Petition Seeks Removal Of Confederate Flag In Kennesaw

KENNESAW, GA -- Near the site of a prominent Civil War battleground in Georgia, a new fight is brewing today as an online petition seeks the removal of a Confederate flag from downtown Kennesaw. The site, centered at the corner of Cherokee and Main streets is not far from Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield Park, where soldiers from the North and South squared off for three weeks in 1864.

Reid Jones, a local resident who started the petition, said that taking down the flag would show that Kennesaw stands for "equality and unity." (SIGN UP: Get Patch's Daily Newsletter and Real Time News Alerts. Or, if you have an iPhone, download the free Patch app.)

"The removal of the Confederate flag from the public flag pole in downtown Kennesaw would serve as a message to all that our community strives for equality and unity, rather than disparity and division," Jones said on the petition, which has garnered more than 2,000 signatures as of midday Wednesday. (SIGN UP: Get Patch's Daily Newsletter and Real Time News Alerts. Or, if you have an iPhone, download the free Patch app.)

Reid said that the purpose of the flag -- to idolize a Confederate train conductor whose actions eventually led to the deaths of eight Union sympathizers -- had outlived hits usefulness.

"The Confederate flag in Downtown Kennesaw is commemorated to William Fuller, a Confederate train conductor whose reclaiming of the General during the Civil War lead to the deaths of 8 Union raiders who attempted to acquire the train for the Union and destroy railways used to support the Confederacy. This man is not someone worth idolization or commemoration," Reid says in the online petition.

Fuller is well-known in Confederate history as the person that helped stop a plan by Union troops to steal a train from Big Shanty, Georgia (now known as Kennesaw), in what is known as the "Great Locomotive Chase." The troops successfully took off in the train, named the General, but Fuller, who initially chased the train on foot, eventually commandeered a train of his own and was able to stop the North soldiers near Chattanooga, Tenn.

At least one local City Councilman said that the flag is off-limits to city officials. “That area is a (state) park, so the council has no authority to remove the flag,” Kennesaw Councilman Jimmy Dickens told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

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Confederate symbols and imagery has become a hot-button issue in the wake of the tragedy in Charlottesville, Va., which erupted into violence during a white nationalist rally and march. A right-wing sympathizer, identified as James Alex Fields Jr. is facing second-degree murder, malicious wounding and failure to stop after allegedly plowing into a crowd of counter-demonstrators at the march.

Read more: Trump attacked for 'both sides' quip about Charlottesville

Thirty-two-year-old Heather Heyer, a paralegal, was killed in the melee, which has sparked a backlash against the "Unite the Right" movement and groups associated with it.

Dickens, who is Kennesaw's first black council member, said that the flag issue is a complex one and that he can empathize with both sides.

“I understand on both sides," he said, according to the AJC. "I understand how people want to represent and show their heritage with the flag and everything, but I also see the other side where people see the flag as intimidation,” he said. “... it reminds some people of a time that America wasn’t as great as it is now.”

The Confederate backlash is growing across the state. In Atlanta, Mayor Kasim Reed said that after receiving a number of petitions, the city is looking into renaming streets honoring Confederates. "I will carefully consider these petitions, because symbols matter, and as those espousing hate-filled idealogies grow bolder, we must grow stronger in defense of our values."

Remove Confederate Carving On Stone Mountain: Atlanta Lawmaker

And in Decatur, a Confederate monument on the Square is being targeted in a petition as well.

Related: The Many Symbols Of The Modern White Power Movement

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