Cape agrees to give CSA monument to original donor

By a unanimous 7-0 vote Tuesday, Cape Girardeau City Council members voted to give the recently relocated Confederate States of America monument back to its donor.

In a Sept. 1 letter addressed to deputy city manager Molly Mehner, the Missouri Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) asked the city to return the marker donated to the city in 1931.

On the day of its dedication, four granddaughters of Confederate Army veterans were in attendance, including a descendant of Col. William Jeffers, commander of a rebel regiment in Southeast Missouri.

The memorial, fashioned from Georgia silver gray marble, stood on Morgan Oak Street near the old traffic bridge for 64 years.

The monument was moved to what is now known as Ivers Square in 1995. Following protests spawned by the May 25 death of George Floyd while in Minneapolis police custody, Cape Girardeau’s council voted to accept a recommendation from its historic preservation committee to remove the memorial — as an intermediate step — to an undisclosed location on city property.

The 12-1/2 ton monument was boxed up July 7 and moved from Ivers Square in late August.

The UDC letter asks the City of Cape Girardeau to cooperate with the Missouri Civil War Museum in relocating the marker to a venue outside Cape Girardeau County.

“We will cooperate with the city to remove the memorial back into our custody and care, thus eliminating the city’s current burden regarding it,” wrote UDC Missouri Division president LaDonna Scott.

“It was a no-brainer (to give it back),” said Bob Fox, Cape Girardeau mayor since 2018, who added the city gave considerable thought to an idea proposed by the Kellerman Foundation to situate the 14-1/2 foot marker in Old Lorimier Cemetery at 500 N. Fountain St.

“(Old Lorimier Cemetery) had some issues — the possibility of needing to move actual graves was one,” said Fox, noting the city’s oldest graveyard also presented a potential security problem.

The UDC letter asked the city to release the marker to its custody within the next 30 days.

Fox indicated the city is happy to oblige.

“We expect (the marker) to be moved by the end of this month,” Fox said.

The UDC said it will bear all the cost of transporting the monument out of Cape Girardeau once the city’s public works department loads it onto a designated UDC transport vehicle.

Mark Trout, executive director of the Missouri Civil War Museum in the Jefferson Barracks area of St. Louis County, will be retrieving the memorial on UDC’s behalf.

“The idea is to get (the CSA memorial) out of harm’s way for its preservation and protection,” said Trout, who added it will be the third monument he has transported this year within Missouri.

The most recent relocation, Trout said, was a 200-ton historic marker from St. Louis’ Forest Park.

Fox said it is his understanding Cape Girardeau’s longstanding CSA monument will find a permanent spot on a Civil War battlefield somewhere.

“Yes, a battlefield is probably No. 1 on the list of possible sites,” Trout agreed.

Trout will not reveal where the museum will store Cape Girardeau’s monument but did say there is no pressure to meet a timeline.

“There’s no hurry to find the right spot and it could take years to find it,” Trout said.

“I’m glad (the monument) will eventually find a home where it will be displayed and tell a story to people interested in its history,” Fox said.