Having been to Lee Chapel many times in my three years at W&L, it wasn't until today that I realized how little I notice each time I enter the chapel. Robert E. Lee's statue in the center demands your attention as soon as you walk in the door, but I had never noticed the various plaques on the wall commemorating different people and events.
There were two stories that really stuck with me and made me think. The first was that of Lee riding Traveller through the country and coming upon a woman who was upset that a certain tree was dying because it had some Confederate significance to it from the Civil War. Lee's response to this woman was to cut it down and to move forward. The reason I found this to be interesting was because Lee is memorialized in his Confederate uniform, asleep on the battlefield. If he truly wanted to put that part of his life behind him, it makes you wonder why he is depicted in that point in his life.
The other story that struck me was that the entirety of Lee Chapel used to be considered the "shrine of the South," and that in recent history there has been a movement to define Lee Chapel as a place created by Lee but intended for the student body of Washington and Lee. This was intriguing to me due to our discussion of how the present affects memorialization of the past. Depending on the time period, a single event, person, or thing can be remembered differently. It was interesting to hear how this narrative has changed over time.
In the museum, I learned a lot about Lee's work as president of the university that I had not previously known before. I think it is interesting that his life as a general is displayed above ground in the main area of the chapel, while his life as W&L's president is kept underground and is much less well known.
No comments:
Post a Comment