UC-NRLF 
 
 SB 
 
THE BEACON BIOGRAPHIES 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 M. A. DEWOLFE HOWE 
 
 ROBERT E. LEE 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM P. TRENT 
 

g - 
 
 1 I M I I in I I 1 \ I I i i 1 I > ! / I > 1 I I XJ ^* 
 
ROBERT E. LEE 
 
 WILLIAM P. TRENT 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY 
 MDCCCCVII 
 
Copyright, 
 By Small, Maynard & Company 
 
 Entered at Stationers Hall 
 
 Press of 
 George H. Ellis, Boston 
 
The photogravure used as a frontispiece 
 to this volume is from a photograph by 
 Homeier & Clark, Richmond, of a por 
 trait by William G. Browne, now in the 
 possession of the Westmoreland Club, 
 Richmond. It is here reproduced by the 
 courteous permission of the owners. Tlie 
 present engraving is by John Andrew & 
 Son, Boston. 
 
 284483 
 
TO BRAIDER MATTHEWS. 
 
 Who makes gratitude a pleasure and friend- 
 ship an inspiration. 
 
PKEFACE. 
 
 In preparing this little volume, I have 
 drawn freely upon the larger biographies 
 of General Lee, particularly upon the elabo 
 rate and excellent one by the late General 
 A. L. Long, and upon those of General 
 Fitzhugh Lee, Eev. J. William Jones, and 
 Professor Henry A. White. Their love of 
 their great subject makes me feel sure that 
 the surviving authors will not begrudge lend 
 ing of their substance to a writer who fully 
 acknowledges his indebtedness to them, and 
 whose sole desire is to add a small tribute 
 to the ever -increasing fame of one of the 
 world s noblest sons. In order, however, to 
 secure substantial accuracy, I have used 
 many books bearing on the war for the 
 Union, such as u Grant 7 s Memoirs," Dr. 
 Jtopes s u Story of the Civil War," Hen 
 derson s u Stonewall Jackson," Bache j s 
 u Life of General George Gordon Meade," 
 etc., and have consulted the records where 
 it seemed necessary. I must frankly admit 
 that, in the course of my studies, I was 
 
x PREFACE 
 
 often tempted to abandon them in despair ; 
 for nearly every author seemed bent on 
 defending Ms own hero from every possible 
 criticism, and on praising such commanders 
 on the other side as his own favorite had 
 defeated. In the mental confusion that 
 overcame me during this beivildering read 
 ing, I was almost rash enough to conclude 
 that, with a few books and a steadfast de 
 termination to praise Lee, I could acquit 
 myself of my task in a most determined and 
 manful fashion ; but now that it is finished 
 I am apprehensive that, not being a special 
 ist in military history, I have fallen into 
 errors even in my bare outline sketch. If 
 I have, I trust that they will be forgiven 
 me because I have loved much. For my 
 enthusiasm I do not ask to be forgiven, 
 although I find that that is a serious fault 
 in these critical days. My admiration for 
 General Lee has always been considerable, 
 but I questioned the full greatness of his 
 powers until I began to study his life closely. 
 Then I learned to see him as he is, not 
 
PEEFACE xi 
 
 merely a great son of my own native State, 
 not merely a great Southern general, not 
 merely a great American in whom citizens 
 of every section may take just pride, but, 
 better than all these, a supremely great and 
 good man, whose fame should not be limited 
 by the chauvinistic conceptions of patriotism 
 so rife among us to-day, but should be as 
 wide as humanity, or, better still, as his own 
 exquisite spirit of charity and brotherly 
 
 W. P. TRENT. 
 SEWANEE, TENN., March 1, 1899. 
 

CHRONOLOGY. 
 
 1807 
 
 January 19. Robert E. Lee was born at 
 Stratford, Westmoreland County, Ya. 
 
 1811 
 His family removed to Alexandria. 
 
 1818 
 
 His father died while Lee was in the 
 midst of his schooling. 
 
