COLUMBUS – A 93-year-old mistake was finally corrected Friday outside the Lowndes County Courthouse.
A second marble monument added under the county’s original World War I marker was unveiled Friday, commemorating 14 soldiers, all but two Black, who fought and died in The Great War.
“Their absence was not just an oversight on the monument; it represented a painful gap in how sacrifice and service were remembered,” District 4 Supervisor Jeff Smith said during the ceremony. “… These men served a nation that was not always willing to fully recognize them. … They fought for freedom abroad, while often denied equality at home. Their courage deserves remembrance, (and) their families deserve acknowledgement. This monument now tells a fuller story of Lowndes County.”
The WWI monument, dedicated by the Daughters of the American Revolution, was first installed in the Magnolia Bowl in 1933 before it was moved to the courthouse lawn in 2015. It features the names of Lowndes County soldiers who lost their lives in the war.
Until Friday, it was 14 names short, which was part of the inspiration behind an impassioned performance by Grayson Garrick, a junior at Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science from New Hope, at the ceremony.
Performing as Pvt. Charles A. Williams, a Black infantryman born in Lowndes County, who served during the Civil War, Garrick stood parallel with the previous incomplete memorial, took out a sheet of paper and for three minutes read every soldier’s name, rank, unit and date of death to the crowd of more than 40 attendees.
Garrick said he had been practicing for two weeks to ensure his performance gave a proper tribute to the men and the MSMS students before him who found their names.
“I’m just a culmination of all that research, which is honestly great,” Garrick said. “I’m not going to sit here and take credit for the research, but I will say that it feels so good to be a part of this journey and a part of something great in our community.”
A long time coming
About seven years ago, a group of MSMS students and history teacher Chuck Yarborough discovered the names of nine Black soldiers who were originally not included on the monument. Yarborough said the names were listed in a DAR scrapbook from 1921, but were ultimately left off.
“The original memorial panels were being placed in the Magnolia Bowl, which is a white space, so it’s not surprising that the Black soldiers were left off,” Yarborough said. “But it’s also true that that’s evidence of a longstanding undervaluation of African American contributions in service to the nation, whether it’s during the Civil War era, the Revolutionary War era, or more recently in the 20th and 21st (centuries).”
Additional research led to the discovery of five additional names of Lowndes County soldiers, three of whom were Black and two of whom were white.
After a 2023 Community Read performance by then MSMS senior Dylan Wiley called attention to the error, former Mayor Keith Gaskin felt compelled to rectify the mistake and give those soldiers the respect they deserved.
“I could see the hurt and frustration in (Wiley’s) eyes as he was delivering it, and I was really shocked by it,” Gaskin said. “… I was just stunned that all those names had been omitted. … I spoke with him afterwards, … and he asked me to try to help make it right, and I promised him I would.”
In 2024, a committee was formed to develop a plan to honor the soldiers. But the project dragged on as members worked to design and create the monument, though the city occasionally displayed a temporary sign in front of City Hall recognizing the forgotten soldiers.
“I would see people standing out there … from all walks of life stopping and looking at it and educating themselves about an important time in our history,” Gaskin said. “… (We wanted) to make sure that everybody was aware of this.”
Board of Supervisors President Trip Hairston admitted the marble monument took “way too long” and should have been addressed sooner. In preparation for Memorial Day, the board approved the marker at its March 2 meeting, finally bringing the project to fruition.
“Anybody who gives their life in service to our country (deserves) their names listed,” Hairston said. “If you list one of those names, you should list all of them, and so therefore that really needed to be remedied. So it’s one of those things … I think we came to a good solution in the long run, without removing the current existing monument.”
Gaskin, Smith and Hairston agreed they were proud to finally see the additional monument completed.
“I’m just grateful to everyone who came together and made this moment happen,” Gaskin said. “It was truly a team effort, and this feels like a more complete Memorial Day that we’ll have this year in the city and Lowndes County.”
More to be done
After Friday’s ceremony, Garrick said he would like to see additional efforts made by governmental bodies to address the importance of Black history in Columbus and Lowndes County.
Agreeing with Garrick, Smith believes the county and city are headed in the right direction, especially with the additions of historic markers commemorating figures like Robert Gleed, Henry Edwin Baker Jr. and Henry Armstrong within the last year.
“It is momentum that’s being continued from other projects that we’ve taken on, and hopefully projects that we will take on in the future,” Smith said. “As we continue to create areas for the public to gather. We also create places where the public can remember and that’s important.
“… Especially for Black history, because often our history sometimes gets lost,” he added.
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