-The death of George Floyd sparked protests
all across America and the world.
Here in Richmond, it ultimately led to graffitiing
and removing Confederate monuments throughout the city.
But the events that took place here
predate George Floyd by centuries.
-Richmond's was the second most profitable and prolific
of the intrastate slave-trading ports.
People had no idea of the impact of that history.
And it really came to a fore
when a previous administration wanted to build a baseball
stadium where the enslaved are buried.
Those burial grounds had already been desecrated multiple times -
parking lots placed over the bodies, interstate --
portions of the interstate pylons
built literally on their graves.
-It showed people the foundations of the places
where not only the Black community of Richmond
basically was born and evolved
but also the 19th-century domestic slave trade.
The markers here are huge, and you don't even see them.
-We have completely removed Black people from the narrative
when they were central to it.
-There have been Black people in this geography
since at least 1695.
When you go through those cemeteries,
as they are trying to recover --
recover them from having been abandoned for so long,
you see an incredibly rich,
dense history of Black people in Richmond
that is otherwise completely invisible.
And I think it's that invisibility
that people are really, really trying to fight.
-Statues of Black Richmonders have been erected
in the past 30 years to reflect a more inclusive city.
But the prominence of five Confederate statues
that line Monument Avenue, which the city is known for,
reflect an exclusion of Black people
from visual representations of the city's history
and a lack of accountability for centuries of mistreatment.
-Generations of extraordinary people
were deprived of the ideals of this nation
as set forth in the Declaration of Independence
and the Constitution, and that is life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness.
And as they're learning that, they're saying, "Okay.
Well, then it's not --
This is not appropriate to be in front of our courthouse,
because these were symbols of oppression --
maybe, you know, symbols of honor and glory for you,
but underneath of it
is something we can't ignore anymore."
-We recognize that we were not actually reconciled
to the narrative that had been imposed by the original statues.
-But not everyone shares that sentiment.
-This one I took particularly hard.
It's the soldiers and soldiers.
It's the common man who served.
By the end of the war, a third of the military-age
male population was dead.
To me, this monument was to the troops.
And so to blame the draftee,
to blame the guy who thought it was his patriotic duty
or to blame the guy whose wife said,
"You got to go do it," to me, is indiscriminate.
-Waite Rawls is the former president of the Museum
of the Confederacy.
For him, the monuments represent his there great-grandfathers
who fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War.
-It's a shame that I didn't have a great-grandfather
from Pennsylvania, 'cause I would have a Union guy.
-For Waite, seeing some of these statues come down is emotional.
-What role do you think these memorials and the people
memorialized play in the landscape of accountability
for racial injustice here in America?
-What role do they play for bravery and duty
and patriotic responsibility to the call of your country?
What role?
What role did that statue or the men that it commemorates
who simply answered the call of duty
have a role in imposing racial injustice?
No. No role whatsoever.
Zero.
-Do you feel like there is space for,
there is room for, accountability for no one caring
about slavery to the point where the wives of dead men
could memorialize their husbands and their heroes
and rewrite history because they cared so little about slaves?
-I think they were thinking principally about, "He's dead."
I think that a good part of the role they should play
is an inspiration to future generations
to be patriotic and courageous and do your duty.
-In every single article of secession,
they make very clear why they are seceding.
The principal reason in every single one of these resolutions
is to preserve slavery,
to preserve their economic power.
More often than not,
the heritage is driven from memory,
not necessarily driven from the vast majority
of the forensic record.
The challenge is helping people build new memories
so they can create a more accurate heritage.
-You know, we are in the middle of the throes
of the first real collective opportunity to express the pain.
But we are so very much in the middle of it.
There is nothing reconciled yet, and it's going to be
really interesting to see what's going to create
the beginnings of that reconciliation.
-Of the 13 Confederate statues erected in Richmond,
only two remain.
One of them is or Robert E.
Lee.
What role does the memorialization
of people like Robert E.
Lee play in this current moment?
-The monuments,
or as represented by the pedestals now,
actually tell the story of this period.
If you go down Monument Avenue now,
you are walking through the history
that is being made in this moment.
-What is your interpretation of the choice to memorialize
Black people at the base of the Robert E.
Lee monument?
-That was what really transformed it into a place
where we get to shed tears over the people
that we have lost to that very effort.
We have to acknowledge the criminality of this past
but also everything that people tried to do to make it right.
Half of us who are here and healthy wouldn't be here
if there hadn't been some successes along the way.
You know, we persevere.
We make it.
How do we make monuments that reflect that?
And I think that -- that is the job before us.