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University buildings and grounds

Silent Sam (UNC Confederate monument)

Silent Sam was the Confederate soldier statue by sculptor John Wilson that the United Daughters of the Confederacy and UNC alumni dedicated in McCorkle Place on June 2, 1913, when Julian S. Carr's speech recounted his horsewhipping of a Black woman. Protesters pulled it down on August 20, 2018, and its pedestal was removed in January 2019.

Map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors. Site locations from the N.C. State Historic Preservation Office survey, Open Orange, Orange County GIS, OpenStreetMap and a few other published sources named on each site’s page; town and community pins show approximate locations.

People in its history

People named in events about this site, ordered by number of mentions. Each example links to an entry with a source citation.

Sites linked through the same people

Indexed works

Books, articles, records, and images about Silent Sam. Each has been reviewed for relevance; materials held at OCPL appear first.

About the site

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Confederate Monument Protests collected tweets, 2017-2019

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library. University Archives · 2017

A set of 77,570 tweet identifiers, about one gigabyte, gathered by the University Archives at Chapel Hill to document protests over the Confederate monument on campus between 2017 and 2019, University Archives 40486. Topics include soldiers' monuments and war memorials in North Carolina, Civil War monuments, protest movements in the state, and the statue by John A. Wilson (1878-1954) known as Silent Sam.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

Graffiti on "Silent Sam", April 1968

Morton, Hugh M. · 1968

Graffiti marks the Silent Sam Confederate monument on the UNC campus in April 1968, with Franklin Street visible behind it. Color 35 mm slide by Hugh Morton.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Graffiti on "Silent Sam", April 1968

Morton, Hugh M. · 1968

Graffiti on Silent Sam, the Confederate monument on the UNC campus, in April 1968, with Franklin Street visible behind the statue. Hugh Morton color slide, 35 mm.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Graffiti on "Silent Sam", April 1968

Morton, Hugh M. · 1968

Hugh Morton photographed graffiti painted on Silent Sam, the Confederate soldier monument on the UNC campus in Chapel Hill, in April 1968. Color mounted slide, 35 mm.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Confederate Soldiers' Monument, University of N.C., Chapel Hill

1943 · Richardson Photo Card, Charlottesville, V.A

Real-photo postcard of the Confederate Soldiers' Monument on the University of North Carolina campus, made by Richardson Photo Card of Charlottesville and sent in 1943. The writer, Otha Tiner of the Naval Reserve's V-5 program, living in Carr Hall, tells Mr. and Mrs. Clary it is one of many campus monuments to Confederate soldiers.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

"Silent Sam" monument, Graham Memorial

Morton, Hugh M. · 1942

Silent Sam, the Confederate monument, stands before Graham Memorial on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus in this Hugh Morton negative from about 1942, probably made on infrared film. A cropped print appeared in the 1942 and 1943 Yackety Yack yearbooks.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA
Show 9 more works

"Silent Sam" monument

Morton, Hugh M. · 1940

Looking up at Silent Sam, the Confederate soldiers' monument on the UNC-Chapel Hill campus. Hugh Morton took the black-and-white negative sometime between the 1940s and the early 1950s.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

UNC student life, 1939-1942

Morton, Hugh M. · 1939

Hugh Morton photograph from 1939 to 1942 of a young man perched on the Confederate monument known as Silent Sam on the UNC campus while a young woman reaches up for his foot. Black-and-white sheet film negative.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

UNC-Chapel Hill student life, 1939-1942, P081

Morton, Hugh M. · 1939

UNC students talk in a group beneath the Silent Sam monument on campus in a Hugh Morton photograph from 1939 to 1942. The Confederate statue stood on the university's campus until 2018.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Silent Sam: photographs (Chapel Hill Historical Society)

1917

Five photographs of the Silent Sam Confederate monument at UNC, from 1917 on. Two World War I student soldiers, Graham D. and Clem B. Holding, pose with the statue; other views show it in fog, being returned to its pedestal and McCorkle Place under snow. Part of the Chapel Hill Historical Society's Prints and Photographs Collection, CHHS.002.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

CH Historical Society

Unveiling of the Confederate Monument, June 2, 1913

1913

Crowds gather in Chapel Hill on 2 June 1913 for the unveiling of the university's Confederate monument, later known as Silent Sam, in this real photo postcard. Writing to his mother, the sender explains that it honors students who left the university to enlist in 1861 and describes the parade of the day before.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Julian Shakespeare Carr papers, 1892-1923

