Town Council and County Commissioners will vote Monday at special joint meeting
BY NICOLE LAYTON
Staff Writer
A Memorandum of Understanding cites the Town of Edenton’s Waterfront Master Plan among the reasons for moving the Confederate Monument at the end of South Broad Street to the Chowan County Courthouse property.
Edenton Town Council and the Chowan County Board of Commissioners will hold a special joint meeting to approve the MOU at 5:30 p.m. Monday, Nov 25, at Town Council Chambers, 504 S. Broad St., Edenton.
According to a copy of the MOU, which is included in the agenda packet, the United Daughters of the Confederacy and other plaintiffs in the civil action against moving the statue have agreed to the MOU and to enter into a Consent Judgment with the town.
The courthouse, at the intersection of Queen and Broad streets in Edenton, is located on several acres that includes a parking lot and green space. The monument will be moved near the intersection of Court and Queen streets, between the Chowan County Jail and the Veterans Memorial.
The Town of Edenton, at its expense, will remove the monument, surrounding brick square, four flag-poles and ground lighting and move all of it to the new location behind the courthouse.
The MOU noted that the location satisfies the statutory requirements of moving the monument to a “site of similar prominence, honor, visibility, availability and access within the town.”
After the statue is moved, the town will convey a bill of sale or similar document to the county. “By accepting the bill of sale, the County agrees to keep and maintain the Confederate Monument in compliance to all federal and state laws and regulations. “The County will also assume all obligations related to the statue’s maintenance and landscaping.
The Confederate Monument erected in the early 1900s after a fundraiser by Bell Battery Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy aimed to honor residents of Chowan County who died while serving the Confederacy during the Civil War.
The first donation toward the $2,000 cost was made by a nine year old, W. D. Pruden Jr., who gave two cents to the project.
By 1904, the chapter secured enough funds to erect the base and shaft which were dedicated on June 3, 1904. On that day, 75 veterans were in attendance for the services. The bronze statue was unveiled on May 10, 1909.
The statue was originally on the green space in front of the county courthouse on King Street and moved to its current location on South Broad Street in the 1960s.
Recent protests about the monument’s location have been going on since at least 2020, according to news reports.
