Columbus City Council will offer Lowndes County supervisors an option between two parcels of land at Friendship Cemetery on which to move the Confederate monument outside the courthouse, after city officials became concerned the first parcel chosen would be too difficult for the monument’s movers to access.
When supervisors first approved a proposal to relocate the memorial from its site at the courthouse to Friendship Cemetery on July 6, Key Blair told The Dispatch it wouldn’t be a simple matter.
“It’s going to be a challenge,” said Blair, owner of Columbus Marble Works, which has taken on the job of relocating monuments in several cities, most recently at Ole Miss.
Among those challenges, he said, was the proposed site. Because state law requires that monuments must be relocated to county-owned property, the city of Columbus, which owns Friendship Cemetery, offered the deed to the county for a site near the graves of Confederate soldiers.
Blair was familiar with the proposed site and the challenges it presented in moving and reassembling the 32-foot tall, 16-foot square monument.
“How are we going to get a crane in there,” he wondered. “How are we going to get an 18-wheeler in there? The little road (through the cemetery) has too many twists and turns for an 18-wheeler.”
During Tuesday’s meeting the council provided an alternative site, one toward the back of the cemetery that will be more accessible for the relocation effort. Mayor Robert Smith said supervisors can choose between that site or the original one near the Confederate graves.
“We’re going to give (the county) two options,” Smith said. “We will quit-claim the deed to both parcels and let them choose which one they want. To get to this site, going south on Fourth Street, you take the second entrance and go all the way to the back of the cemetery near the river.”
City attorney Jeff Turnage said the second site is easier to navigate.
“It’s a straight shot, all the way down,” Turnage said. “You wouldn’t have to make any turns and risk running over any markings or knocking anything over.”
The council approved the measure unanimously.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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