"After four years of arduous service, marked by unsurpassed courage and fortitude, the Army of Northern Virginia has been compelled to yield to overwhelming numbers and resources.

I need not tell the survivors of so many hard-fought battles who have remained steadfast to the last that I have consented to this result from no distrust of them; but feeling that valor and devotion could accomplish nothing that could compensate for the loss that would have attended the continuance of the contest, I determined to avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose past services have endeared them to their countrymen. By the terms of the agreement, officers and men can return to their homes and remain until exchanged.

You may take with you the satisfaction that proceeds from the consciousness of duty faithfully performed, and I earnestly pray that a merciful God will extend to you his blessing and protection.

With an unceasing admiration of your constancy and devotion to your country, and a grateful remembrance of your kind and generous consideration of myself, I bid you all an affectionate farewell."

"I have fought against the people of the North because I believed they were seeking to wrest from the South its dearest right. But I have never cherished toward them bitter or vindictive feelings, and I have never seen the day when I did not pray for them."

"Our cause was so just, so sacred, that had I known all that has come to pass, had I known what was to be inflicted upon me, all that my country was to suffer, all that our posterity was to endure, I would do it all over again."

"NOT FOR FAME, NOT FOR PLACE OR RANK, NOT LURED BY AMBITION OR GOADED BY NECESSITY; BUT IN SIMPLE OBEDIENCE TO DUTY AS THEY UNDERSTOOD IT THESE MEN SUFFERED ALL, SACRIFICED ALL, DARED ALL - AND DIED."

"I was born a Daughter of the Confederacy. A part of my heritage was that I came into this world with the blood of a soldier in my veins...a soldier who may have had nothing more to leave behind to me and to those who come after me except in heritage...a heritage so rich in honor and glory that it far surpasses any material wealth that could be mine. But it is mine, to cherish, to nurture and to make grace, and to pass along to those yet to come."
Mary Nowlin Moon, UDC, Chapter 10, Lynchburg, VA (1915)

"There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery as an institution is a moral and political evil... How long their servitude may be necessary is known and ordered by a merciful Providence. Their emancipation will sooner result from the mild and melting influences of Christianity than from the storm and tempest of fiery controversy. This influence, though slow, is sure. The doctrines and miracles of our Saviour have required nearly two thousand years to convert but a small portion of the human race, and even among Christian nations what gross errors still exist! While we see the course of the final abolition of human slavery is still onward, and give it the aid of our prayers, let us leave the progress as well as the results in the hands of Him who, chooses to work by slow influences, and with whom a thousand years are but as a single day."
Letter dated December 27, 1856

Editorial Note: Historians generally agree that the "cause" that the Southerners fought for, was not for slavery, but for states' rights. (The vast majority of Southern soldiers did not own slaves.) Lee was right, Christianity would prevail in the end.