Roy Exum: New Orleans Slaps History

  • Tuesday, April 25, 2017
  • Roy Exum
Roy Exum
Roy Exum

It was balmy and relatively quiet on Sunday afternoon in New Orleans. The flowers of spring were in full flush on Canal Street and, as darkness began to cloak the city, no one was aware that a cadre of police snipers was quietly setting up in a hotel parking garage across from the Liberty Place monument. Shortly after 1 a.m. yesterday morning, a number of large trucks rumbled past the police barricades on Canal and it was an odd sight indeed, even in the land of legendary Vieux Carré (The French Quarter.)

The men in the trucks wore military helmets, flak jackets, and had their faces swathed as though they were some enemy terrorists.

The signs on the trucks were hidden by tape and cardboard. Police cruisers allowed none unauthorized within three blocks and the media was hardly notified. And then the cranes lowered, the thick cables stealthily removedg the first of four Civil War monuments that have stood for almost 150 years.

As the states of Mississippi and Alabama celebrated Confederate Memorial Day on Monday, and Georgia recognized a thinly-guised “State Holiday,” a predominately black New Orleans City Council in a predominately black New Orleans took a big chunk out of the South’s history. In coming days three other statues of General Robert E. Lee, G.T. Beauregard, and Confederate President Jefferson Davis will also be removed from public view.

The reason is that the symbols of the Civil War – which incidentally really happened – are understandably offensive to many blacks and, after the tragic murders of black worshippers in Charleston, S.C., in 2015, far more than the Stars-and-Bars battle flags have been scorned by millions across the entire nation.

Yet to many others in the historically-rich Deep South, allowing racial sentiment to literally tear pages from the history books – the very pages we need to read the most, mind you -- is akin to what New Orleans Mayor Martin Behrman quipped when the famous brothels in Storyville were shuttered exactly 100 years ago in 1917. Behrman chortled, “You can make (prostitution) illegal, but you can’t make it unpopular!”

I personally view the desecration of any monuments, historical markers, or any other learning tool as sacrilege. The greatest rule we must accept was “That was then and this is now … what have we learned and how has it made us better?” Our Civil War heroes were admittedly stunning Americans; what I wouldn’t give to have dinner with Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee. Study either and you’ll understand the true fiber of our nation. And to tear asunder a statue of Lee makes us better?

The most moving day of my life was spent at Auschwitz, the concentration camp where over 10,000 human “monsters” believed killing 1.1 million other human beings was the right thing to do. We must learn from that and never – ever – forget that was one of every six Jews at the time. It is a life’s lesson beyond compare. We must keep Auschwitz and its depravity alive so every generation can learn as I did.

I once spent an entire day at Alcatraz. Should we tear it down because it is a monument to crime or embrace it because it is a monument to justice? The history lesson is indescribable. Every year millions come to Chattanooga to study the Civil War … should we have unmarked trucks with police snipers tear down all the monuments on Lookout Mountain, Missionary Ridge and Chickamauga? Or should we make a concerted effort to take all of our black and white teenagers there to let them properly understand and, yes, confront anew what our country was going through 150 years ago?

Then there was the day I was in France and I went to the Chateau de Versailles. It’s about 10 miles outside of Paris and in 1919 the treaty was signed there to end World War I. Actually all the talking to hammer out the deal had taken place in Paris at the Quai d'Orsay beforehand. I know this because my grandfather on my Dad’s side was part of all of that.

I never knew grandfather Exum – as a plantation owner in Mississippi he lived wonderfully large and before I was born they found him frozen to death with his best friend. The two had partied hard at a ritzy deer camp in the delta. So they staggered to the deer stand early, had gotten further likkered up, and froze to death together.

My sentiment? I would have given a leg to have known such a great and storied character but fate intervened. So? What a way to go! I’ve got a picture of him in a uniform at the treaty signing with all of his medals. Going to Versailles was a pretty big moment for me. I always knew it was a big moment for my grandfather too.

A few years back there was a big roar to remove the bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest from the state capital. Said he owned slaves. Then we found out he was primarily the one who kept Sherman from burning Nashville. Somebody checked the state historical markers – former President Andrew Jackson has three, Davy Crockett two, and General Forrest 28. Further study found Forrest was wildly popular with the blacks back them. Hello?

None of us should be proud of all the good that has happened in history but none should mourn the bad until we are ready to admit good people were doing the best they knew at the time it happened.

When Volkswagen built the billion-dollar assembly plant, no one could possibly be so naïve to invite the Germans to our Coolidge Park, the tribute to Charles Coolidge who earned the Medal of Honor in the fight for America’s freedom. At the time of his heroics, Mr. Coolidge was fighting the Germans. And we won.

That was then. This is now. Why is it the Volkswagen people recognize that when we have those among us who said a Medal of Honor monument will detract from our greenspace? Send those chumps to New Orleans.

royexum@aol.com

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