City’s Urban Design Committee releases draft plan for removal of Confederate monument pedestals

Save for the Robert E. Lee statue (owned by the Commonwealth of Virginia) and the A.P. Hill statue at Hermitage Road and Laburnum Avenue, the city’s Confederate monuments were largely all removed during the protests and social unrest supporting the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. The granite pedestals, however, have remained.

That appears poised to change according to new documents released by the city’s Urban Design Committee Monday afternoon. The documents outline proposed plans, to go before City Council, to remove the pedestals and replace the bases with ornate landscaping or simply grass, depending on the case.

The released plans go into detail about the removal of pedestals that once featured Matthew Maury, Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson Davis, J.E.B. Stuart, Fitzhugh Lee, Joseph Bryan, Williams Carter Wickham, the Soldiers and Sailors Monument, two Confederate cannons, and A.P. Hill – under which his remains are buried. The case of A.P. Hill will, of course, require more due diligence and the reinternment of the remains elsewhere. In this case, the city says they are consulting the Department of Historic Resources and have been in contact with Hill’s descendants – and will respect their wishes.

Of note, the roundabouts where the J.E.B. Stuart, Stonewall Jackson, Soldiers and Sailors, and A.P. Hill monuments are located will be removed entirely, as the city views them as safety hazards. In most other cases, the pedestals will be replaced by shrubbery and/or grass.

Broken down into individual project estimates ranging from $5,000 to almost $48,000, the city estimates a total cost of $232,870 to complete the removal of all pedestals.

There’s no word on whether funds for the removals would be sought in the city’s FY22 budget, which is currently under development.

View highlights below or download the entire file (PDF, 66 MB) here.