Statue of Hans Christian Heg

Hans Christian Heg (1829-1863) was a Norwegian American abolitionist, journalist, anti-slavery activist, politician and soldier. He was born at Haugestad in the community of Lierbyen in Lier, Buskerud, Norway, where his father ran an inn. His family emigrated to the US in 1840, and settled at Muskego Settlement, Wisconsin. After two years as a Forty-Niner in California following the California Gold Rush, Heg returned to settle in Wisconsin.

Heg is best known as the colonel who commanded the 15th Wisconsin Volunteer Regiment on the Union side in the American Civil War. He died of the wounds he received at the Battle of Chickamauga. A 10 ft (3.0 m) high pyramid of 8 in (20 cm) shells at Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park marks the site on the battlefield where Heg was mortally wounded.

The bronze sculpture measures approximately 9.5 ft × 3 ft × 3 ft (2.90 m × 0.91 m × 0.91 m), and stands on a granite base which measures approximately 6 ft × 5 ft × 5 ft (1.8 m × 1.5 m × 1.5 m).[1]

The statue depicts Colonel Heg standing in his Union Army uniform, with a long belted double-breasted dress coat, riding boots, and girt with a sword to his left side. He has a beard and moustache, and is bare headed, with his Hardee hat held in his right hand.

The statue was created in 1925 as a gift of the Norwegian Society of America, which raised funds for its cost. The sculptor was the Norwegian-American Paul Fjelde who, in describing his work said, "The figure that I have created shows a much younger Colonel Heg than his photographs. After all he was a young man, only thirty-three when he died. I tried to regain the spirit of youth which must have been his before the cares of war had aged him beyond his years. I think I have succeeded."[2]

The statue is one of three casts made at the foundry of Ernst Poleszynski[3] in Kristiania, Norway.[4][5] It was shipped in 1925 from Norway on the Norwegian-American Line, arrived in New York on August 21 of that year, and completed the rest of its journey to Madison on September 3. After its arrival, the 2,000 lb (910 kg) crate containing the statue was stored in the northeast pavilion of the Capitol Building. The delay between arrival and dedication lasted for more than a year, and was due to the need to raise some $2,000 to purchase and erect a base for the statue's final home.[6]

Two thousand spectators attended the unveiling of the statue on October 17, 1926 at the Wisconsin State Capitol. It was dedicated "in memory of a distinguished citizen and volunteer soldier of the Civil war period."[1][7][8]

The statue in Madison, Wisconsin, was beheaded and thrown in Lake Monona by protestors, incensed by the arrest of a member of Black Lives Matter as demonstrations in Madison turned violent in June 2020,[15][16] despite it being of a Union soldier and abolitionist.[17][18] The Associated Press reported that "it seems likely that few Wisconsinites know Heg's biography".[17][18] On the morning of 24 June, someone painted "Fire Matt Kenny" on the base of the Heg statue.[19] (This was a reference to an incident in 2015, when a police officer shot and killed a 19-year-old black man; the police officer was cleared of any criminal wrongdoing, and is still employed.)[19] Another Capitol Hill statue toppled on the same night, Forward, is of a female figure representing Wisconsin's "Forward" motto.[19]

Protester Micah Le said the two statues paint a picture of Wisconsin as a racially progressive state "even though slavery has continued in the form of a corrections system built around incarcerating Blacks."[19] Two protesters interviewed by the Wisconsin State Journal said that toppling the statues was to draw attention to their view of Wisconsin as being racially unjust.[20]

Black student activists had called for the removal of the statue of Abraham Lincoln at University of Wisconsin–Madison in early June 2020, and repeated those calls after Heg's statue was toppled.[21][22]

On July 20, 2020, the State Capitol and Executive Residence Board (SCERB) voted unanimously to repair the Colonel Heg and Forward statues. As of that date, the Wisconsin Department of Administration was still compiling a cost estimate, and the Wisconsin Historical Society planned to start a fundraising drive[23] to raise $50,000 to offset the insurance deductible. The SCERB signed off on that effort unanimously as well.[24] At the time of the vote, the head and the spur of the right boot of the statue were still missing, and photographs of the statue showed the left leg as still removed as well.[25][26] The Wisconsin State Department of Administration planned to build a new head by recasting the head of a similar Heg statue near the town of Norway, Wisconsin.[27] The state of Wisconsin received a grant of $30,000 from the National Endowment for the Humanities the following October towards the expense of repairing of both the Heg and Forward statues. The statues were taken to Detroit where restoration will be done by Venus Bronze Works Inc. with reinstallation on the Capitol grounds anticipated by July 2021.[28][29]

• List of monuments and memorials removed during the George Floyd protests

• Media related to Hans Christian Heg by Paul Fjelde at Wikimedia Commons