 1825 
 Entered West Point. 
 
 1829 
 
 Graduated second in his class. His 
 mother died. Assigned to duty at 
 Hampton Roads, Ya. 
 
 1831 
 
 June 30. Married Mary Randolph Custis, 
 of Arlington. 
 
 1834-37 
 Assistant to chief engineer of the army. 
 
 1837 
 
 June. Took charge of improvement of 
 Mississippi at St. Louis. 
 
xiv CHKOM)LOGY 
 
 1838 
 Made captain of engineers. 
 
 1841 
 
 At Fort Hamilton, in New York Har 
 bor, in charge of defences. 
 
 1844 
 Appointed visitor to West Point. 
 
 1846-47 
 
 Eendered distinguished services in Mexi 
 can War. 
 
 1848 
 January-June. Stationed in Mexico. 
 
 1849-52 
 At work on the defences of Baltimore. 
 
 1852-55 
 Superintendent of West Point Academy. 
 
 1855 
 
 April. Appointed lieutenant colonel of 
 the Second Cavalry. 
 
 1856-59 
 Saw service against Indians in Texas. 
 
 1859 
 
 October. Suppressed the John Brown in 
 surrection. 
 
CHEONOLOGY xv 
 
 1860 
 
 February. Took charge of Department 
 of Texas where he stayed one year. 
 
 1861 
 
 March 1. Eeturned to Arlington to his 
 family. 
 
 March 16. Appointed colonel of First 
 Cavalry. 
 
 April 18. Offered command of United 
 States armies. 
 
 April 20. Resigned commission in army. 
 April 23. Accepted command of Vir 
 ginia forces. 
 
 May-July. Organized troops and advised 
 President Davis in Eichmond. 
 August-October. Was in charge of abor 
 tive campaign in Western Virginia. 
 November. Had charge of coast defences 
 in South Carolina and Georgia until in 
 
 1862 
 
 March. He became military adviser to 
 President Davis. 
 
 June 1. Assumed command of Army of 
 Northern Virginia. 
 
xvi CHRONOLOGY 
 
 1862 (continued} 
 
 June 26-July 2. Commanded Confeder 
 ates in Seven Days fighting around 
 Richmond. 
 
 August 30. Defeated Pope at second Ma- 
 nassas. 
 
 September 5. Crossed the Potomac. Be 
 gan advance into Maryland. 
 September 12. Drew battle of Antietam 
 or Sharpsburg. Abandoned campaign 
 of invasion. 
 
 December 13. Won a victory over Burn- 
 side at Fredericksburg. 
 December. Was in winter quarters until 
 March. 
 
 1863 
 
 May 2-3. Won a victory over Hooker at 
 Chancellorsville. 
 
 May 10. His great lieutenant, " Stone 
 wall 7 Jackson, died. 
 June. Began movements leading up to 
 second invasion of the North. 
 July 1-3. Defeated at Gettysburg. 
 July 4-13. Made a masterly retreat and 
 recrossed the Potomac. 
 
CHEONOLOGY xvii 
 
 1863 (continued) 
 
 October-November. Conducted the inef 
 fective campaign of Mine Bun. 
 December. Lay in winter quarters on the 
 Eapidan until April. 
 
 1864 
 
 May 5-6. Fought the Battle of the Wil 
 derness against Grant. 
 May 8-18. Conducted fighting about 
 Spottsylvania Court-house. 
 May 2l-June 1. Conducted operations 
 on interior lines. 
 
 June 2-3. Fought a fierce battle at Cold 
 Harbor. 
 
 June 18. Joined Beauregard at Peters 
 burg. Siege of Petersburg began. 
 July 30. Fought the Battle of the Crater. 
 
