The George Washington monument that stands near the entrance of Druid Hill Park in Baltimore was vandalized sometime during the night between Sunday and Monday, according to multiple reports.
According to The Baltimore Sun, the monument was doused in red paint, along with graffiti which read “Destroy Racists.” These acts of vandalism are common following the death of George Floyd, with many defaced and overturned statues of slave owners across the country.
Fox Baltimore reported that, like many of the defaced statues and monuments, George Washington was also a person in history who owned slaves, thus making him a target of the Black Lives Matter movement.
For one resident of Baltimore, living in an area where George Washington was celebrated was a source of anger for people whose neighbors are getting arrested or killed, according to Fox Baltimore.
“It must be tough if you grew up in this neighborhood or in Druid Hill and every day you see the celebration of George Washington, but at the same time you also see your neighbors being arrested and being killed. I’m sure there’s dissonant feelings there and there’s anger there and it’s justified anger,” the resident said.
Baltimore police did not receive any calls regarding anyone vandalizing the monument, but cans of red paint were left beneath the monument. It is uncertain when the vandalism will be cleaned up if at all, Fox Baltimore reported.
It wasn’t the first monument in the city to be defaced. Back in 2018, a statue of Francis Scott Key was vandalized and defaced with red paint. In addition, several other statues and monuments were removed in the middle of the night back in 2017.
According to the news outlet, the four monuments that were removed were honoring Robert E. Lee and Thomas. J. “Stonewall” Jackson in Wyman Park, a Roger B. Taney monument in Mount Vernon, the Confederate Women’s Monument in Bishop Park, as well as the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument that was placed on Mount Royal Avenue.
Several statues have been overturned in various states amid the protests. In North Carolina, two bronze statues of Confederate soldiers were toppled by protestors.
