treasurer Tishaura O. Jones, which is raising money to remove the monument to “a more appropriate place, instead of the public park where it currently resides,” continues to grow. It has reached almost $15,000 of Jones’ $25,000 goal, with only two weeks of fundraising. Krewson told The American she welcomes the assistance of crowdfunding to move the monument.
A rally in support of keeping the monument in the park is set to occur this Saturday, June 3. A Facebook post, outlining rules for the “Stand Up For America” rally in support of keeping the statue suggests that no one bring Confederate flags, even though the Confederacy is precisely what this monument glorifies.
“But what about Americans who care about history?” asked one man, arguing his point late into the evening of May 30.
“I care about history,” a woman with a Black Lives Matter sign replied. “And this is revisionist history.”
To contribute to the GoFundMe campaign, visit https://www.gofundme.com/forest-park-monument.
Sophie Hurwitz is a St. Louis American editorial intern from John Burroughs School.