 1865 
 
 February 9. Issued his first general order 
 as commander- in- chief. 
 April 2. Eetreated from Petersburg. 
 End of the siege. 
 April 3. Eichmond fell. 
 April 9. Surrendered to Grant at Appo- 
 mattox Court-house. 
 
xviii CHKONOLOGY 
 
 1865 (continued) 
 
 April 10. Issued his Farewell Address to 
 the Army of Northern Virginia. 
 June 13. Applied for pardon. 
 August 4. Elected President of Washing 
 ton College, Lexington, Va. (now Wash 
 ington and Lee University). 
 
 1867 
 
 February 4. Declined to be a candidate 
 for governorship of Virginia. 
 
 1870 
 
 March-April. Visited Georgia in search 
 of health. 
 
 October 12. Eobert E. Lee died at Lex 
 ington. 
 
ROBERT E. LEE 
 
ROBERT E. LEE. 
 
 I. 
 
 ROBERT EDWARD LEE was the third 
 son, by a second marriage, of the cele 
 brated " Light- horse Harry" Lee, who 
 played such a brave part as a cavalry 
 leader in the Revolutionary War, but is 
 perhaps better remembered for having 
 summed up the career of Washington in 
 the appropriate though often misquoted 
 phrase, first in war, first in peace, and 
 first in the hearts of his fellow- citizens. 77 
 The great Confederate chieftain un 
 doubtedly got much of his military 
 genius and fiery energy from his father s 
 side; but, in his nobly balanced moral 
 and spiritual nature, he seems to have 
 taken after his mother, Anne Hill Car 
 ter, who, in her person, represented 
 family traditions and powers as eminent 
 as those of the Lees. We have not time 
 to go into the records of these two fami 
 lies, which Lee himself never paraded. 
 
2 KOBEET S. LEE 
 
 It must suffice us to know that, after 
 ancient and honorable distinction in 
 England, men and women bearing the 
 names have for two centuries and a half 
 illustrated the annals of Virginia, with 
 public virtues and private graces which 
 culminate in the character and career of 
 the hero whose life will be briefly told 
 in these pages. 
 
 That life began on Jan. 19, 1807, in 
 the family house of Stratford in "West 
 moreland. County. In the same county, 
 at an estate looking out upon the same 
 broad Potomac, the greatest of all Vir 
 ginians and Americans had been born 
 seventy-five years before. In 1811, by 
 the removal of his father to Alexandria 
 in Fairfax County, the young boy, 
 whose name will be more and more 
 linked with that of Washington as time 
 goes on, was brought, as though by a 
 propitious fate, into a favored region, 
 over which the mature fame of his great 
 predecessor presided, and still presides, 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 3 
 
 like a tutelar genius. It was not admi 
 ration for Washington, the man, or in 
 terest in Washington, the city, from 
 which he had withdrawn ten years be 
 fore at the advent of Jefferson to power, 
 that induced Colonel Henry Lee to 
 change his residence, but the very 
 prudent and proper desire to afford his 
 eight children greater educational priv 
 ileges. The poetically- minded reader 
 will thank him, however, for thus giv 
 ing additional local contact to two great 
 careers destined to be linked still more 
 closely through a happy marriage 5 while 
 the reader who craves romance will be 
 glad to learn that it was from Alexan 
 dria that the old warrior, who had been 
 commissioned by his friend Madison as 
 major-general in the army for the in 
 vasion of Canada, sallied forth in July, 
 1812, for the succor and support of an 
 other friend, the Federalist editor Han 
 son. In the latter s behalf he received 
 wounds, at the hands of a Eepublican 
 
4 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 mob in Baltimore, that subsequently sent 
 him to the West Indies for five years in 
 a vain search for health, and to Cum 
 berland Island off the Georgia coast, the 
 estate of his dead comrade, General Na 
 thaniel Greene, to find release from his 
 sufferings far from his home and his 
 kindred. These elements of romance in 
 the father s life find few counterparts in 
 that of the son, just as the strong in 
 herited and transmitted passions of the 
 former were kept in splendid subjection 
 by the latter; but the highest glory 
 needs no glamour, and the unselfish life 
 of a great man, like Lee, epitomizes and 
 embodies as much of true glory as finite 
 men can attain to. 
 
