Posted in Immigrants, Monuments, National Parks

Bunker Hill Monuments Set to Lose Quotes From the Civil War and Reconstruction Era

   Published Date: June 10, 2026

The National Park Service exhibition at the Bunker Hill Monument is undergoing changes in response to President Trump’s 2025 Executive Order “Restoring Sanity” in the retelling of American history. While Bunker Hill is a Revolutionary site, the exhibits under attack depict the Era of the Civil War and Reconstruction. There has been resistance from elected officials and the public in the Boston area to the decision to strip the exhibit of references to African Americans, women, and immigrants. According to the Washington Post:

“The National Park Service has ordered the removal of three quotes at the Bunker Hill Monument in Boston commemorating a Revolutionary War battle because they have run afoul of President Donald Trump’s policy seeking to scrub “corrosive ideology” from federal institutions, according to three people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

The site includes panels with quotes from historic figures or writings that reflect on the 200-year-old monument. A visitor at the site complained to park staff about a quote related to women’s suffrage as being “woke” feminist ideology, the people familiar said, and the visitor later sent an email complaint…
That prompted a wider review of material at the site that ultimately led the agency to order the removal of the three quotes in time for the 251st anniversary of the monument on June 17, two of the people said. The panel quotes have not yet been removed.”
One quote came from an 1846 letter sent by G.B. Stebbins in the abolitionist newspaper The Liberator that said “As we drew near to Boston, there stood Bunker Hill Monument, towering up towards the heavens, as if in silent, bitter mockery of the millions of slaves guarded by the professed lovers of Liberty, who reared it’s lofty column.” Quotes about Black people have been frequent targets of the Trump Administration if they appear on government exhibits.
In 1875, The Boston Pilot, an Irish immigrant publication, issued an editorial on the old guard Anglo Saxon aristocracy trying to write Catholics and Irish out of the history of the United States during the Centennial of the American Revolution. The Pilot said: “Now that a public orator has declared that foreign-born men have no association with the men of the Revolution, it is our duty to show that in love of freedom and loyalty to the republic, the citizens of foreign birth take no second place.” References to the immigrant background of the United States are often frequent targets.
Sen. Ed Markey opposes the change saying that “The Administration should learn from all the lessons of Bunker Hill: America was built on the fight for that freedom. No money from Congress should go to the Trump censorship brigade.”
The president’s Executive Order says that some of the National Parks harm the “United States by casting its founding principles and historical milestones in a negative light.” The president says that proper history should “foster unity.” He writes that “Rather than fostering unity and a deeper understanding of our shared past, the widespread effort to rewrite history deepens societal divides and fosters a sense of national shame.” The president sketches out how the National Park Service should approach history:

“It is the policy of my Administration to restore Federal sites dedicated to history, including parks and museums, to solemn and uplifting public monuments that remind Americans of our extraordinary heritage, consistent progress toward becoming a more perfect Union, and unmatched record of advancing liberty, prosperity, and human flourishing. ”

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Author: Patrick Young