• In the wake of nationwide protests against racial injustice, protesters are calling for the removal of Confederate statues across the country. 
• There are 775 Confederate monuments and statues in public places in the US, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. 
• Business Insider identified some of the most common Confederate figures in history commemorated on public soil.
• Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

As nationwide protests against racial injustice sweep the country, local governments and protesters are removing monuments and statues that celebrate and commemorate slave-owners and Confederate figures.

The city of Jacksonville, Florida, recently removed a statue of a Confederate soldier from the city’s Hemming Park ahead of a planned protest near the monument, according to the Florida Times-Union. Louisville, Kentucky, took down the John Breckenridge Castleman monument, a statue of a Confederate soldier in the heart of downtown, CNN reported. 

In Alexandria, Virginia, a bronze statue of a Confederate soldier named “Appomattox” was removed last week, according to the local CBS affiliate. In Richmond, Virginia, protesters defaced the statue of of Confederate Gen. Williams Carter Wickham in the city’s Monroe Park, and then used ropes to pull it down, Vox reported. 

The last time there was this level of removal of Confederate monuments was in 2017, in the wake of violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, when three people died after white nationalists, neo-Nazis, and members of the alt-right descended on the college town for a protest.

The Southern Poverty Law Center reported in February 2019 that there are some 775 Confederate symbols displayed in public spaces throughout the country. The US is dotted with parks, military forts, fountains, and roads bearing the names of men who chose to secede from the Union and form the Confederate States of America. The list does not include Confederate symbols featured in graveyards, battlefields, or on private property.

Business Insider took note of Confederate figures who are commemorated with more than one statue, monument, memorial, bust on public land, or name of a public square, according to the SPLC. Some of the statues on the SPLC’s list may have already been removed by this time.

Here are the backgrounds of the men whose statues are now at the heart of a nationwide controversy.

Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/confederate-monuments-spark-controversy-2017-8