A Conflict of the Past That Should Teach Us Lessons for the Future: Photographs of The Battle of Liberty Place Monument in New Orleans by Newt Rayburn

In the early morning hours of Monday, April 24, 2017, under the cover of darkness, a clandestine SWAT squad mobilized by the City of New Orleans quickly and hastily removed a 126-year-old monument from the streets in the French Quarter.

The stone pillar brought attention to an armed insurrection that occurred in New Orleans on September 14, 1874, nearly ten years after the Civil War.

The inscriptions on the monument changed over the years, and some were quite controversial. However, the monument endured, first on Canal Street and later moved to Iberville, with contextualization and new engravings that refined the history of the incident.

As is the purpose of any monument, The Battle of Liberty Place obelisk called attention to a troubling event, a moment in which people died. Monuments promote the study of history to future generations so that lessons can be learned from the past.

I myself would not know anything about this event in history, nor would I have ever even thought to research it, if the monument had not been there in the first place.

Wikipedia has a primer on the uprising and the history of the monument if you’re interested: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Liberty_Place

The Battle of Liberty Place monument is gone now, swept off the streets under the cover of darkness by an armed squad in the middle of the night.

_____

These photographs are by Oxford, Mississippi photographer Newt Rayburn and most were shot on January 2, 2016 and a couple were taken on October 20, 2016. Copyright © 2016 Newt Rayburn – newtrayburn@gmail.com