ROME, Ga. (AP) - An advisory committee says that a northwest Georgia statue of Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest should be placed inside a local museum.
The statue of Forrest, credited with being a founder of the Ku Klux Klan, was removed from its base in Rome’s Myrtle Hill Cemetery in January.
The Rome News-Tribune reports that City Commissioner Jamie Doss reported the recommendation of the committee to the full City Commission last week.
“The committee likes the idea because they can tell the whole story (about Forrest),” Doss said. “They can tell the truth, the good and the bad.”
City leaders appointed the committee in August to determine what to do with the statue. Forrest was considered a military hero for saving Rome from federal troops in 1863. But he made his fortune in trading slaves, executed hundreds of Black prisoners at Fort Pillow in 1864 and became a leader of the Ku Klux Klan after the Civil War.
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