Carr, Julian Shakespeare · 1892

Papers of Julian Shakespeare Carr, 1892 to 1923, a Durham industrialist in tobacco, textiles and banking, a Methodist active in Sunday schools, and a figure in the finances of the university at Chapel Hill. They also cover Confederate veterans, race relations, white supremacy campaigns, and the Chapel Hill war memorial by John A. Wilson known as Silent Sam. Southern Historical Collection at UNC, collection 141.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

Confederate Monument, University of North Carolina, Durham

Undated postcard of the Confederate Monument on the University of North Carolina campus in Chapel Hill, the statue known as Silent Sam. Though labeled Durham, the monument stood in Chapel Hill.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Silent Sam's reckoning

A periodical on the Confederate monument known as Silent Sam and on what followed its fall at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The cover phrasing speaks of making history visible in absence and of reckoning with myth and reality. Topics include protest movements and white supremacy movements in Chapel Hill and registers of students and alumni who were slaveholders.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

UNC

Soldiers' Monument. Chapel Hill, N.C.

R. W. Foister, Chapel Hill, N.C

The soldiers' monument at Chapel Hill, published as a postcard by R. W. Foister of Chapel Hill.

Included because: The site is named in the title, catalog subjects, or description.

DPLA

Surveys and maps of the area

Not about Silent Sam alone: the architectural surveys that cover its town or the county, and maps drawn while it stood. Several of the surveys can be read free online at NC Digital Collections.

The Town and Gown Architecture of Chapel Hill, North Carolina: 1795-1975

Little-Stokes, Margaret Ruth · 2006

Margaret Ruth Little-Stokes's survey of Chapel Hill's town and campus buildings from 1795 to 1975, published by the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill in 2006. Chapters run from the first campus buildings through David Swain's romantic campus to midcentury modernism, followed by area surveys of the campus, east and west Chapel Hill, downtown, Northside and the suburbs.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal UNC Duke NC State Durham Chapel Hill PL Library of Congress CH Historical Society

The town and gown architecture of Chapel Hill, 1795-1975

Little, M. Ruth · 2004 · Preservation Society of Chapel Hill

M. Ruth Little's 2004 architectural history of Chapel Hill and the university campus from 1795 to 1975, written for the Preservation Society of Chapel Hill. A 99-page survey with a bibliography.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Chapel Hill historic sites survey : final report.

Gatza, M. B. · 1992 · Chapel Hill Planning Department

M. B. Gatza's final report of the 1992 Chapel Hill historic sites survey for the town Planning Department, with contributions by Beverly C. Kawalec and Catherine Bishir. It covers historic buildings and districts in Chapel Hill in 80 pages.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

NC Cardinal NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

When Chapel Hill was a village

Love, Cornelia Spencer, 1892-1981 · 1976 · Chapel Hill Historical Society

Cornelia Spencer Love's recollections of Chapel Hill as a village, published by the Chapel Hill Historical Society in 1976 with drawings by John V. Allcott. Love lived from 1892 to 1981, and the book covers Chapel Hill biography, the town's social life and customs, and the faculty of the university before 1962. viii and 87 pages with illustrations.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC Library of Congress CH Historical Society NC Cardinal

[Map of Chapel Hill and vicinity].

Harris, Hunter Lee, 1866-1893 · 1888 · Hunter Lee Harris?

Dating from 1888 and attributed to Hunter Lee Harris, a map of Chapel Hill and its vicinity, reproduced as a photocopy measuring 22 by 37 centimeters. Harris died in 1893, which brackets the drawing to the late nineteenth century. An early depiction of the streets of the village and the land around it.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC

[Map of Chapel Hill].

1895

Pen-and-ink manuscript map of Chapel Hill dated 1852, with a table of measurements, showing the University campus, the village around it, street widths and layout, and the town limits. Later notes attributed to Kemp P. Battle give the longitude and latitude of landmarks as measured from atop New East Hall in 1880.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC DPLA
Show 2 more surveys and maps

Sanborn Fire Insurance Map from Chapel Hill, Orange County, North Carolina.

1925

Sanborn Map Company fire insurance map of Chapel Hill, June 1925, on eleven sheets, with Carrboro also drawn. Sanborn maps recorded the outline, construction and use of each building for fire insurers, so the set shows both towns block by block in the mid 1920s.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

Library of Congress Digital Collections

Map of Chapel Hill & vicinity.

