OP-ED: Local and Notable Historian Johnnie Warner Takes Public Notice of Columbus, GA's Historical Faux Pas

FAUX PAS - noun. plural: faux pas [foh , pahz, foh , pah]. a slip or blunder in etiquette, manners, or conduct; an embarrassing social blunder or indiscretion.

READ: "WTF!! In a city that is predominantly Black, they have the audacity having this guy, Allen Woodall, representing Columbus, Georgia on the Columbus, Georgia Visitor Guide! He is the Great Grandson of Confederate Colonel Allen C. McGehee, a Columbus, Georgia Slave Dealer and illegal Slave Trafficker! Plus this Columbus, Georgia's visitor guide doesn’t give Columbus, Georgia Black businesses no awareness or justice at all! Wake up Black Americans of Columbus, Georgia! See my post: Columbus, Georgia Slave Dealer and Trafficker"

Local Historian Johnnie Warner (also known as "Uncle Johnnie" to his constituency), who has often worked overtime and tirelessly to call attention to the much-ignored or disenfranchised history of Columbus, Georgia, uses his Facebook platform to get the word out about the whitewashing of what should be called historical honor in the southwestern Georgia town.

Though not a native of the State, his work to preserve the true history of the south has never gone without notice.

The State of Georgia has a history of glossing over the whole entire truth of its own colorful beginnings, but Columbus often seems to have a particular affinity for it.

The narrative of this short-circuited history is always dictated by what we often refer to as the "status quo" of the town - or at least it seems to be 'feeling some kind of way' about exposure and rightful discussion of these American truths.

However, with the influx of Podunk USA now consistently making US news and the entire nation being held captive by what can rightfully be called "small town Trumpism," the renderers of whitewashed history often seem to be in desperate need of attention.

First off, (but by no means the entire story of the original sanctification of deep south racism), there is the federal lawsuit that wants the name of a confederate soldier reinstated to where it was removed from.

The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer reports: "A motion hearing was held Thursday in a federal courtroom in Columbus in the ongoing lawsuit the NRMF filed against the U.S. Department of Defense to reinstate the name of Col. John Mosby, a former Confederate soldier, to the ranger memorial." LINK (Of course Clay Land is the "judge of that," who else would be?)

***___________________***

On the one hand, there's the reason someone was trying to purge white history from where it belongs, and then on the other hand, there's the reasoning for why other people would work to restore it as if it's something for the locals to be proud of.

The FOR PEOPLE stated "“In attempting to address the abominable treatment of our citizens of African descent,” the foundation’s letter says, “Fort Moore leadership has unfortunately taken a one-size-fits-all approach, which is itself abominable treatment of other citizen groups.”

The AGAINST PEOPLE said they “strenuously object to the defacement and desecration of the National Ranger Memorial," in a letter the Ledger-Enquirer reported from the National Ranger Memorial Foundation that was sent to Kevin McCarthy and Mike Rogers in May of 2023.

What's this really all about then?

A Silent Auction continually going about left and right, wheel upon wheel, to preserve the history of the southern Confederacy?

While we are of the mindset that confederate anti-Black racism is efficiently not something the south or the USA should proudly display as if it was an accomplishment, we are also of the opinion that the best thing to do is to help preserve ALL of the truth, INCLUDING the part where the name of Col. John S. Mosby goes down in history with its uglier memories - never to be forgotten again.

"Those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it."

We, in this page in current events and history, are watching as the 1800s confederacy tries to raise its ugly head again in direct opposition to progress, the future, and the "growing up" of a stuck-in-grade-school mentality in the deep south of America, so as our grandmas used to say "Leave it where the Good Lord flung it."

I kept a confederate flag in my possession in order to help the future generations learn about it and see the truth about how ungodly this nation is, as opposed to the ideology that the United States was birthed out of a "Judeo-Christian ethic" that really did not exist, then or now.

I could have burned the egregious thing, but it just seemed to serve as further proof that "Christianity" was never the root of what built America: It was slavery and anti-Black hatred that built it, along with Eastern-centric AfroAsiatic ingenuity and the heart and spirit of overcoming that hatred and surviving and thriving in spite of it.

That's what built America.

It shouldn't be purged, it should always be a forever-ongoing point of conversation about the nation's cornerstone; just stop taking out the other pertinent parts of the stories.

So, "Uncle Johnnie" is correct when he properly and timely addresses this particular sludge piece of Columbus, the McGehee's (probably European Irish), that seeks to make an example of an aged "son of the confederacy" as a sense of nationalist pride and then puts him on the front cover of a magazine regularly handed out to tourists, as if everyone in Columbus is in line with this sort of history and whitewashed activity--and "some people" aren't welcome here, as well.

No, it's not his actual fault, but the simpler truth is that most of us didn't know a thing about it...until now. So what did they leave out? Who paid for that cover? And did we need to know it? 

Abso-effing-lutely!

It is the age of the Internet, the INFORMATION HIGHWAY OF THE WORLD...nothing need be withheld any longer.

My paternal Muskogee ancestors walked the  historical Trail of Tears from Fort Mitchell, Alabama to Fort Gibson, Oklahoma and finally settled in a place about two hours away called 'WEWOKA, OKLAHOMA'. My maternal Yuchi ancestors -owned by the Bradley family (of WC Bradley fame)- stayed here with the permission of privileged whiteness, becoming latter-day post-slavery slaves, with two-cent taxable wages, to the old guard of the Confederate nations.

SALUTATIONS

Today, we at Fountain City News salute "Uncle Johnnie" Warner, along with his and the lovely impartations of Columbus' own Billy Winn, whom I 'remet' at a book signing--some years after leaving the Ledger-Enquirer. 

Without them keeping up and 'keeping it real', I would not have made the connection that I was the literal "Missing Link" in our family's history that I spent a lifetime searching for. 

Also, with more than a winking nod to Elizabeth Bradley Turner, without whose 'inadvertent' life biography that I wasn't supposed to know about, showed me that -through my maternal grandmother, Blanche Lee Williams-Doctor- we are also the blood descendants of a European Scottish slaveowner by the name of Forbes Bradley," I would never have known who I am in this life.

Our native son, Dr. John Henrik Clarke, buried in Columbus' Green Acres Cemetery that was grounded, in a word, by the family of George H. Less, once stated "History is a clock that people use to tell the political and cultural time of day. It is also a compass that people use to find themselves on the map of human geography ... )".

Maybe the family of George H. Less would have been a more appropriate one to put on the cover of that Tourist brochure, along with some accurate stops on Columbus' Black History Tour on its list of "Places to Visit" while here.

Never stop telling the whole truth and nothing BUT the truth, Columbus Georgia. 

Let Columbus be called "The Little City where #WOKE CAME TO LIFE!!!" And to you reading this ... NEVER STOP SEEKING.

#WEALLREADY #WEWOKE #FORTHEBIBLETELLSUSSO