RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A state commission in Virginia has decided to include Nat Turner in an anti-slavery monument. Turner was the leader of a bloody slave uprising in 1831.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that the issue was hotly debated before the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Commission voted Wednesday to honor Turner. The panel of state lawmakers and historians is tasked with selecting 10 honorees whose names and faces will be featured at the monument’s base.
Charles Withers, a commission member from Roanoke, said Turner was “the bravest black man in that era.”
But Lauranett Lee, a professor at the University of Richmond, said women and children were among the roughly 60 people killed before Turner was caught and executed.
The monument will be built on Brown’s Island in Richmond.
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Information from: Richmond Times-Dispatch, http://www.richmond.com
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