The Charlottesville Monuments

Abstract

This chapter discusses the statue of Robert E. Lee that was donated by philanthropist Paul Goodloe McIntire to the city of Charlottesville in 1924. The statue depicted Lee riding his horse in a heroic, dignified pose. It also mentions another statue McIntire commissioned of Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, who was designed by Charles Keck and set on a granite base carved with the allegorical figures of Faith and Valor. The Lee and Jackson statues embodied the “lost cause” interpretation of the Civil War, a phrase first attributed to Edward A. Pollard, a graduate of the University of Virginia (UVA) and apologist for slavery. This chapter talks about Elizabeth R. Varon, an American history professor, who describes the “lost cause” narrative as the original “false equivalency.”