Statue of John Brown Gordon facts for kids
John Brown Gordon statue (2005)
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| Coordinates | 33°44′59″N 84°23′18″W / 33.74972°N 84.38833°W |
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| Location | Georgia State Capitol, Atlanta, Georgia |
| Designer | Solon Borglum Alexander Campbell Bruce (pedestal) |
| Builder | McNeel Marble Works (pedestal) |
| Type | Equestrian statue |
| Material | Bronze |
| Dedicated to | John Brown Gordon |
The John Brown Gordon statue is a monument on the grounds of the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The monument, an equestrian statue, honors John Brown Gordon, a general in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War who later become a politician in post-Reconstruction era Georgia. Designed by Solon Borglum, the statue was dedicated on May 25, 1907 to large fanfare. The statue has recently become a figure of controversy over Gordon's racist views and associations with the Confederacy, with some calling for its removal.
History
Background and creation
John Brown Gordon was a noted Confederate general during the American Civil War who served multiple terms as a Senator from Georgia and as Governor of Georgia in the post-Reconstruction era. He was also generally recognized as the leader of the Ku Klux Klan in Georgia and supported the institution of slavery. Following his death on January 9, 1904, multiple civic leaders in Atlanta began to plan a monument in his honor. On January 19, 1904 (Robert E. Lee Day), a meeting at the Georgia State Capitol of groups including the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the United Confederate Veterans was held where Clement A. Evans proposed creating a statue to honor Gordon. The John B. Gordon Monument Association was formed for this purpose, led by William Lowndes Calhoun as its president. While the association was successful in fundraising, a total of $25,000 had to be secured from the state government in order to complete the project. Solon Borglum (whose brother Gutzon Borglum was the first sculptor to work on the Stone Mountain Confederate Memorial) was commissioned to design an equestrian statue of Gordon, which would rest on a pedestal designed by Alexander Campbell Bruce and supplied by the McNeel Marble Works.
The statue, Atlanta's only equestrian statue, was dedicated on the grounds of the Georgia State Capitol on May 25, 1907. Evans served as the main orator for the unveiling. During the dedication, Governor Joseph M. Terrell and another speaker called for the erection of additional monuments on the Capitol grounds for Robert E. Lee, James Longstreet, and the "common soldier", but budgetary issues prevented these plans from coming to fruition. The statue's unveiling attracted many onlookers, and contemporary accounts mention a choir singing "Dixie" to loud cheers during the ceremony. The event took place less than a year after the Atlanta race riot.
Calls for removal
Recently, the statue has come under criticism due to Gordon's stance on race. Following the Charleston church shooting in 2015, a state senator proposed a law forbidding the official recognition of Confederate symbols, including icons such as the Gordon statue. Around the same time, American historian Kenneth W. Noe, speaking with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, spoke directly about the Gordon statue and others on the Capitol grounds as symbols of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy. In 2019, the government of Georgia passed a law barring the removal of Confederate monuments and memorials.
During the George Floyd protests in 2020, many protesters called for the removal of the statue, prompting a trending hashtag on Twitter, #TEARDOWNGORDON. On June 8, Bob Trammell, the minority leader in the Georgia House of Representatives, sent a letter to Georgia Governor Brian Kemp asking him to remove the statue of Gordon, saying, "the statue's nexus to hate in our state is overwhelming" and "its presence is both divisive and offensive." Protests regarding the statue and others prompted a barricade to be erected around the Capitol grounds. On June 11, a protester was arrested for vandalizing the statue, writing "tear down" with chalk on the monument.
Following these events, 44 descendants of Gordon sent an open letter to Governor Kemp calling for the removal of the statue from the Capitol grounds, stating that "the primary purpose of the statue was to celebrate and mythologize the white supremacists of the Confederacy".
Design
The monument consists of a bronze equestrian statue of Gordon resting on a pedestal inscribed with his last name. The horse is Marye, Gordon's warhorse during the Civil War. Gordon is dressed in his Confederate uniform, but is depicted as an elderly man.
Images for kids
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Bas-relief depicting the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House
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Informational plaque
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Bas-relief showing portrait of Gordon
See also
In Spanish: Estatua ecuestre de John Brown Gordon para niños
