From Monuments to Mochas: West Virginia's Obsession with Stonewall Jackson
Document Type
Panel Presentation
Keywords
Civil War, memory, West Virginia
Biography
Steven Straley is a graduate student pursuing an M.A. in History. He is a graduate assistant in the History Department, a docent at Heritage Farm Museum & Village, a writer for The Clio app, and a volunteer for the Ramsdell House Museum, the Ceredo Museum, and the Kenova Historical Commission. Straley is also a recipient of the 2019 West Virginia History Hero Award, and the 2018 Gilder Lehrman History Scholar Award. He is currently working on his thesis, which will focus on memory and commemorations of Stonewall Jackson in West Virginia. Straley lives in Kenova.
Major
History
Advisor for this project
Dr. Greta Rensenbrink
Abstract
West Virginia has a stronger obsession with Stonewall Jackson that any of the other Union states from the Civil War. The Clarksburg native opposed the partition of Virginia and firmly wished to occupy his home region in the name of the Confederacy. Yet today the West Virginia landscape is dotted with tributes to the rebel general: statues, plaques, public buildings, a 4-H camp, a lakeside resort, and even a trendy coffee shop. This study seeks to answer the question of why the Mountain State celebrates a man opposed to its very existence.
The widespread idolization of Stonewall Jackson is symptomatic of the influence of former Confederate supporters in West Virginia in the decades following the Civil War. By the late 1800s these supporters formed local branches of national Confederate heritage organizations and worked to promote the Lost Cause narrative in the state. Stonewall Jackson was adopted as the figurehead of West Virginia’s Lost Cause movement. His supporters promoted Jackson as an example of honor, integrity, and piousness. In the process Stonewall Jackson transitioned from being a Confederate figure into a popular West Virginia figure over the course of the twentieth century.
This presentation draws upon a variety of primary and secondary sources on both a local and national level. It utilizes materials from Special Collections, regional newspaper accounts, and early and contemporary studies of Jackson. The evidence gathered from this research reveals the profound impact of Confederate heritage groups on Civil War memory in West Virginia.
From Monuments to Mochas: West Virginia's Obsession with Stonewall Jackson
West Virginia has a stronger obsession with Stonewall Jackson that any of the other Union states from the Civil War. The Clarksburg native opposed the partition of Virginia and firmly wished to occupy his home region in the name of the Confederacy. Yet today the West Virginia landscape is dotted with tributes to the rebel general: statues, plaques, public buildings, a 4-H camp, a lakeside resort, and even a trendy coffee shop. This study seeks to answer the question of why the Mountain State celebrates a man opposed to its very existence.
The widespread idolization of Stonewall Jackson is symptomatic of the influence of former Confederate supporters in West Virginia in the decades following the Civil War. By the late 1800s these supporters formed local branches of national Confederate heritage organizations and worked to promote the Lost Cause narrative in the state. Stonewall Jackson was adopted as the figurehead of West Virginia’s Lost Cause movement. His supporters promoted Jackson as an example of honor, integrity, and piousness. In the process Stonewall Jackson transitioned from being a Confederate figure into a popular West Virginia figure over the course of the twentieth century.
This presentation draws upon a variety of primary and secondary sources on both a local and national level. It utilizes materials from Special Collections, regional newspaper accounts, and early and contemporary studies of Jackson. The evidence gathered from this research reveals the profound impact of Confederate heritage groups on Civil War memory in West Virginia.
