‘We Won’t Miss You’: Dead Confederate Klan Leader Being Dug Up and Evicted From Memphis Park

The dead body of Confederate General and Ku Klux Klan leader Nathan Bedford Forrest is being dug up and ejected from a Memphis park that will host a Juneteenth celebration in two weeks.

The remains are being dug up by workers hired by the Sons of Confederate Veterans, according to The New York Times, and not a moment too soon for residents who look forward to celebrating Juneteenth in the park where the guy was buried:

The excavation may take several weeks, according to Lee Millar, a spokesman for the group, which represents direct descendants of Confederate soldiers and promotes a revisionist view of the Civil War.

But even if the process is not completed by June 19, the Juneteenth celebration will take place at the park, now known as Health Sciences Park, according to Michalyn Easter-Thomas of the Memphis City Council.

“Having him there was like having him dance on our graves, the graves of our ancestors,” she said. “You can go quietly. We won’t miss you.”

The exhumation follows years of protests at the site, decades of demands from the city’s Black residents to remove the statue and the remains, and numerous court fights over what should happen to the burial site.

Forrest’s dead remains and a statue will be moved to the National Confederate Museum, some 200 miles away in Tennessee.