Confederate statues still stand in rural Virginia

BRISTOL, VA. — The chorus of opposition to Confederate monuments has yet to strike a chord in southwestern Virginia, where the service of the “brave men and women” who fought and died for the Confederacy is enshrined in the statue of a soldier in the center of the city.

Dedicated to the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1920, the statue was restored a few years ago and now sits on the bank of a small creek, between Lee Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. The monument is also within eyeshot of the Bristol Veterans Memorial, which includes four larger-than-life bronze statues honoring members of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines, as well as a Cobra attack helicopter with shark-teeth nose art.

Joyce Kistner, a retired elementary school teacher who led the restoration effort while serving as chairwoman of the Ann Carter Lee chapter of the UDC, said local residents have celebrated their preservation push, which was funded by the sale of a “Dixie Delights Cookbook.”

“We have had the support of the community from the beginning,” Mrs. Kistner told The Washington Times, speaking on behalf of herself and not the UDC. “Everybody has appreciated it. We have never had any questions about it like, ‘Why did you want to save him?’”

“When I was a teacher, I never thought anyone would want to tear down a statue, a soldier or anything,” she said. “It’s mind-boggling.”

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