Civil War Journal - DeLue’s triad

Donald DeLue—noted for his sculptures Washington at Prayer at Valley Forge and the Spirit of American Youth at Omaha Beach, Normandy, France—gracefully summarizes the Confederacy’s short history and its long memory in his three Gettysburg sculptures. DeLue’s enormous modernistic sculptures blend naturalism and abstraction, reflecting the ideals and deeds of the Confederacy as larger than life. Like the great classical Greek statues, DeLue’s three enormous sculptures capture the essence of the southern poet and novelist Robert Penn Warren’s observation that the Civil War was “our Homeric period, and the figures loom up only a little less than gods, but even so, we recognize the lineaments and passions of men, and by that recognition of our common kinship share their grandeur.”

Near the spot where Hood Division opened its attack on July 2, 1863, the Soldiers and Sailors of the Confederacy Memorial honors the valor of all Confederates serving in its armed forces. All 11 seceding states—plus the states of Kentucky, Maryland and Missouri, which contributed soldiers to the Confederacy—funded the memorial. Dedicated in 1965, at the end of the Civil War centennial, it portrays a Confederate soldier on a pedestal springing into battle over a stone wall, with a laurel bush symbolizing heroism at his feet. The memorial is 19 feet high and has the names of the Confederate states engraved on its base. The soldier looks back and encourages his comrades into the battle. The memorial represents the Confederacy at its “high tide” at Gettysburg—united, vigorous and aggressive.

The second DeLue sculpture is the Mississippi State Memorial. Dedicated in 1973, the memorial, with its “colossal” figures, visually suggests heroic and tenacious resistance, death and defeat for the gallant Confederates. DeLue wrote this memorial “expresses [the] bitter fighting on both sides. But, here on the Confederate side, the tide has turned against them, ammunition gone and the flag down, only the courage of desperation remains to the courageous young soldier.” The Mississippi Memorial depicts the flag falling next to a mortally wounded Confederate soldier. The poorly shod but courageous Confederate defiantly swings his empty rifle at unseen enemies, reminiscent of the popular image of Davy Crockett at the Alamo. The Confederate flag falls to the ground, symbolizing defeat.

The monument shows the Confederate with partially ruined shoes, reflecting the story that the Southerners were looking for shoes when they came to Gettysburg on July 1. But it also reflects the long historical tradition among the defeated Confederates that they were worn down by superior Union equipment, material and manpower.

Dedicated in 1971, the Louisiana State Memorial represents acceptance of defeat for the Confederacy, reconciliation with the North, confidence in an economically prosperous South, and moral and spiritual regeneration. It consists of a gigantic Spirit Figure blowing a horn over a fallen soldier covered by a Confederate flag. The Spirit Figure holds a flame, symbolizing the courage and integrity of the Confederate soldiers. Supporting the Spirit Figure are two laurel branches, the traditional symbol of heroes. The two laurel branches also symbolize North and South. A dove representing peace and reconciliation connects them. The laurel tree symbolizes the reunited American nation.

DeLue says the Spirit Figure “represents … peace and memory, also a resurgent Confederacy, strong and confident and prosperous … blowing the long shrill clarion call over the graves of the Confederate dead. A comrade has laid the Confederate battle flag lovingly over the prostrate form that has clutched the flag to his heart. In a way, it recalls to mind the tombs of the Knight Crusaders.” Here DeLue skillfully merges the spirit of a “resurgent, strong and confident and prosperous” South with the Confederacy’s demise symbolized by the fallen soldier and the folded flag.

The Spirit Figure symbolizes not only renewed prosperity, but also moral and spiritual regeneration. For decades after the war, Southern ministers assured their parishioners that a stronger, more virtuous South would emerge from the ashes of defeat.

The Knight Crusader theme that DeLue mentioned is common in Southern literature. Some antebellum writers explicitly claimed the white plantation owning class as direct descendants from the Norman knights that birthed the Christian crusading ideals in the 1100s. Before the war, the educated white Southerners read Sir Walter Scott’s popular novels such as Ivanhoe that extolled chivalry and the doomed cause of Scottish independence. In keeping with the South’s romance with the Scottish independence cause, a number of historians trace the Confederate battle flag’s origin to the Scottish Cross of St. Andrew.

The chivalric image had such widespread appeal that, by the 1890s, former Confederates of all ranks and social classes considered themselves as modern versions of medieval chivalry. In 1899, at the United Confederate Veteran reunion, a Charleston reporter said the Confederate veterans were “like pilgrims going to the tomb of a prophet or a Christian knight to the walls of Jerusalem.”

The Louisiana Memorial shows a folded Confederate flag on the fallen soldier, symbolizing not only the death of DeLue’s “Knight Crusaders,” but also the death of the Confederate national dream. In this motif, the Louisiana State Memorial suggests the Confederate Burial Ritual developed by the United Confederate Veterans. The ritual includes phrases such as “he fought a good fight and has left a record of which we, his surviving comrades, are proud and which is a heritage of glory to his family and their descendants.” During funeral ceremonies, the Confederate flag appeared underneath the deceased’s head, lay on his chest or formed a floral “pillow of immortelles.”

The Soldiers and Sailors of the Confederacy Memorial and the Mississippi and Louisiana state memorials form a triad, illustrating the various phases of the Confederacy. The Soldiers and Sailors Memorial symbolizes a united vigorous Confederacy on the attack; the Mississippi Memorial suggests tenacious resistance, death and defeat; and the Louisiana Memorial symbolizes grief, remembrance, peace, reconciliation and renewal.

These monuments are easily accessible on West and South Confederate avenues. For a more in-depth study of the DeLue sculptures, read Dreaming the Lost Cause: The Mind of the South and the Confederate Memorials at Gettysburg, an article I wrote for Gettysburg Magazine in July 2006 (#34, pp. 98-127).

Jim Martin serves as a licensed battlefield guide at Gettysburg. These guides are independent contractors licensed and supervised by the National Park Service as historical interpreters of the Battle of Gettysburg. To book a battlefield tour, call the Gettysburg Foundation at 877-874-2478 or 717-334-2436.

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