 Meanwhile, with his father away to 
 the South, his brother Carter at Har 
 vard, and his brother Sidney Smith in 
 the navy, the young Eobert became 
 the nurse and mainstay of his invalid 
 mother ; for one of his sisters was an in 
 valid also, and one was still younger 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 5 
 
 than himself. All accounts go to prove 
 that never did any son accept responsi 
 bilities more faithfully or any mother 
 receive her son s loving services more 
 gratefully and appropriately, with ben 
 edictions and counsels and prayers. 
 "Bobert was always good/ his father 
 once wrote ; and this is the testimony 
 of the schoolmaster who trained him in 
 mathematics for West Point, and of 
 relatives who watched his development 
 with pride. The dignity and grace of 
 absolute self-poise, and of single-hearted 
 devotion to duty, are as characteristic 
 of Lee s youth as of that of Milton or 
 of Washington ; and in all three cases it 
 is impossible to discover the least trace 
 of unpleasant self- consciousness or of 
 priggishness. And with Lee ? as with 
 Washington, it was maternal devotion 
 that best seconded Nature in her task of 
 preparing for the world a rounded man. 
 His choice of a military career was 
 probably determined for Lee by in- 
 
6 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 herited capacities ; but perhaps, as some 
 biographers have suggested, he wished 
 also to relieve his mother of the charge 
 of supporting him. Doubtless he would 
 have succeeded equally well in the min 
 istry ; for his mere presence was from 
 his earliest youth a reproof to vice, as we 
 learn from the story of a dissipated host 
 of his, who came to his young guest s 
 room, without a word said by the latter, 
 and confessed his faults and promised 
 amendment. Milton, at Cambridge, was 
 just such an apostle of purity ; but pre 
 cisely as we are glad that Milton partly, 
 at least, abandoned theology for poetry, 
 so we are glad that Lee illustrated the 
 Christian virtues in the camp and on the 
 battlefield instead of in the pulpit. He 
 began to illustrate them, amid somewhat 
 alien surroundings, immediately upon 
 his entrance to West Point in 1825, on 
 an appointment secured for him by Gen 
 eral Andrew Jackson, on whom he had 
 made a good impression. He received 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 7 
 
 not a single demerit, was punctilious in 
 performing his soldierly duties, con 
 tracted not a vice or even an unsavory 
 habit, and finally gave proof of his dili 
 gence and of the clearness and strength 
 of his mind by graduating, after a four 
 years* course, with the second highest 
 honors of his class. He was at once ap 
 pointed second lieutenant of engineers, 
 and hastened home to his mother, who 
 was permitted just to smile upon him 
 before she died. 
 
 Two years later another woman came 
 permanently into Lee s life to make it 
 blessed in the highest sense of the word. 
 During his boyhood he had visited, at 
 Arlington, the beautiful Potomac home 
 of Mr. Washington Parke Custis, and 
 had been attracted by that gentleman s 
 surviving daughter, Mary Eandolph. 
 This grand- daughter of Washington s 
 wife seems to have been a lovely and 
 fine woman, as well as a great heiress. 
 Moreover, she knew how to recognize 
 
8 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 noble qualities in a man, which lovely 
 and fine women have not always done. 
 Lee in his cadet nniforin had looked 
 handsome enough, and had pleased 
 young and old alike, when during his 
 vacations he had gone from one Vir 
 ginia house to another, as was the fash 
 ion in those hospitable days; but he 
 must have been specially attractive, as 
 a tall, manly officer, when he took a 
 holiday from his engineering work on 
 the fortifications at Hampton Roads, in 
 order to visit Arlington and its young 
 mistress. In due time (June, 1831) 
 the courtship ended in one of those 
 delightful, old-fashioned country wed 
 dings of which the few survivors love to 
 tell. We can still read the names of 
 the bridesmaids and groomsmen, if we 
 have a mind to ; we can imagine the 
 hilarity of the well-cared-for slaves; 
 we can smile at the picture presented 
 by the tall parson, who, drenched in a 
 shower, had been forced to don habili- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 9 
 
 merits originally cut to the measure of 
 short Mr. Custis ; we can wish that some 
 Virginian poet had outstripped Suck 
 ling by making this wedding famous in 
 song. But, after all, the best thing we 
 can do is to remember that no purer 
 marriage was ever made, and that noth 
 ing but happiness flowed from it. 
 
