Edith D. Pope (1869 – 1947) was an American editor. She was the second editor of the ''

Confederate Veteran The ''Confederate Veteran'' was a magazine about veterans of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War of 1861–1865, propagating the myth of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy. It was instrumental in popularizing the legend of Sa ...

'' from 1914 to 1932, and the president of the Nashville No. 1 chapter of the

United Daughters of the Confederacy The United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) is an American neo-Confederate hereditary association for female descendants of Confederate Civil War soldiers engaging in the commemoration of these ancestors, the funding of monuments to them, ...

from 1927 to 1930. She played a critical role in the promotion of the

Lost Cause of the Confederacy The Lost Cause of the Confederacy (or simply Lost Cause) is an History of the United States, American pseudohistorical historical negationist, negationist mythology that claims the cause of the Confederate States during the American Civil Wa ...

Early life

Edith Drake Pope was born in 1869 to a former slaveholding family. She grew up in Williamson County, "less than one mile" from the John Pope House in

Burwood, Tennessee Burwood, Tennessee is an unincorporated community in southwestern Williamson County, Tennessee. History The hamlet was "originally named Williamsburg, later Shaw and ultimately Burwood." In the middle decades of the 20th century, Burwood was a r ...

, built by her paternal great-grandfather. Her father, William Campbell Pope, served in the

Confederate States Army The Confederate States Army, also called the Confederate Army or the Southern Army, was the military land force of the Confederate States of America (commonly referred to as the Confederacy) during the American Civil War (1861–1865), fighting ...

during the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by state ...

of 1861–1865. She had two brothers and three sisters. Pope graduated from the (now defunct)

Tennessee Female College Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

Franklin, Tennessee Franklin is a city in and county seat of Williamson County, Tennessee, United States. About south of Nashville, it is one of the principal cities of the Nashville metropolitan area and Middle Tennessee. As of 2020, its population was 83,454 ...

, in 1888.

Career

Pope began her career as

Sumner Archibald Cunningham Sumner Archibald Cunningham (July 21, 1843 – December 20, 1913) was an American Confederate soldier and journalist. He was the editor of a short lived Confederate magazine called "Our Day" (1883-1884) published in New York. In 1893 he establish ...

's secretary; Cunningham was the founder and editor of the ''Confederate Veteran'', a monthly magazine about veterans of the

. When he died in December 1913, she became its editor until her retirement in 1932. Pope was an active member of the

. She was the president of the Nashville No. 1 chapter from 1927 to 1930, and its recording secretary from 1930 to 1935. She helped install the

Matthew Fontaine Maury Monument The Matthew Fontaine Maury Monument, is a partially deconstructed memorial installed along Richmond, Virginia's Monument Avenue depicting Matthew Fontaine Maury and commemorating his Confederate naval service and contributions to oceanography and ...

in Richmond, Virginia, and the Tennessee Confederate Women's Monument in Nashville. She was also a member of the Confederate Memorial Literary Society, which established the

Museum of the Confederacy The American Civil War Museum is a multi-site museum in the Greater Richmond Region of central Virginia, dedicated to the history of the American Civil War. The museum operates three sites: The White House of the Confederacy, American Civil War M ...

in Richmond; it was later renamed the

American Civil War Museum The American Civil War Museum is a multi-site museum in the Greater Richmond Region of central Virginia, dedicated to the history of the American Civil War. The museum operates three sites: The White House of the Confederacy, American Civil War M ...

Pope also played a key role in the construction of

Confederate Memorial Hall The Confederate Memorial Hall (sometimes calling itself the "Confederate Embassy") was a museum, library, and social club owned by the Confederate Memorial Association and located at 1322 Vermont Avenue NW in Washington, D.C. The brownstone that ...

Peabody College Vanderbilt Peabody College of Education and Human Development (also known as Vanderbilt Peabody College, Peabody College, or simply Peabody) is the education school of Vanderbilt University, a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee ...

(now

Vanderbilt University Vanderbilt University (informally Vandy or VU) is a private research university in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1873, it was named in honor of shipping and rail magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt, who provided the school its initial $1-million ...

) in Nashville, where she made sure the college would also teach a course on Southern history. Pope supported the

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and Ca ...

and

Jim Crow laws The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Other areas of the United States were affected by formal and informal policies of segregation as well, but many states outside the Sou ...

. She was a proponent of the "repatriation" of African-American United States citizens to Africa, and she was nostalgic about the

American Colonization Society The American Colonization Society (ACS), initially the Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America until 1837, was an American organization founded in 1816 by Robert Finley to encourage and support the migration of freebo ...

Personal life and death

Pope resided in the West End neighborhood of Nashville, next to Centennial Park and Vanderbilt University. Pope died on January 27, 1947, in Burwood, Tennessee.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pope, Edith D. 1869 births 1947 deaths People from Williamson County, Tennessee People from Nashville, Tennessee American magazine editors Women magazine editors Members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy Neo-Confederates