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A COURAGEOUS SOLDIER,
Christian gentleman, and distinguished
educator,
Robert E. Lee was the fifth child and
third son of Henry "Light-Horse Harry"
Lee, famous Revolutionary general, and
Anne Hill (Carter) Lee. He was born on
January 19, 1807 at Stratford,
Westmoreland County, Virginia.
Two signers of the Declaration of
Independence, Lee's grandfather Richard
Henry Lee and granduncle Francis
Light-foot Lee, had also been born at
Stratford. General Lee's wife, Mary
Custis, whom he married in 1831, was a
great-granddaughter of Martha
Washington, and her father's residence,
Arlington House, across the Potomac from
Washington, had been their own home
until the Civil War.
At the age of eleven Robert lost his
father; at eighteen he entered the
Military Academy at West Point, where he
was adjutant of the corps and from which
he was graduated second in his class
without a demerit. At the outbreak of
the Mexican war he was captain of
engineers at San Antonio. He joined
General Winfield Scott in the Vera Cruz
expedition to win the general's lasting
confidence and esteem by his capacity on
the march. During the various
engagements leading to the capture of
Mexico City, in one of which Lee was
wounded, his regular rank was augmented
by three brevets for gallantry to that
of colonel. He returned to the United
States in 1848 and was supervising the
construction of Fort
Carroll in Baltimore harbor when
appointed superintendent of the Military
Academy in 1852. Three years later
United States Secretary of War Jefferson
Davis approved his transfer from
staff to line, and he was commissioned
lieutenant colonel of the 2nd Cavalry in
west Texas.
He was on leave at Arlington, which he
had inherited from his father-in-law, at
the time of John Brown's raid on Harpers
Ferry and was placed in command of the
detachment of marines that stormed the
engine house, capturing Brown and his
garrison."
When the lower south seceded in 1861,
General Scott, at the instance of
President Lincoln, offered Lee the chief
command of the United States forces,
which he refused. When Virginia seceded,
Colonel Lee tendered his resignation and
within two days was made commander in
chief of the military and naval forces
of Virginia. Though Lee had freed the
slaves which he had inherited from his
father-in-law and had no sympathy for
the institution, he wrote his sister at
the time that he could not raise his
hand against his relatives, his
children, and his home.
Lee led his men in a series of battles
and campaigns that still serve as models
of military strategy and won for him and
his army undying fame, even though he
lost the war. III- equipped and
outnumbered, with his men subsisting
near the end on a daily ration of a pint
of cornmeal and quarter of a pound of
bacon, he could not resist the massed
pressure of
Grant, who broke through his lines at
Petersburg. In January, 1865, Lee had
been confirmed general in chief of the
Confederate States. On April 9, he
surrendered what was left of his
fighting forces at Appomattox Court
House. Of thirty-five thousand troops
with which he started, only
seventy-eight hundred remained with arms
in their hands.
When General Lee appeared among his men
after the surrender, mounted on his
famous war horse Traveller, they
overwhelmed him with regard and
sympathy. As
a paroled prisoner of war he returned to
Richmond; he had no home, for Arlington
had been seized by the federal
government. The Lee continued to pay
rent on a house in Richmond in
Confederate money, which the landlord
insisted was in the original agreement.
Lee received many tempting offers but
accepted the presidency of Washington
Academy at a salary of fifteen hundred
dollars a year and set off alone for
Lexington on Traveller from a farmhouse
where he had spent the summer. The
buildings, damaged by federal troops,
were occupied by four professors and
forty-five cadets. The trustees managed
to borrow five thousand dollars so the
college could open. Through Lee's
leadership, and the cooperation of
patrons north and south, the academy
prospered. In 1867 there were four
hundred students enrolled, and the
trustees doubled his salary. Lee sought
to instill moral and religious ideals in
his students. He made many educational
innovations and initiated the honor
system. He said, "We have but one rule
here, and that is that every student
must be a gentleman." Washington College
changed its name to Washington and Lee
University in his honor.
General Lee had applied for a pardon and
the restoration of his citizenship on
June 13, 1865, but the pardon was never
granted. He was indicted for treason and
never brought to trial, but America's
great examplar continued to live without
bitterness. His three sons followed him
in the conflict. One son, George
Washington Custis Lee, graduated at the
head of his class at West Point, was
aide-de-camp to Jefferson Davis, major
general of a division of the army of
northern Virginia, and when General Lee
died on October 12, 1870, succeeded his
father as president of Washington and
Lee University.
No American had a comparable influence
on the people of the Confederate states.
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Physically, morally, and intellectually
he was no ordinary man. Of deep
religious convictions, he was a true
soldier of the cross. His faith in the
God of his fathers, his devotion to
duty, patient serenity, tolerance of
others, all blend into one preeminent
personality to form the Southern
gentleman. Out of all the carnage and
sorrow of that unfortunate conflict,
the sublimity of General Lee emerges as
both the incarnation of the lost cause
and the guiding spirit of the resurgent
South. (1)
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There were more slaves died in the
concentration camps of the yanke's than
died on both sides of the War for
Southern Independence. (2)
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The War for Southern Independence was
not faught over slavery. Just as it is
stated here, it was faught for Southern
Independence, and economics. As stated in the U S
Constitution, we seceded from the
Union because they were getting too big
for their britches, too big of a
government. (and still are)
Also, when our slaves
were set free after 6 or 7 years, they
would head north and take jobs up north.
There was a black man who was a slave
owner in New
Orleans who tried to get it to where
slaves were owned for life. Think of
that, a black man! Yankes also had
slaves, but they don't
mention that, or any of this other
mentioned here in our (their) history
books,
written by yahkees. ;o wonder why???
(3)
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Southerners did not have time to go
sailing off in ships to capture
Africans, they were too busy farming and trying to make a living.
Yankee ships, and ships from European
countries sailed to Africa and traded
the stronger tribes whisky and the like
for the weaker tribes they had captured. (4)
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The Confederate battle flag is not a
symbol of hate. It is a symbol of heretage. Heretage of my ancestors who fought in the War for Southern Independence. It is a symbol of my heretage. It was the flag for the
Confederate States of America, just like
the stars and strips was and still is
the flag for the Unided States of
America. There was slavery under both
flags. If we are going to lower one because it stood for slavery, we have to lower both.
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Created and designed by Wile E. Coyote, 'Cowboy','Colt', TLRJr.
footnotes:
1. coppied from the book
'Sons of the
South'. page 148. :o
2. see the link to Southern Initiative above at My Links. :o
3. see the link to Southern Initiative above at My Links. :o
4. 'Facts the Historians
Leave out'. Page 11. :o
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