 The honeymoon seems to have been 
 spent at Arlington, and must have given 
 Lee occasion to ponder, in his serious 
 way, over the responsibilities resting 
 upon the owner of many slaves. Neither 
 he nor his father-in-law believed in the 
 institution which was just beginning to 
 array its warm partisans and violent 
 opponents. Indeed, Mr. Custis manu 
 mitted his negroes ; and Lee, as executor, 
 carried out the provisions of his will, 
 although the War for the Union was 
 raging at the time. So long, however, 
 as circumstances forced him to be a 
 master, the young officer was determined 
 to be a kind one. There is even a story, 
 
10 KOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 as Professor White reminds us, that he 
 took a consumptive coachman of his 
 mother s to Georgia, and there had him 
 cared for. But Virginia country life 
 had its pleasures as well as its respon 
 sibilities 5 and, if Lee had been made of 
 less strenuous stuff, he would have hesi 
 tated to serve his country three years 
 longer in building coast defences, and 
 would have settled down at Arlington 
 to take his ease. He had loved hunting 
 ever since boyhood, when he used to fol 
 low the hounds for hours unfatigued; 
 the sights and sounds of Nature were 
 dear to him through life ; he could 
 have made himself as methodical a 
 farmer as Washington ; he thoroughly 
 enjoyed social visiting from plantation 
 to plantation. In a word, he had in 
 him the making of an ideal country 
 gentleman; but he had also something 
 more. He loved his profession, and felt 
 that it was a noble one ; and he resolved 
 to cling to it for his country s sake, al- 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 11 
 
 though he was too good a man to wish 
 for war and the personal distinction he 
 might acquire therein. 
 
II. 
 
 IN 1834 Lee was transferred from 
 Portress Monroe to Washington, where 
 he acted as assistant to the chief engi 
 neer of the army, with the rank of first 
 lieutenant. This enabled him to live 
 at Arlington ; but, on days when the 
 long horseback ride was impossible, he 
 joined a "mess" containing such emi 
 nent Southerners as William C. Bives, 
 Hugh S. Legare, and Joel E. Poinsett, 
 as well as some younger spirits, one 
 among whom was destined to obtain a 
 rank among Confederate commanders 
 second only to his own, Joseph E. John 
 ston. Lee was probably not the gayest 
 or most talkative of the company, al 
 though there is plenty of evidence that 
 he enjoyed a joke, and could tell one 
 on occasion; but at least he was never 
 known to speak ill of any one, and he 
 was not too sedate to invite a comrade 
 to mount behind him and ride double 
 down Pennsylvania Avenue. 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 13 
 
 After three years of such uneventful 
 life, he was ordered West to superintend 
 the proposed improvement of the Upper 
 Mississippi for the purposes of navi 
 gation. At St. Louis the river was 
 threatening to leave the city high and 
 dry, while inundating the Illinois shore. 
 There was also work to be done at the 
 mouth of the Des Moines Eiver and else 
 where. After a long trip, via the Ohio, 
 and a steamer wreck at the Des Moines 
 rapids, Lee and his party made their 
 surveys, and then prepared their maps 
 and plans in a St. Louis warehouse. 
 Lee did this sort of work admirably, for 
 he was neatness and accuracy personi 
 fied, and looked for a strict observance 
 of orders in others. Congress approved 
 the St. Louis report subsequently sub 
 mitted ; and the accomplished engineer, 
 who was made captain in 1838, was 
 kept at his important task until he was 
 able to show his captious local critics 
 that his plan of forcing "the current 
 
