Soldiers and Sailors Monument (Lancaster, Pennsylvania)
monument in Lancaster, Pennsylvania
The Soldiers and Sailors Monument is a 43-foot (13 m) tall Gothic Revival memorial which stands in Penn Square in downtown Lancaster, Pennsylvania. It was dedicated on July 4, 1874, at its present site on the Northeast intersection of King and Queen Streets. The monument's original intention was to pay tribute to Lancastrian Union soldiers killed during the American Civil War. However, today the Soldiers and Sailors Monument also represents those who have served in subsequent American military conflicts.
The 1744 Treaty of Lancaster between the British and Iroquois was signed in the old Lancaster courthouse which stood on the site of the monument at the time.
The Soldiers and Sailors Monument also stands on the exact spot where the Second Continental Congress met during the American Revolutionary War on September 27, 1777, in the old Lancaster Courthouse. The courthouse was built in 1739 but later burned down in 1784, rebuilt 1787 to serve as State House from 1799 to 1812 and reverting as Lancaster County Courthouse until 1852.
The monument has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since April 2, 1973.
Description
The Lancaster Soldiers and Sailors Monument features a 43-foot (13 m) tall Rhode Island, rectangular granite pillar topped with a statue of a robed woman on a pedestal known as the "Genius of Liberty". The Genius of Liberty holds a drawn sword and a shield.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Soldiers and Sailors Monument (Lancaster, Pennsylvania)” as monument in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the places & architecture register because the source frames it as monument in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1121083. Authority coordinates are 40.038, -76.308. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1874, 1744, 1777 and 1739.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Soldiers and Sailors Monument (Lancaster, Pennsylvania)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.