1933

Street and property map of Chapel Hill and the surrounding country, revised to 1 January 1933 and printed in the town. Topics include streets, real property and the historical geography of Chapel Hill along with maps of the University of North Carolina in its 1793 to 1962 period. A useful sheet for tracing lot lines and street names as they stood at the start of the 1930s.

Included because: A survey or map of the town or county where the site stands.

UNC

Found a book OCPL doesn’t own? You can often borrow it through interlibrary loan at OCPL.

Start at OCPL

    Where to look on the shelf

    These books don’t necessarily mention Silent Sam, but they cover where it stands, its kind of building and the land, family and burial records behind it, and they are where a search for a place like this usually goes next. All are at OCPL, most in the Wall Collection.

    Histories of the town and county

    • Rebecca Wall Collection · NC 975.656 STO Chapel Hill: A Pictorial History Stolpen, Steven · 1978

      Steven Stolpen's pictorial history of Chapel Hill, one of the Donning Company's photographic town histories, published in Norfolk, Virginia in 1978. Photographs and portraits carry the story of the town and the university, including references to Thomas Wolfe's years as a student at Carolina. 156 pages with illustrations.

    • Foundational · 975.656 RYAN Orange County Trio: Hillsborough, Chapel Hill, and Carrboro, North Carolina, Histories and Tour Guides Ryan, Elizabeth Shreve · 2004

      Elizabeth Shreve Ryan's combined histories and tour guides for Hillsborough, Chapel Hill and Carrboro, the three towns of Orange County, with the University of North Carolina treated alongside Chapel Hill. Each town gets a narrative history and a tour of its streets and buildings. Published by Chapel Hill Press in 2004, 369 pages with illustrations and maps.

    Buildings and surveys

    • Foundational · NC 720.975 BIS A Guide to the Historic Architecture of Piedmont North Carolina Bishir, Catherine W. · 2003

      Catherine W. Bishir and Michael T. Southern's field guide to the historic buildings of the North Carolina Piedmont, arranged county by county from Wake and Franklin in the east to Mecklenburg and Gaston in the west. The Orange County section takes in Hillsborough, Chapel Hill and Carrboro along with the rural county, with entries on individual buildings and maps for finding them. Published 2003, 596 pages with illustrations and maps.

    • Foundational · NC 917.56 HIS Historic Buildings and Landmarks of Chapel Hill, N.C Chapel Hill Historical Society · 1973

      A pocket-sized guide to the historic buildings and landmarks of Chapel Hill, prepared by the Chapel Hill Historical Society and printed by Creative Printers in 1973. Forty pages with illustrations and maps, 14 by 22 cm. Topics include architecture, historic buildings and historic districts in Chapel Hill, and the guide is useful for a walking tour of the older parts of town.

    In the chronology

    Storyline about this site, with a page of its own:

    1. UNC trustees approve the United Daughters of the Confederacy's request to build a Confederate monument on the campus The board of trustees approved a request from the North Carolina Division of the UDC for a monument on the campus. President Francis P. Venable took part in the planning and fund-raising and later committed university money when UDC and alumni contributions fell short. People: Francis Preston Venable UNC A to Z (UNC Press): Confederate Monument (Silent Sam)
    2. John Wilson begins designing UNC's Confederate monument After the monument committee weighed competing designs, it chose Canadian sculptor John Wilson's design for the Confederate soldier statue planned for the UNC campus. Wilson began the work in 1910, using sixteen-year-old Harold Langlois of Boston as his model. People: Francis Preston Venable UNC Libraries: Timeline (A Guide to Resources About UNC's Confederate Monument)
    3. Bettie Jackson London publishes the design for the campus monument and appeals for the $7,500 Writing from Pittsboro as chairman of the UDC monument committee, Mrs. Henry A. London described the monument designed by the sculptor John Wilson, a soldier above a bronze tablet of the State calling a student from his books, and warned that the chapters had not met their pledges and the unveiling at the semicentennial commencement was in doubt. People: John A. Wilson DigitalNC: The News and Observer (Raleigh), March 14, 1911, page 1
    4. The Tar Heel reports the monument's unveiling put off from the 1911 commencement for want of funds The paper reported that the UDC chapters had been unable to fulfill their pledges toward the $7,500, so the monument could not be unveiled at the June 1911 commencement, the fiftieth anniversary of the war's beginning, and would certainly be unveiled in 1912. It was in fact dedicated in June 1913. People: John A. Wilson The Tar Heel, April 1, 1911, p. 1
    5. UNC's Confederate Monument is dedicated On the second day of commencement Major H. A. London introduced Governor Craig; Mrs. London presented the monument to the trustees for the UDC, President Francis P. Venable accepted it for the university, and Julian S. Carr spoke for the students of 1861. Carr's speech, which praised the Confederate army and recounted his horsewhipping of a Black woman in the village in 1865, is the part now most remembered. People: Julian S. Carr, John A. Wilson, Locke Craig DigitalNC: The News and Observer (Raleigh), June 3, 1913, page 1
    6. N.C. State freshmen paint the Silent Sam statue Eight N.C. State College freshmen, egged on by upperclassmen, daubed the Confederate soldier statue on the UNC campus with gray paint on a night raid. They turned themselves in, paid for the cleaning, and on February 7, 1961, pleaded guilty and paid $10 fines in Chapel Hill Recorder's Court. The News of Orange County (Hillsborough), February 9, 1961, p. 9
    7. Vandals splatter Silent Sam with paint and a hammer and sickle Silent Sam, the Confederate monument in McCorkle Place, was found splattered with red, green, yellow and brown paint, with a red hammer and sickle on the back of its base, early on Sunday, April 7, three days after King's assassination. Campus police did not know who did it. Letters to the paper reported that students who scrubbed the statue on April 8 also hung small Confederate flags on it, which an assistant dean had taken down. The Daily Tar Heel, April 10, 1968, p. 2
    8. Kappa Alpha stages an Old South secession ceremony at Silent Sam, and the mayor gives it the key to the town About fifty members of the Kappa Alpha Order and their dates, some on horseback, paraded behind drums to the Confederate monument in McCorkle Place for an Old South Weekend ceremony that, the Daily Tar Heel reported, honored the Old South's 'grace and charm' and declared the chapter's mock secession from the Union. Mayor Sandy McClamroch presented the fraternity with the key to Chapel Hill. People: Sandy McClamroch The Daily Tar Heel, March 30, 1969, p. 1
    9. Silent Sam is lifted from its pedestal and sent to Cincinnati for restoration A crane lifted the Confederate monument from the base on McCorkle Place where it had stood since its June 1913 unveiling, and a Cincinnati bronze conservator trucked it away for an $8,200 restoration of the weathering, corrosion, vandals' paint and lead patches that had turned it green, expected to take about six months. The work was arranged by Chancellor Fordham's Advisory Committee on Historic Property, chaired by University property officer Grace Wagoner, which planned to restore the Caldwell Monument the next year for $2,300. People: Christopher C. Fordham III The Daily Tar Heel, April 23, 1986, p. 1
    10. Silent Sam goes back on its pedestal after restoration in Cincinnati At noon a crane returned the Confederate monument known as Silent Sam to its pedestal in McCorkle Place before about 100 people, seven months after it was taken down. Bronze specialists Eleftherios and Mercene Karkadoulias of Cincinnati had repaired cracks, cleaned off green oxidation and coated the statue with urethane for $8,200, a cost University property officer Grace Wagoner called well spent; rain cancelled the senior class's welcome-home party. The Daily Tar Heel, November 13, 1986, p. 1
    11. A Black Cultural Center program drafts race-relations proposals, including a monument to balance Silent Sam At "Racism: Our common bondage," a program of the Black Cultural Center and the Chapel of the Cross, six mixed groups of students, faculty, staff and residents who had met weekly for about six weeks compiled recommendations for Chancellor Paul Hardin. They included housing all freshmen in one area to end the concentration of Black students on South Campus, more race-relations study in the curriculum, a required non-Western culture course and a monument to a prominent Black alumnus to balance the Silent Sam statue. The Daily Tar Heel, November 20, 1989, p. 3