14 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 back into its original channel, by driv 
 ing piles and constructing cribs and 
 wing-dams, " would afford the city the 
 relief it needed. His method of proced 
 ure seems to have been more or less 
 original, and to have been the result of 
 much hard study. We are more inter 
 ested, however, in the familiar letters 
 written home, which give glimpses of 
 the growth of a strong, fine character. 
 The testimony of comrades, also, is not 
 wanting to strengthen our impression 
 that few people could have met Lee at 
 the beginning of his prime without 
 being struck by his manly beauty, his 
 genial but dignified nature, his mental 
 breadth and balance, and his unobtru 
 sive but always conspicuous Christian 
 character. 
 
 Between his Western service and the 
 outbreak of the Mexican War in 1846, 
 Captain Lee s life was singularly free 
 from incident, if his chief biographers 
 may be trusted. He seems to have been 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 15 
 
 offered iu 1839 an instructorship at West 
 Point, which with his usual and, it 
 must be confessed, over-scrupulous mod 
 esty he declined. Two years later he 
 was put in charge of the defences of New 
 York Harbor, and remained at Fort 
 Hamilton until his services were re 
 quired in the field. Perhaps the un- 
 eventfulness of his life is sufficiently 
 explained by the fact that he was con 
 tinuously busy, not merely with his 
 engineering work, but with his military 
 studies. He must have been studying 
 the campaigns of great commanders, and 
 become infused with the martial spirit ; 
 for we find him, upon the eve of the war 
 with Mexico, longing to enter some more 
 active branch of the service, preferably 
 the artillery. Meanwhile family life 
 was most pleasant to him, and he proved 
 himself an excellent father to his seven 
 children. 
 
 His views with regard to the just or 
 unjust character of the Mexican War 
 
16 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 are not easily determined. He did, in 
 deed, declare that the United States had 
 bullied the weaker nation, and that he 
 was ashamed of the fact ; but his natural 
 exultation at the great success of the 
 American arms, to which he had con 
 tributed most signally, was able to make 
 him put such thoughts in the back 
 ground, and there is evidence that he 
 had a soldier s impatience at diplomatic 
 slowness, and wished a just portion of the 
 conquered territory to be taken at once. 
 As questions of public policy were being 
 freely discussed at the time, this com 
 parative silence of Lee s is of interest as 
 throwing light upon his subsequent con 
 duct. It is clear that, although, as we 
 shall see later, he was not incapable of 
 forming intelligent opinions upon such 
 matters, he was disposed to preserve a 
 military aloofness from politics. This 
 fact partly explains his subsequent adhe 
 sion to the Confederacy, and his unwill- 
 ness to press his own views upon the 
 government of President Davis. 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 17 
 
 Be this as it may, it is quite clear that 
 of all the young officers, whether from 
 the North or the South, to whom the 
 Mexican War gave the baptism of fire, 
 the most distinguished, whether for indi 
 vidual feats of bravery or for important 
 military services, was Captain Eobert E. 
 Lee. At the outbreak of hostilities he 
 was attached to General WooPs com 
 mand in the northern departments. His 
 chief exploit at this stage of his career 
 gives evidence of the fearlessness and 
 thoroughness of his scouting qualities, 
 qualities which he afterward used often 
 to put into practice, even when he was 
 commanding large armies. General 
 Wool, just before the battle of Buena 
 Yista, wished to know whether it was 
 true that Santa Anna and his army were 
 encamped within twenty miles, as had 
 been reported. Lee volunteered to find 
 out, and started off with a Mexican guide 
 to meet his cavalry escort. He missed 
 these in some way, and soon found him- 
 
