Trump resurrects bases’ Confederate names, though Fort Polk won’t honor Episcopal bishop

[Episcopal News Service] Fort Johnson, an Army installation in Louisiana, is poised for another name change – back to Fort Polk – though the reversal, promised this week by President Donald Trump, won’t officially honor the fort’s original namesake, Episcopal Bishop Leonidas Polk.

Instead, Fort Polk will honor Gen. James H. Polk, a Silver Star recipient who served in World War II.

During the Biden administration, the Pentagon had renamed nine bases that previously were named for Confederate generals. Fort Polk became Fort Johnson, honoring a Black soldier, William Henry Johnosn, who served in World War I. The changes were based on a commission’s recommendations to fulfill legislation passed by Congress mandating the elimination of the Confederate names.

On June 10, Trump said his administration intended to return all nine bases to their original Confederate names. The bases, however, now would officially honor different war heroes who happen to have the same names as the Confederates but fought for the United States rather than against it.

“We won a lot of battles out of those forts. It’s no time to change,” Trump said in explaining his desire to resurrect the bases’ Confederate names.

Bishop Leonidas Polk left the Diocese of Louisiana in 1861 to join the Confederate Army and fight for the South in the Civil War. Photo: Library of Congress

Polk, the Episcopal bishop is arguably one of the most controversial figures in the church’s history. Born in 1806 to a family of slaveholders, he has long been lauded for his role leading the church’s 19th century expansion as a missionary bishop and as the first bishop of Louisiana, and he was the driving force behind the 1857 founding of the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee.

He later was both honored and vilified for joining the Confederacy as a general in support of the South’s succession to preserve slavery. Sometimes referred to as “the fighting bishop,” Polk was killed in 1864 on a battlefield in Georgia.

Long after his death, Polk’s name and tributes to him could be found in Episcopal churches across the United States, though in recent years, many of those displays have been removed as congregations and the larger church have grappled with their complicity in slavery and other racist systems.

The decision to restore the name of Fort Polk has generated criticism from those who argue Johnson, the World War II soldier, is more deserving of the honor. State lawmakers from Johnson’s native New York issued a statement objecting to the move.

“In yet another attempt to revise our nation’s proud history, the implications of reverting to a name with such proximity to the original inspired by the Confederacy is an insult to Black Americans who have served this nation honorably,” the lawmakers said. “Sgt. Henry Johnson’s legacy deserves full recognition. He embodied the very ideals of courage, sacrifice, and patriotism that our military installations should reflect.”

– David Paulsen is a senior reporter and editor for Episcopal News Service based in Wisconsin. He can be reached at dpaulsen@episcopalchurch.org.