    12. Demonstrators re-read Julian Carr's 1913 dedication speech at the monument and unveil a mock plaque A campus demonstration read Carr's dedication-day speech aloud at the statue and unveiled a new plaque of its own giving the monument's history. The Daily Tar Heel reported a further Real Silent Sam movement protest on the statue's history later that month. People: Julian S. Carr Commemorative Landscapes of North Carolina: Confederate Monument, UNC (Chapel Hill)
    Show all 21 dated events
    1. William J. Barber II speaks at a rally at Silent Sam on its 100th anniversary On the Confederate monument's 100th anniversary, William J. Barber II, president of the North Carolina NAACP, spoke at a rally at its foot organized by the Real Silent Sam Committee, saying the statue had never been silent. UNC Libraries, A View to Hugh: The soul of the beholder will determine the revelation of its meaning
    2. UNC leaders warn Governor Cooper that Silent Sam may be pulled down UNC System President Margaret Spellings, Chancellor Carol Folt and the chairs of the Board of Governors and the campus trustees wrote to Governor Roy Cooper that police believed an attempt to pull down Silent Sam could come at any time. Cooper answered that state law let the university remove the monument if its leaders saw a real risk to public safety. People: Carol L. Folt The Daily Tar Heel: Cooper gives UNC permission to remove Silent Sam
    3. Silent Sam is toppled On the evening of August 20, 2018, the eve of fall classes, about 250 protesters pulled UNC's Confederate monument in McCorkle Place from its pedestal at around 9:20 p.m. The toppling followed a year of campaigning for removal after the 2017 Charlottesville rally, and campus authorities took the statue to an undisclosed location. Commemorative Landscapes of North Carolina: Confederate Monument, UNC (Chapel Hill)
    4. UNC leaders ask the SBI to help investigate the toppling of Silent Sam The day after protesters pulled down Silent Sam, Spellings and Board of Governors chair Harry Smith called the act unacceptable, dangerous and incomprehensible. A later joint statement with Chancellor Folt and trustees chair Haywood Cochrane said the administration never told police to let the monument fall and that the SBI had agreed to help investigate. People: Carol L. Folt NC Newsline: UNC leaders: SBI investigating 'Silent Sam' toppling
    5. The UNC Board of Governors gives Chapel Hill until November 15 to propose a 'lawful and lasting' plan for the monument Eight days after the toppling, the Board of Governors met for nearly two hours in closed session and adopted a resolution directing Chancellor Folt and the trustees to present by November 15 a plan offering 'a lawful and lasting path that protects public safety, preserves the monument and its history'. Thom Goolsby cast the lone no vote, and the board ordered an outside review of the University's handling of the August 20 protest. The trustees met the same day. People: Carol L. Folt WRAL: UNC-CH board has until November to devise plan for 'Silent Sam'
    6. UNC trustees vote to house the monument in a new $5.3 million University History and Education Center At a special meeting the Board of Trustees approved a four-part plan for the Board of Governors: relocate the statue and tablets into a new free-standing building at the former Odum Village site on south campus, add a McCorkle Place gateway with plaques, and continue contextualizing campus history. The center was priced at $5.3 million with $800,000 a year to operate; Folt said police advised that the statue could not safely return to McCorkle Place. People: Carol L. Folt UNC-Chapel Hill: BOT recommends four-part plan on Confederate Monument, campus contextualization
    7. Folt orders the Silent Sam pedestal removed and announces she will step down Folt ordered the removal on the Monday and announced in a campuswide email that she would resign, saying the remaining parts of the monument threatened the safety of the community. The university said at 1 a.m. on Tuesday that removal had begun, and by 2:40 a.m. a crew had taken the last of the base from the quad. NPR: On Her Way Out, UNC Chancellor Orders Removal Of Silent Sam Pedestal
    8. The UNC System gives Silent Sam to the Sons of Confederate Veterans with a $2.5 million trust in a same-day consent judgment The North Carolina Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans sued the UNC System and Board of Governors over the monument and a consent judgment was entered the same day in Orange County Superior Court. The System handed over the statue, to be kept outside the fourteen counties with a System campus, and endowed a $2.5 million charitable trust from non-state funds for its care and display. Board chair Randy Ramsey said the deal let the University 'move forward'. WRAL: UNC System, Sons of Confederate Veterans reach settlement on Silent Sam
    9. Judge Allen Baddour voids the Silent Sam settlement in Hillsborough for lack of standing At a hearing in Hillsborough, Orange County Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour ruled that the Sons of Confederate Veterans had no standing to bring the suit and set aside the consent judgment and the $2.5 million trust. Five UNC students and a faculty member represented by the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law had sought to intervene; their motion was denied but the judge took up the standing question they raised. NPR (via WESA): Judge Voids UNC's Controversial Settlement Over Confederate Statue 'Silent Sam'

    Open these in the chronology →

    Research sources

    Sources cited in this site’s history, National Register documents, and places to get research help. Research guide: Investigate a school or community institution.

    Background 10

    Show all 10

    National Register files

    Historic sites, markers, and maps

    Records of the time 15

    Show all 15

    Collections and databases

    Local help 6

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