18 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 self several miles beyond the American 
 lines. Threatening his guide with death, 
 should he prove treacherous, Lee rode 
 on until he came to signs that seemed to 
 have been made by the enemy. He 
 must have fuller information, however, 
 and, in spite of his guide s terrors, per 
 sisted in searching for Santa Anna s 
 picket- posts. Further and further he 
 pressed, until he came upon what ap 
 peared to be a large encampment. Even 
 now he would not turn back, but pene 
 trated to within ear-shot, and then vent 
 ured into moonlight clear enough to 
 assure him that the apparent encamp 
 ment was a flock of sheep ! The drovers 
 informed him that Santa Anna had not 
 yet crossed the mountains, and he gal 
 loped back twenty miles with the impor 
 tant news. After three hours rest he 
 led some cavalrymen over his former 
 route until he actually reached the out 
 posts of the enemy s army. If he could 
 always have gathered his information 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 19 
 
 in the War for the Union in this thor 
 ough manner, more than one important 
 campaign might have had a more pros 
 perous ending. 
 
 In the beginning of 1847, Lee joined 
 the staff of General Winfield Scott before 
 Yera Cruz, at the personal request of that 
 commander. The high-strung old sol 
 dier knew his man, and declared later 
 that Lee was "the greatest military 
 genius in America. 7 The latter cer 
 tainly gave his chief every reason to 
 form such an opinion, when Scott s 
 ebullient nature is taken into account. 
 He began by arranging the batteries, 
 which reduced the town within a week ; 
 and amid the incessant firing he had 
 time to pray for the safety of his brother, 
 Sidney Smith of the navy, who was in 
 charge of one of the guns. His ac 
 tivity secured him favorable mention, 
 which became even more complimentary 
 after his skilful reconnoissances amid the 
 mountain spurs had rendered possible 
 
20 EOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 the storming of the heights of Cerro 
 Gordo and the rout of Santa Anna s 
 army. There is a touch of generous en 
 thusiasm in General Scott s praise of his 
 subordinate s usefulness, and of his gal 
 lantry " in conducting columns to their 
 stations under the heavy fire of the en 
 emy." There is also a touch of impetu 
 ous rashness in the story that Lee, while 
 scouting, pushed too near the enemy, 
 and was forced to lie in concealment all 
 night beneath a fallen tree, on which 
 more than one Mexican sat down to rest. 
 In his after career, this spirit of battle 
 intoxication led Lee too far, just as it 
 did Washington ; but it increased the 
 love of his soldiers for him, and it lends 
 an attractive human flush to his fame. 
 The human note is conspicuous also in 
 the affectionate letters he was sending 
 home to his wife and children, of whom 
 lie was thinking " when the musket- balls 
 and grape were whistling over his head 
 in a perfect shower 7 5 and his tender 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 21 
 
 heart comes out in his descriptions of 
 the horrors of war, and of the relief with 
 which he turns to the natural beauties of 
 the country around him. It may be 
 well to note here that Lee s love of 
 external nature, as evidenced by his 
 letters, was as characteristic of him as 
 his love of children. His love of ani 
 mals was also marked. On one occasion 
 near Petersburg, after having warned 
 back some soldiers who had ventured 
 into danger on account of their enthusi 
 asm for him, he exposed himself to the 
 enemy s fire, in order to replace an un 
 fledged sparrow in its nest. 
 
 By August Scott was ready to advance 
 upon the City of Mexico, and by the 19th 
 his headquarters were at San Augustin. 
 Eeconnoissance of the causeways leading 
 to the capital had to be made ; and Lee 
 and an officer, afterward famous as Gen 
 eral Beauregard, were sent across a 
 broken field of volcanic rock, known as 
 the Pedrigal, to explore the situation of 
 
22 EOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 Contreras. Having surveyed the rough 
 ground, Lee set a pioneer corps to mak 
 ing a road, over which in a few hours 
 he guided the divisions of Pillow and 
 Twiggs. He accompanied the latter 
 force in its attack upon General Valen 
 cia s intrenchments at the edge of the 
 lava field. Darkness having checked a 
 flank movement, it was deemed best to 
 await re -enforcements ; and Lee under 
 took to report to General Scott the plan 
 of attack he had himself suggested to a 
 council of officers. Unattended, amid 
 thick gloom and driving rain, he set out 
 over the fissured lava, and by midnight 
 reached San Augustin, and reported to 
 his commander. Scott was so impressed 
 by his courage and endurance that he 
 afterward declared that in that midnight 
 journey Lee had done "the greatest 
 feat of physical and moral courage per 
 formed by any individual, ? to his knowl 
 edge, during the campaign. Not content 
 with this signal exploit, Lee guided re- 
 
