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Virginia Governor Ralph Northam on Thursday called for the removal of a 50-foot arch at Fort Monroe that honors the former president of the Confederacy - two months after a blackface scandal nearly ended his time in office. The Daily Press reported that Northam's office presented a letter to the Fort Monroe Authority Board of Trustees supporting removal of the Jefferson Davis Memorial Arch, which was built near to where the first enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia some 400 years ago. The board's eight members voted unanimously for the structure's removal, though this is likely to be a long process...

"Just 90 miles from here in 1619, the first indentured servants from Africa landed on our shores in Ole Point Comfort," Northam said Embattled Virginia Governor, Ralph Northam (D-VA), referred to people that came to America as slaves from Africa as “indentured servants from Africa” during an interview with CBS News’ Gayle King on Sunday. Northam sat down with King for his first interview since the Virginian-Pilot published a photo from Northam’s medical school yearbook showing “two men, one in blackface and one in a Ku Klux Klan robe and hood, on the same page as the governor.” King asked...

President Barack Obama has chosen a historic 19th-century Army fort on the Virginia coast to be his first national monument. Fort Monroe, one of the few Union military installations in the South during the Civil War never occupied by Confederate forces, will get the designation under the 1906 Antiquities Act. "It's a huge economic opportunity for southern Virginia," Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told The Virginian-Pilot of the site that holds both Civil War and African-American history. Antiquities Act designations haven’t always gone down well. Utah officials complained in 1996 that President Bill Clinton caught them off guard by creating the...

FORT MONROE, Va. (8/23/2005) — Most local headlines in Charleston, S.C., probably won’t grab national attention: a road is closed for construction, local officials debate a proposed law, a man is shot in a small town outside Charleston. But how about this for a headline: “Run for Your Lives: Charleston will blow up this week.” A military training exercise, Sudden Response 2005, is using Charleston as the setting of a nuclear disaster to improve the United States’ readiness if such an event should occur. At Fort Monroe, Joint Task Force Civil Support, a unit composed of servicemembers from all branches...

Commission Votes to Close Five Army Bases By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer 9 minutes ago The commission considering the Pentagon's proposal to restructure hundreds of U.S. military bases voted to shut down five major Army bases in Georgia, New Jersey, Virginia and Michigan. As it began final voting Wednesday with lightning speed, the nine-member panel also signed off on closing nearly 400 Army Reserve and National Guard facilities in dozens of states, creating instead new joint centers. The commission decided to side with the Pentagon in closing Fort Gillem and Fort McPherson in Georgia, Fort Monroe in Virginia, the...

The Army has taken the extraordinary step of relieving a four-star general, with military sources citing sexual misconduct as the reason. An official announcement yesterday did not specify why Gen. Kevin P. Byrnes, 52, was removed from his command of all soldier training and doctrine development, but two retired Army officers said it was for having an extramarital affair. Adultery is illegal in the military, constituting conduct unbecoming an officer. The sources said they think the woman was not a subordinate of Gen. Byrnes at U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, Fort Monroe, Va.

WASHINGTON (Army News Service, June 30, 2005) – Germany showed its commitment to the U.S. Army when its embassy officials presented the nation’s second-highest service award June 29 to an American general. German Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger presented Gen. Kevin P. Byrnes, U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command’s commanding general, with the Federal Republic of Germany’s Knight Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit at a ceremony. The award was presented to Byrnes on behalf of Germany’s Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder. “We are truly thankful for his personal commitment, which was the driving force of intensified positive military relations between the United...

Monroe closure defended The fort has little military use and should be closed, the Army tells a base-closure commission. BY DAVID LERMAN I (202) 824-8224 May 19 2005 WASHINGTON -- Army leaders defended their recommendation to close Fort Monroe on Wednesday, saying Hampton's historic fort is a relatively small base for strictly administrative use and has low military value. Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey said the proposed closures of Fort Monroe and two bases in Georgia are part of an effort to consolidate Army forces into larger, multi-use bases that can accommodate greater numbers of troops. Under the Pentagon's plan,...

Military working dogs Don (on bench) from Fort Knox, Ky., and Goro wear donated Doggles, eyewear designed especially to protect dogs' eyes from heat and desert sandstorms, while working in Iraq with their military police partners. American citizens organize donations for dog handlers in Iraq By Sgt. 1st Class Reginald P. RogersApril 9, 2004 FORT MONROE, Va. (Army News Service, April 5, 2004) -- The military police motto "of the troops and for the troops" has been taken to heart by some American citizens concerned for the Army's four-legged troops: the military working dogs. The MWD teams, an intricate...

FORT MONROE, Va., Sept. 4 — The Army is looking to instill the fighting spirit in some unlikely combatants — its cooks, mechanics and other support troops who are normally far from the front lines. Unlike the Marine Corps, whose credo is that every marine is first and foremost a rifleman, the Army has too many soldiers who have lost touch with their inner warrior, said Gen. Kevin P. Byrnes, the Army's top training general. And, he said, it is time the Army borrowed a lesson from the Marines. "We've become too specialized," said General Byrnes, the head of Training...

For Your Info. The Army bases currently proposed for closure or realignment in 2005 include: Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania; Detroit Arsenal, Michigan; Fort Belvoir, Virginia; Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico; Fort McPherson/Gillem, Georgia; Fort Monmouth, New Jersey; Fort Monroe, Virginia; Fort Polk, Louisiana (to realign); Fort Richardson, Alaska; Fort Sam Houston, Texas; Fort Shafter, Hawaii; Lima Army Tank Plant, Ohio; Natick Soldier Center, Massachusetts; Picatinny Arsenal, New Jersey; Redstone Arsenal, Alabama; Rock Island Arsenal, Illinois; Sierra Army Depot, California; and Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona. Air Force base closures and realignments include: Altus AFB, Oklahoma; Beale AFB, California; Brooks AFB, Texas; Cannon AFB,...