Overview
Silent Sam is a monument at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill erected in 1913 to honor the more than 1,000 UNC-Chapel Hill men who fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War. It was paid for by the United Daughters of the Confederacy. A plaque on the monument is inscribed with the dedication: "To the sons of the university who answered the call of their country in the War of 1861-65, and whose lives taught the lesson of their great commander that 'Duty is the sublimest word in the English language.'"
The statue is located on McCorkle Place and faces north, toward Franklin Street, to symbolically defend the South from Northern troops.
The Silent Sam monument was erected in 1913. Photo by Don McCullough (source)
History and Controversy
Silent Sam has been the subject of controversy throughout the 20th century, with some critics considering it a symbol of racial oppression. During a speech at the monument's dedication ceremony, local industrialist Julian Carr said that "100 yards from where we stand, less than 90 days perhaps after my return from Appomattox, I horse-whipped a negro wench, until her skirts hung in shreds, because upon the streets of this quiet village she had publicly insulted and maligned a Southern lady.”
The monument's Confederate heritage has sparked the formation of a UNC-Chapel Hill student group called "The Real Silent Sam Coalition" aimed at creating a dialogue about the statue's racial history. In 1968, protesters tagged the statue with graffiti.
Protesters tagged the Silent Sam monument with graffiti in 1968. Photo courtesy of the Wilson Library archives.
However, some historians contend that the statue is a historical war memorial like any other and a product of its time. In the 2013 Carolina Alumni Review, professor John Shelton Reed said of Silent Sam: "He doesn't honor a cause; rather, he honors brave men who died in a war. The analogy to the Vietnam memorial is not a bad one. Many of the people who go to it, I'm sure, believe that the cause these people died for was futile or wrong."
Sources used in this article :
United Daughters of the Confederacy
The Carolina Story: A Virtual Museum of University History "The Civil War Years"
The Carolina Story: A Virtual Museum of University History "McCorkle Place"
The Graduate School at UNC-Chapel Hill: University Landmarks
