Community organizers are coming together Saturday to call for the removal of a 46-foot-tall Confederate statue that looms over the final resting places of prominent African-American figures, including journalist and organizer Ida B. Wells, Jesse Owens and Mayor Harold Washington.
The statue commemorates over 4,000 Confederate prisoners who were initially interred
at Camp Douglas, a Union Army prisoner of war camp and training ground during the Civil War. 
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Those soldiers, as well as some Union soldiers who died at the camp, were reinterred together at Oak Woods Cemetery in a mass grave. That spot is called Confederate Mound.
The rally from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. at Oak Woods Cemetery, 1035 E. 67th St., in the Greater Grand Crossing neighborhood, was organized by Smash White Supremacy Chicago, because of that monument. The 183-acre cemetery is along 71st Street, which is the honorary Emmett Till Road. Till, a 14-year-old from Chicago, was murdered in Mississippi in 1955; his death was a spark for the civil rights movement.
Andrew Koch, an organizer with Smash White Supremacy Chicago, said the push for removal of the statue started after in October after violent protests at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
“We’re not against remembering history, but the monument isn’t the only way to remember this war,” Koch said. “Monuments are erected to honor or commemorate the highest held ideals of our country and it’s inappropriate to have this near Ida B. Wells who has a tiny grave marker.”
Along with other Chicago-based organizations, like Black Lives Matter Chicago and Black Youth Project 100, organizers are calling for the statue’s removal and the installation of a memorial for Wells. 
That idea was started by Black Youth Project 100, which launched the #HonorHerLabor campaign to build a memorial to Ida B. Wells to replace the confederate statue in the cemetery. 
The rally follows on the heels of other demonstrations to topple confederate monuments that started in earnest last year after the Charlottesville rally.
Among the commemorations removed were statues and plaques honoring Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy; its top military commander, Gen. Robert E. Lee; and other Confederate veterans. 
There have been many more proposals in cities across the country to remove plaques or statues commemorating Confederate soldiers. 
Koch said that because the statue is federally owned the decision to remove it would come from the National Park Service. Smash White Supremacy Chicago has gone door-to-door, garnering signatures to present to local officials so they can put pressure on the park service. 
“We’re not asking that they not have a grave marker, but we want the statue removed,” Koch said. “A common opposition to the removal movement is that it’s erasing history. No one we’ve spoken to has had that response.”
Imagine how they could honor Emmett Till if instead of demonstrating, they were to grab some brooms and sweep the street.