With regard to your editorial (”The era of ‘Talbot Boys’ statues is over,” August 14), let me contrast how two towns on the Eastern Shore are dealing with white supremacy and their racial histories. First, the city of Salisbury. Recently the Wicomico County Council agreed to remove a plaque honoring a Confederate General who oversaw Confederate Prison Camps during the Civil War (”A county on Maryland’s Eastern Shore quietly takes down a Confederate memorial, after years of rejecting the idea,” July 26). In addition they established the Salisbury Lynching Memorial Task Force, which collected soil samples from lynching locations in Wicomico and Somerset Counties and put the samples on display at the Chipman Cultural Center in Salisbury. Mayor Jack Day also accepted the recommendation of the City’s Human Rights Advisory Committee to create a monument in remembrance of the three Salisbury citizens who lost their lives at the hands of lynch mobs in Wicomico County.
Now we have the story of Easton, Maryland, where a statue of the Talbot Boys has stood since 1916. This statue honored the town’s Confederate Soldiers and shows a soldier holding the Confederate Flag. It stands at the front of the Talbot County Courthouse. Resolutions have been introduced by the County Council President to take it down, but on Aug. 11 the Talbot County Council voted 3-2 not to remove it. It is remarkable that in this day and age, with the death of George Floyd and the issue of White Supremacy and racism in this country, that people are not more sensitive to how these monuments appear to some.
These statues and monuments were erected to send a negative message to a certain segment of their community and to honor the Confederacy, which rebelled against the United States to uphold slavery. They all should be removed!
Brad Feig, Baltimore
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