As officials across the country examine whether to display Confederate monuments in U.S. cities, the area park dedicated to one of the most noteworthy Civil War battles has no plans to remove anything memorializing Confederates.

In the wake of white supremacist rally and ensuing violence in Charlottesville, Virginia, Gettysburg National Military Park has not received any new complaints about its Confederate monuments at the park, said spokeswoman Katie Lawhon.

More than 1,300 monuments, markers and plaques are housed at the park to memorialize the historic battle, including a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and a Confederate flag on display in the museum. The park maintains that the memorials are important to the cultural landscape and has no plans to remove any monuments or statues.

"The National Park Service is committed to safe guarding these unique and site-specific memorials in perpetuity, while simultaneously interpreting holistically and objectively the actions, motivations, and causes of the soldiers and states they commemorate," states policy from the U.S. National Parks Service.

Charlottesville's unrest Saturday was a result of a clashes between "pro-white" rally protesting the city's decision to remove its statue of Lee and counter-protesters. An apparent car attack by James Alex Fields Jr. during the unrest killed 32-year-old Heather Heyer on Saturday, as a result of Fields plowing into a group of counter protesters, injuring 19 others.

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The incidents in Charlottesville have reignited the debate about honoring Confederate statues and monuments across the country, a movement which gathered a steam in 2015 as then South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley removed the Confederate flag from its prominent spot at the state capitol.

Leaders in other southern states are facing similar decisions with statues as Charlottesville has with the Lee statue. Mayor Jim Gray, of Lexington, Kentucky, said the events in Charlottesville "accelerated" the process of removing two statues from Lexington streets and placing them in a local park.

In Baltimore, Mayor Catherine Pugh has looked into removing Confederate-era monuments in the city, voicing frustration that the process wasn't further along for two of four monuments that have been recommended for removal. A statue of Supreme Court Justice Roger Taney, author of the Dred Scott decision, might be removed as Maryland House Speaker Michael E. Busch is calling for the removal of the Annapolis statue. Monuments in Jacksonville, Florida are coming under fire as activists push for removal of the symbols.



After the Civil War, Lee resisted efforts to build Confederate monuments in his honor and instead wanted the nation to move on from the Civil War, according to an Associated Press report.

After his death, Southerners adopted "The Lost Cause" revisionist narrative about the Civil War and placed Lee as its central figure. The Lost Cause argued the South knew it was fighting a losing war and decided to fight it anyway on principle. It also tried to argue that the war was not about slavery but high constitutional ideals.

As The Lost Cause narrative grew in popularity, proponents pushed to memorialize Lee, ignoring his deficiencies as a general and his role as a slave owner, according to Gary Gallagher, a University of Virginia professor specializing in the history of the Civil War. Lee monuments went up in the 1920s just as the Ku Klux Klan was experiencing a resurgence and new Jim Crow segregation laws were adopted.

The Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville was erected in 1924. A year later, the U.S. Congress voted to use federal funds to restore the Lee mansion in the Arlington National Cemetery.

The U.S. Mint issued a coin in his honor, and Lee has been on five postage stamps. Most Union figures, besides President Abraham Lincoln, weren't granted as many honors.

Shawn Alexander, associate professor of African and African-American studies at the University of Kansas, said that despite the attempt to use Lee as a reconciliation figure, many African-Americans spoke out in the black press that Lee had betrayed the U.S. and was responsible for tens of thousands of deaths. "He was no hero in their eyes," Alexander said.

By the early 20th century, Northern state politicians -- fearing deadly violence over black civil rights in the South -- caved to pressure from Southern leaders to cast Lee in a more conciliatory light, said Gerald Horne, a professor of history and African-American studies at the University of Houston. "The South showed it would shed blood," Horne said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.