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| H. K. Edgerton of Asheville speaks at Sons of Confederate Veterans rally at Person County Courthouse Friday. (Ken Martin / C-T) |
As they paraded down Main Street, the E. Fletcher Satterfield Camp, Sons of Confederate Veterans and their supporters sang Dixie and waved what they call a symbol of Southern heritage and history, not of racism or division.
In the front line of the peaceful demonstration marched H. K. Edgerton, an African American man who says he is proud of the Confederate battle flag because it is a symbol of all that is Southern, and of the many men, both black and white who fought and died to preserve the South from invasion by the Union Army from 1861 until 1865.
Edgerton is director of the Southern Legal Resource Center in Asheville.
Speaking from behind the stone marker at the Person County Courthouse that bears the name of Confederate veteran E. Fletcher Satterfield, Edgerton said Friday afternoon he stood as a proud and “true Confederate patriot.” He said he represented the 2.5 million “Southern bondsmen, bondswomen and freemen” who “loyally served the Confederate cause” during the Civil War.
Edgerton is the former head of the Asheville branch of the NAACP, and for the last five years he has been a defender of the Confederate flag and other related causes. He is presently traveling the southern states because, “It’s high time to have education for black and white folks about Southern history.”
His trip is also an effort to raise funds for the Southern Legal Resource Center and the SCV for the preservation of “our heritage and history.”
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| Beneath a variety of flags, including the controversial Confederate battle flag, members of Sons of Confederate Veterans and supporters march along Main Street Friday. (Ken Martin / C-T)
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He and the SCV marched through Roxboro Friday afternoon in response to last month’s banning of the Confederate flag likeness at Person High School. Twenty-four students have been suspended from PHS for wearing the symbol. The first 23 were suspended within a week of the Oct. 6 ban, and another student was suspended this week.
PHS Principal Greg Hicks banned display of the flag after it apparently caused a fight between two students. Other minor incidents had taken place at the high school as well that could be attributed to the flag. Hicks and Schools Supt. Ronnie G. Bugnar, along with school board Chairman Ronnie King, have said the ban was in the interest of student safety and to preserve an environment conducive to learning.
Joe Medlin, public relations manager for the E. Fletcher Satterfield Camp SCV, said the Friday march and Edgerton’s speech were “for the children at the high school.”
Medlin said PHS administration took the Confederate t-shirts and other paraphernalia away from the students “because people don’t know true history.”
He went on to say, “Our ancestors fought with amazing courage” to defend their homeland from invading Northern armies. The Civil War, he said, “was not about slavery. It was about family, home and country.”
The Sons of Confederate Veterans, said Medlin, exists for the purpose of preserving and honoring the history of the South. He said the SCV also strives to teach “our children about the honor and the sacrifice” that was a part of the Confederacy.
“Freedom was measured in lives,” Medlin said of the war.
With a cadre of Roxboro Police Department officers, Person County sheriff’s deputies and North Carolina Highway Patrol officers standing by, the SCV and Edgerton said they wanted to make it clear that they were marching and speaking for one purpose only — to ensure that true history was taught to today’s young people.
Person County Sheriff Dennis Oakley said he and Roxboro Police Chief Terry Hill worked together, along with the N.C. Highway Patrol, to ensure the safety of the marchers.
“These folks have never been violent, or never been out of the way,” said Oakley, and that therefore neither he nor Hill expected any trouble from the marchers. “We’re here for their protection,” Oakley said.
The marchers, numbering between 20 to 30, were led from the corner of Gordon and Lamar streets by a Roxboro Police Department vehicle, with another police car bringing up the rear. The march went down Main Street, to the Person County Museum of History, then back to and around the courthouse, before ending with Medlin and Edgerton speaking at the Satterfield monument.
A handful of people, black and white, stood in door fronts and along Court and Main streets as the messages were delivered. Several onlookers when asked for comment about what they had heard declined to make a statement on record for the newspaper.
Camera crews from area television stations were on hand to cover the event.
Apparently two “camps” of the Sons of Confederate Veterans are active in Person County, the Satterfield camp and the Roxboro Grays Camp, which did not take part in Friday’s march.