https://apnews.com/article/robert-e-lee-statue-virginia-removed-92955a351d9fda6319f379ddc28df8a0

“It’s very difficult to imagine, certainly, even two years ago that the statues on Monument Avenue would actually be removed,” said Ana Edwards, a community activist and founding member of the Virginia Defenders for Freedom Justice & Equality. “It’s representative of the fact that we’re sort of peeling back the layers of injustice that Black people and people of color have experienced when governed by white supremacist policies for so long.”

Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam ordered the statue’s removal last summer amid the nationwide protest movement that erupted after the murder of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis. But litigation tied up his plans until the state Supreme Court cleared the way last week.

Slavery has not been and is not the right way in human society.

But it had lasted probably for millions of years until only a few hundred years ago

when the western world opened their eyes and felt how wrong it was and then it was demolished

gradually and now completely.

However, should we deny our human history entirely in order to agree to the descendants

of the former slaves?

I feel that the activists go too far. 

It's like that (only) black lives matter, but not that all lives matter. 

I don't think I should go too far on this issue.

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/articles/10-facts-appomattox-court-house

Fact #5: Grant agreed to parole the entire Army of Northern Virginia rather than take them as prisoners.

At around 1:30 in the afternoon on April 9, Lee and Grant met at the McLean House in the village with a group of officers. The Union general granted Lee favorable terms of surrender: allowing the men to return to their homes and letting the officers, cavalrymen, and artillerymen keep their swords and horses if the men agreed to lay down their arms and abide by federal law. Grant even supplied food to the Rebels, who were desperately low on rations.

Grant's leniency – together with Lee's reluctance to risk a guerrilla war – can be partially credited for the relative peacefulness of the Reconstruction.

*They fought fiercely risking their lives, but they recognize themselves as an American.

They made sure that America is one nation that is The United States of America.

Lee should be respected for it.

Surrender Meeting at Appomattox Court House

Surrender

Union soldiers at the courthouse in April 1865

Dressed in his ceremonial white uniform, Lee waited for Grant to arrive. Grant, whose headache had ended when he received Lee's note, arrived at the McLean house in a mud-spattered uniform—a government-issue sack coat with trousers tucked into muddy boots, no sidearms, and only his tarnished shoulder straps showing his rank. It was the first time the two men had seen each other face-to-face in almost two decades. Suddenly overcome with sadness, Grant found it hard to get to the point of the meeting, and instead, the two generals briefly discussed their only previous encounter, during the Mexican–American War. Lee brought the attention back to the issue at hand, and Grant offered the same terms he had before: ...

At the surrender ceremonies, about 28,000 Confederate soldiers passed by and stacked their arms. General Longstreet's account was that 28,356 officers and men were “surrendered and paroled”. The Appomattox Roster lists approximately 26,300 men who surrendered. This reference does not include the 7,700 who were captured at Sailor's Creek three days earlier, and who were treated as prisoners of war. 

"What great Generals they were! I spent a moment dreaming the scene. KHC"