Talbot Boys Confederate Monument to Be Removed on Courthouse Grounds on Maryland’s Eastern Shore

What is believed to be the only Confederate statue remaining on public grounds in Maryland will be removed after the Talbot County Council adopted an immediate resolution to move it from outside the courthouse to a private park in Virginia.

The bronze Talbot Boys Statue, stationed on the lawn outside the Eastern Shore courthouse, honors Talbot County residents who fought for the South during the Civil War, its chief figure a life-size young soldier clutching a Confederate flag.

Under the resolution, the statue will be moved from the Easton courthouse to the Cross Keys Battlefield, a private park in Harrisonburg, Virginia, “as soon as is practicable.” The statue will then be under the care of the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation. No taxpayer money will be spent; instead the Mid-Shore Community Foundation, a charity group, will pay for all the costs associated with the statue’s removal.

The resolution passed 3-2, with Council President Chuck F. Callahan and Councilwoman Laura E. Price voting no.

“With talking with my constituents, with the exception of a handful of constituents, they want this statue removed,” Council Vice President Pete Lesher said. “Or they want us to move on to issues that help make their lives better.”

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The ACLU filed a federal lawsuit in May demanding the statue’s removal, calling it unconstitutional, and Maryland activists long have said that the statue should no longer stand outside the courthouse. Prior council resolutions to remove the monument failed, although a smaller Frederick Douglass statue was erected in front of the courthouse in 2011, according to the suit. {snip}

Kisha Petticolas, a Talbot County public defender named in the ACLU suit, cheered the council’s decision, but called herself “cautiously optimistic.”

“I am an African-American woman and the United States of America, in 2021. I’ve seen a lot. I’ve read a lot” she said. “And I know that these things don’t die quietly.”

She won’t truly be able to celebrate, she said, until the statue is removed, and she doesn’t need to walk past it to enter the courthouse.

“I’ve been practicing [law] in Talbot County since 2007,” she said. “And it’s hurtful. It’s been hurtful all that time.”

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The monument, which was dedicated in 1916, lists the names of Confederate soldiers from Talbot County. In 2015, the Talbot County Council announced it would not remove the statue, saying the federal government considered Confederate soldiers to be U.S. veterans.

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