If it weren’t bad enough that the city of Richmond decided to desecrate the grave of General A.P. Hill, the contractor who carried out the hideous work decided to make things even worse with a series of flippant and sometimes profane Facebook posts insulting and ridiculing General Hill.
Patrick Lindsay, the Director of Operations of the contracting company in question, made an extensive series of posts showing the once magnificent monument being hideously dismantled and the grave site being turned into a pathetic pile of rubble. Lindsay brags about his role in the despicable act of desecration and proudly poses for a selfie in front of his horrific handiwork.
“AP Hill caved like a pathetic little bitch,” Lindsay wrote in one caption.
In another post, he wrote: “As far as I can tell the inventory was a few buttons, the brass hardware from the oaken box, two femurs, a skull, some assorted ribs, and a pelvis… No partridges. No pear trees.”
Seeing the photos of this vicious and intentional destruction makes me feel as if my soul is being crushed, and as if a knife is being twisted in my heart. Yet again, everything that makes my life worth living, dismantled piece by excruciating piece, deliberately reduced to a pitiful pile of rocks. The fact that anyone could witness (let alone participate in) such a thing and post about it in such a casual, flippant, and joking manner… is incomprehensible. Disgusting. Appalling. Abhorrent. No words are quite sufficient to express the pain that these actions have caused me.
So I’d like to correct Mr. Lindsay.
In reality, A.P. Hill was a brave and skilled general who fought for what he believed in.
And in reality, Patrick Lindsay is a pathetic little bitch.
Patrick Lindsay has never in his life demonstrated even a shred of courage, integrity, or moral character. In fact, he chose to do the most cowardly thing a human being could ever do. He chose to attack, insult, and ridicule someone who is completely helpless, someone who cannot do anything whatsoever to defend himself. Someone who is dead.
Hopefully Patrick Lindsay dies painfully one day, like A.P. Hill did, and hopefully, years later, someone desecrates his grave, digs up his remains, and profanely insults and ridicules him. Then maybe his soul (if it even exists, which is doubtful, now that I think about it) will look upon what is happening and gain a tiny shred of understanding of what A.P. Hill has gone through.
Far too many people have lost sight of the fact that every historical figure was a human being. And no human being deserves to be treated the way A.P. Hill has been treated.
A.P. Hill didn’t deserve to be murdered by an invading army that was waging a war to force people to remain part of the United States against their will. (That was what the Union side in the Civil War was doing.)
A.P. Hill didn’t deserve to be murdered again, over 150 years after his physical death, by having his statue obliterated and his remains desecrated.
A.P. Hill didn’t deserve to be insulted and ridiculed by a coward who has never suffered any hardships, never taken a stand for any principles, and never contributed anything positive to the world.
I stand with A.P. Hill.
Pardon my French, but…
Fuck Patrick Lindsay, and fuck every miserable excuse for a person who thinks that murdering historical figures is even remotely acceptable.