Statue of Edmund Kirby Smith facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Edmund Kirby Smith |
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The statue in the National Statuary Hall Collection
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| Artist | C. Adrian Pillars |
| Medium | Bronze sculpture |
| Subject | Edmund Kirby Smith |
| Location | Washington, D.C., United States |
Edmund Kirby Smith is a bronze sculpture commemorating the United States Army officer of the same name by C. Adrian Pillars, installed in the United States Capitol Visitor Center as part of the National Statuary Hall Collection. The statue was gifted by the state of Florida in 1922.
Smith, who died in 1893, was the last surviving full General of either the CSA or GAR. After he died his family changed their name to Kirby-Smith to help “distinguish him from the other Civil War “General Smiths” (approx. 35).”
William J. Sears quoted a resolution from the Confederate Congress regarding him at the statue’s unveiling in Congress that praised Kirby Smith’s “justice, his firmness and moderation, his integrity and conscientious regard for law, his unaffected kindness to the people, the protection of their rights and the redress of their wrongs, and has thus won the confidence of Congress.”
On March 19, 2018, Governor Rick Scott signed legislation replacing the statue with one of African-American educator and civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune. As of August 2020, the statue is still in the Capitol, pending delivery of the replacement statue of Bethune.
The fate of the statue of Smith, once removed, has been much discussed, and as of August 2020 remains unresolved. His birthplace, St. Augustine, does not want it. The statue was to have been moved to the Lake County Historical Museum, in Tavares, Florida, but there has been significant local opposition. Smith never lived in Lake County; at the time Smith was born Lake County was part of St. Johns County, whose county seat is St. Augustine. On July 7, 2020, Lake County commissioners voted 4–1 against accepting the monument.
