Tag Archives: Loudoun Rangers

Statues for Black Union Troops and Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglas statue - to be unveiled in the Capitol

It’s high time that we had a statue placed on the Loudoun County Court house lawn honoring Frederick Douglas and the black Union troops from Loudoun County that fought for the union and for their freedom from slavery.

In Washington, DC, there is a statue to Black Union Troops.

Next week, there will be a statue of Frederick Douglas unveiled in the Capitol.

But we have no memorial in Loudoun.

You may not appreciate that there’s good and sufficient history to do so.

Kevin Dulany Grigsby, a Loudoun native, believes his black ancestral heritage from the Civil War has been overlooked, invisible in Loudoun County, particularly how Blacks fought for the Union. Continue reading

White Wash

Samuel C. Means, a Waterford Mill Owner, leader of the Loudoun Rangers

In the past week, I urged that we remove the Confederate Soldier Statue, bearing a rifle in the direction of approaching visitors to the court in Leesburg, because it is an offending symbol of disunion, lawlessness and slavery.

In 2009, a Deputy Clerk at the Court, Jennifer Grant, reportedly told the Post that she “didn’t like [the statue],” but “there were certain things people didn’t talk about.”

Johnny Chambers, on his way to Court this past Tuesday, told WUSA*9 that, “It’s hard to get justice when you got people that live in this area, that run this country, that believe in this system,” pointing at the Confederate Soldier statue.

Leesburg court personnel told me, “We all read what you wrote. We here talk among ourselves and some of us have resented that statue. … You should know you have support in this building.”

The most virulent opposition to removing the statue claims that the statue’s not about slavery, it’s just history.

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