![Confederate Monument, Washington, VA](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/38/Confederate_Monument%2C_Washington%2C_VA.JPG)
Herbert Barbee (October 8, 1848 – March 22, 1936
) was an American sculptor from
Luray, Virginia
Luray is the county seat of Page County, Virginia, United States, in the Shenandoah Valley in the northern part of the Commonwealth. The population was 4,895 at the 2010 census.
The town was started by William Staige Marye in 1812, a descendant ...
. He was the son of
William Randolph Barbee (1818–1868), also a renowned sculptor, with whom he studied in
Florence, Italy
Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...
for some time.
He lived for much of his life in his home county, where he had something of a reputation as an eccentric, and where he was not respected by many of the locals due to his propensity for carving
nude figures.
At one time he also kept a studio in New York,
and in 1887 and 1888 he was active in
Cincinnati
Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...
.
During his career he also worked in
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
,
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
, and
St. Louis
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
.
Eventually he opened a studio in
Hamburg, Virginia, not far from his birthplace.
In addition to his own work, Barbee completed several pieces which had been left unfinished by his father at the time of his death,
and also carved marble pieces after a number of his father's clay models; one of these, ''The Star of the West'', received a gold medal at the
Southern Exposition
The Southern Exposition was a five-year series of world's fairs held in the city of Louisville, Kentucky, from 1883 to 1887 in what is now Louisville's Old Louisville neighborhood. The exposition, held for 100 days each year on immediately sout ...
of 1883.
He erected a bust of William, looking up at
Mary's Rock, at the old family cemetery in Thornton Gap; placed there in 1930, after the elder Barbee's remains had been moved to a cemetery in Luray, this was removed sometime after the construction of
Skyline Drive
Skyline Drive is a National Parkway that runs the entire length of the National Park Service's Shenandoah National Park in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, generally along the ridge of the mountains. The drive's northern terminus is a ...
through the area. It was intended that it should be paired with a bust of Herbert's mother, looking down on her husband from the Rock, but that piece was never completed.
Barbee married, on February 20, 1895, Blanche E. Stover of Luray. With her he had four children: Herbert Randolph, Aurelia Loreta, Mary Frances, and William Clifford.
Barbee lived at a house called "Calendine", which had been erected in the 1850s to serve as a general store and stage stop along the
Sperryville-
New Market New Market may refer to:
Bangladesh
*New Market, Dhaka
*New Market, Khulna, in Sonadanga Model Thana
*New Market, Chittagong, near Government City College, Chittagong
India
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Jamaica
*New Market, Jama ...
turnpike; he used the former store area as his studio.
He is buried at the Stover Cemetery in Luray.
"Calendine" still stands; it is denoted by a historic marker erected by the Page County Historical Society, which purchased the building in 1968
and which today operates the house as a museum.
Work
Barbee's most notable work is a memorial to the Confederacy in Luray, erected in 1898; called the "Confederate Heroes Monument", or sometimes "Barbee's Monument", its erection is said to have been inspired by a visit to the
battlefield
A battlefield, battleground, or field of battle is the location of a present or historic battle involving ground warfare. It is commonly understood to be limited to the point of contact between opposing forces, though battles may involve troops ...
at
Gettysburg,
although the more immediate reason for its creation was as the focal point of a proposed park, called Henkel Woods Park, whose construction was never completed.
Its design is said to have been based on the memory of a sentry Barbee saw standing on the mountain above
Thornton Gap
Thornton Gap is a wind gap located in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia separating the Shenandoah Valley from the Piedmont region of the state.
History
Thornton Gap was named for Francis Thornton (1711–April 14, 1749), owner of the land ...
one winter's day during the Civil War.
The statue is the earlier of two Confederate memorials in Luray, the newer one being erected in 1912. A variety of reasons have been given for the creation of the new statue, including suggestions that the original was disgraceful to the memory of the dead, depicting as it did a soldier in tattered clothing; that the original statue did not face "defiantly north" and so was unacceptable; that the first statue was too far beyond the town's limits to be acceptable; and that Barbee's reputation tainted his work, and so a "purer" representation was needed as a memorial.
Even so, one author said of him, "Herbert Barbee made stone speak as life. He left us a marble monument that endures today, an honor to Luray, Page County and Virginia."
Barbee also crafted monuments to the Confederacy in
Warrenton and
Washington, Virginia
The town of Washington, Virginia, is a historic village located in the eastern foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains near Shenandoah National Park. The entire town is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a historic district, Wa ...
.
The latter was commissioned in 1900, although the date at which it was actually constructed is unknown;
the former, a red obelisk which sits on the green just north of the
old jail
Old or OLD may refer to:
Places
*Old, Baranya, Hungary
*Old, Northamptonshire, England
* Old Street station, a railway and tube station in London (station code OLD)
*OLD, IATA code for Old Town Municipal Airport and Seaplane Base, Old Town, Ma ...
, was unveiled in 1920,
and includes as part of its design a
bas relief
Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term ''relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that the ...
portrait of
John Singleton Mosby
John Singleton Mosby (December 6, 1833 – May 30, 1916), also known by his nickname "Gray Ghost", was a Confederate army cavalry battalion commander in the American Civil War. His command, the 43rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry, known as Mosby's ...
.
See also
*
Moses Jacob Ezekiel
Moses Jacob Ezekiel, also known as Moses "Ritter von" Ezekiel (October 28, 1844 – March 27, 1917), was an American sculptor who lived and worked in Rome, Italy, Rome for the majority of his career. Ezekiel was "the first American-born Jewis ...
References
1848 births
1936 deaths
Neoclassical sculptors
Sculptors from Virginia
People from Luray, Virginia
19th-century American sculptors
19th-century American male artists
American male sculptors
20th-century American sculptors
20th-century American male artists
Neo-Confederates
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