Workers took down Mobile’s 120-year-old monument to Admiral Raphael Semmes in the early morning hours of June 5, 2020, days after the downtown statue was vandalized.
Mayor: Removal Is About the City’s Future
Mayor Sandy Stimpson confirmed the removal in a statement issued the same morning, saying the statue had been placed in a secure location.
“To be clear: This decision is not about Raphael Semmes, it is not about a monument and it is not an attempt to rewrite history,” Stimpson said. “Moving this statue will not change the past. It is about removing a potential distraction so we may focus clearly on the future of our city. That conversation, and the mission to create One Mobile, continues today.”
City Communications Director George Talbot confirmed the city carried out the removal overnight and said later that morning that both the removal and the statue’s location were temporary, with no return date announced and a further city statement expected.
The removal came after the Semmes monument — which had stood in downtown Mobile for roughly 120 years — was vandalized earlier that week, an incident that led to an arrest.