Downtown monument focus of march
Juneteenth protest will target Texarkana Confederate memorial
TEXARKANA, Texas — A local veteran’s group is planning a peaceful protest for Juneteenth at a Confederate monument in downtown Texarkana.
Organizer Bess Gamble Williams of Texarkana Area Women Veterans Outreach Group said the demonstration is meant to evoke a conversation about taking the monument down and perhaps relocating it to a museum-type setting.
In the wake of a global movement for racial justice and equality spurred by the death of George Floyd, Confederate monuments and memorials to historical figures associated with racial oppression have been moved or toppled at several locations here and abroad.
It’s a symbol of hate and racism,” Williams said. “This Confederate soldier is not an inspiration in Texarkana for African Americans. There is nothing represented to teach my children that should be held in high esteem for them or for our community. It only represents hate to people of color.”
The Confederate Mothers Monument was dedicated in 1918 by a chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which has since disbanded, according to Wikipedia. The site states that the City of Texarkana, Texas, is responsible for its upkeep.
Texarkana, Texas, Mayor Bob Bruggeman said the city’s attorney has reviewed a 1914 deed which grants caretaking responsibility for the monument to United Daughters of the Confederacy and mentions both Texarkana, Texas, and Texarkana, Arkansas. Bruggeman said more research is needed.
Texarkana, Texas, City Council Ward 1 member Jean Matlock said she believes the monument should come down but emphasized the need to preserve it elsewhere.
“Taken down, yes. But destroyed, no,” Matlock said. “It is somebody’s history.”
Matlock said denying or forgetting history can lead to a repeat of past mistakes and injustices.
The monument includes two marble statues. The top figure depicts a confederate soldier facing south on a small island of land in front of the historic federal building which serves Texas and Arkansas. The lower figure is that of a confederate soldier’s mother.
The inscription on the base of the soldier reads: “To our loyal Confederates.” The inscription on the mother’s base reads: “O Great Confederate Mothers, we would paint your names on monuments, that men may read them as the years go by and tribute pay to you, who bore and nurtured hero sons and gave them solace on that darkest day, when they came home, with broken swords and guns.”
The monument stands at 500 State Line Avenue and is just feet away from the Texas-Arkansas border. Williams said the protest calling for its removal is scheduled for the evening of June 19, or Juneteenth.
While President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation took effect Jan. 1, 1863, it was read to enslaved African-Americans in Galveston, Texas, on June 19, 1865, by Union Major General Gordon Granger, according to PBS. The date has become a holiday celebrating emancipation in most states, including Texas and Arkansas. Efforts to make the date a national holiday have stalled in Congress.