Hollywood Cemetery is a beautiful, sprawling old cemetery overlooking the James River just west of downtown Richmond. Established in 1849, Hollywood Cemetery is the final resting place of two U.S. Presidents, James Monroe and John Tyler, and Jefferson Davis, the only President of the Confederacy. Also buried at Hollywood are 28 Confederate Generals including JEB Stuart and George Pickett as well as a considerable number of Confederate soldiers, both known and unknown. The Monument of Confederate War Dead is found there as well in the form of a 90 foot pyramid dedicated in 1869.
We enjoyed our visit to Hollywood Cemetery and spent several hours there. It has quite a history and some beautiful examples of funerary art. The President’s Circle includes the two presidents mentioned above and local celebrity burials as well. The south side of the cemetery offers beautiful views of the James River and Downtown Richmond. We used the Girl Scout Self-Guided Tour Pamphlet (found HERE) to help us find our way around. It can be tricky, but it’s not big enough to get really lost. I hope you enjoy these photos from Hollywood Cemetery.
I took these photos last week in the midst of the Confederate statue removal process in the old Confederate Capital of Richmond. It was a unique time to visit because some of the statues had already been removed, one of JEB Stuart was in the process of being removed and the two central ones to Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis still stood, although both have been slated for removal.
In taking these photos I wanted to capture the spirit of the protests which ultimately have led to the conversation over the removal of these statues, so I have included some close-up shots of the graffiti. Some of the graffiti is targeted towards police brutality while some supports the Black Lives Matter movement.
I am of the opinion that these statues cannot continue to stand in these central places in our nation’s cities. While there are aspects of all of these men which I admire and respect, the cause for which they fought was ultimately the continuation of slavery in perpetuity. There are places for these statues as I believe all art tells a story, but the story currently being told isn’t a complete one and needs to be adjusted with our current understanding of history. These statues coming down isn’t erasing history, it is history.
It’s time. It’s actually long past time for these monuments to come down across the South. When I say these monuments, though, I’m speaking very specifically. I don’t personally believe that all traces of the Confederacy should come down although I don’t believe that doing so would in any way erase history. History is history and no monuments or statues can change it. Many of these monuments, though, were put up not in tribute to fallen soldiers but specifically to support a platform of white supremacy, and that is a history that should be told too. In fact, that is an even more crucial topic for people to learn about if we want to move forward as a nation. But either way, statues to Confederate generals put up in prominent parts of town as hero’s monuments have no place in 2020 America. It’s time for them to come down.
The Civil War was a horrific chapter in our nation’s history which caused the deaths of over 600,000 people. Many of those soldiers’ bodies never came home and are either buried where they fell or among the thousands upon thousands of “unknown” graves around the country. I believe that no matter what their beliefs were, every mother has a right to bury her child and in this case, that wasn’t often possible. Many of the Civil War memorials around the South are depictions of a simple foot-soldier with the names of those soldiers from that town who went to fight in the war. We must also understand that many young men were drafted into the war and did not join of their own free will. Many joined to defend their towns and villages which were most certainly in harm’s way. Many were teenagers who couldn’t have possibly known or understood the larger implications of the war. Most didn’t own slaves. Before I go any further I want to make two things abundantly clear. First, I hate slavery with every bone in my body. I don’t think that owning another person has ever been right in the entire history of the world. Second, I am completely aware that slavery was the primary cause of the Civil War insomuch as had there been no slavery, there would have probably been no war. However the idea that the war began as a noble cause on the part of the abolitionist Northerners to end slavery is simply not true. I wish it was because then I could condemn all Confederates who took up arms and the men who led them. But I know too much about the war to believe that and feel too strongly that too many young men simply got caught up in the war and died too young. So I say let those local memorials stand, but every one of them should be removed from town centers and in front of county courthouses and placed respectfully and with dignity in the local cemeteries. It’s time to bury the dead.
As for these big statues which are coming down now, I know this may be unpopular, but I do respect them as both art and history and I think there is a place for them on the Civil War battlefields of the country. I’d like to see them placed in the hands of the National Park Service which will properly interpret them as to how, why and by whom they were originally erected, who they represent and why they were removed to the battlefield. As for those memorials which were specifically commissioned as a response to Brown vs. The Board of Education or similar hallmarks of progress in Civil Rights, I’d like to see a select few collected to interpret that time in our history and the rest smashed to pieces and used as the foundations to new memorials to the men and women who led that movement.
"The Prettiest Town in Dixie" is a pretty big claim to make. Having traveled fairly extensively around the south in my life, I've seen some really beautiful towns. But this claim is certainly an enticing one and a bold one, so I had to go and see for myself. The town that made this claim? Tiny Cheraw, South Carolina. I got there first thing in the morning with the intention of staying maybe an hour or two, and ended up being there the better part of the day. It really is a beautiful town, steeped in history and with one of the best tourism infrastructures I've come across in a town this size anywhere. I came knowing almost nothing about Cheraw, and left charmed by it and knowing it's a place I will return to.