KOBEET E. LEE 23 
 
 enforcements before dawn to the seat 
 of operations, and thus secured from 
 Scott the chief credit for the brilliant 
 victory of Contreras that ensued. 
 
 The Mexicans were now concentrated 
 at the village of Churubusco ; and, in the 
 assault that followed. Lee rendered good 
 service by urging forward a howitzer 
 battery to the support of the brigades of 
 Pierce and Shields, and by reporting to 
 Scott the movements of the enemy s 
 cavalry. The victory of Molino- del-Bey 
 followed on September 8. Then came the 
 brilliant charge up the steeps of Chapul- 
 tepec, which had been advised by Beau- 
 regard, Lee dissenting. On this day of 
 hot firing, in which Joseph E. Johnston, 
 George B. McClellan, George E. Pickett, 
 and Thomas J. Jackson distinguished 
 themselves, Lee as chief aide carried 
 Scott s orders to and fro " until he 
 fainted from a wound and the loss of 
 two nights 7 sleep at the batteries. 7 ? He 
 had already been bre vetted major after 
 
24 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 Cerro Gordo and lieutenant colonel after 
 Churubusco. ~Now he won the brevet 
 rank of colonel. His wound did not 
 keep him out of the race for the capital, 
 and he had his part in the triumphal 
 entry of Sept. 14, 1847. 
 
 In the lull that followed, Lee had 
 plenty of work to do in connection with 
 surveys and drawings of the city. He 
 was so busy that he could not be dragged 
 to a banquet to answer to a toast to him 
 self, but he found time to write very 
 genial letters home and to make visits 
 to churches and interesting spots in the 
 vicinity. He did not join in any exu 
 berant celebration of his country s vic 
 tories 5 but his comrades, as we have just 
 seen, remembered him, and the com 
 manders, from Scott down, wrote and 
 spoke highly in his praise. His desires 
 for active and successful service had 
 been amply fulfilled ; and, if he had had 
 any personal vanity, he might have been 
 pleased to learn that competent judges 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 25 
 
 considered him the handsomest man in 
 the army. A photograph taken in 1852 
 makes one feel that this was not a mis 
 taken judgment ; but it is best to let 
 one s mind dwell on the soldier s daring 
 and the man s quiet virtues, and on the 
 fact that he had received just the sort 
 of training in subordinate positions that 
 would fit him to be a great leader when 
 the time should come. His bursting into 
 tears when he saw how Joe Johnston 
 had been affected by the loss of a dear 
 relative, and his efforts to patch up the 
 differences between Scott and his sub 
 ordinates, were indicative of qualities 
 that would not interfere with this train 
 ing, but would rather tend to make him 
 the most gentle and considerate and 
 best beloved of all the great captains. 
 
 The war over, Lee was placed in 
 charge of the defences then constructing 
 at Baltimore. While in this employ 
 ment, he was tendered the leadership of 
 a Cuban insurrection by a junta in New 
 
26 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 York, but declined it, as Mr. Jefferson 
 Davis has informed us, on account of his 
 duty to his own country to continue in 
 her service. Perhaps by going he might 
 have averted a subsequent war, and 
 been brought to the front more quickly 
 in the War for the Union, with results 
 that cannot well be calculated. Such 
 speculations are idle ; but it is well to 
 notice the delicate conscience with re 
 gard to the national government, as well 
 as the always preponderant modesty 
 with which he sought to decline his 
 appointment in 1852 to the superintend- 
 ency of the academy at West Point. 
 His superiors would not hear of his de 
 clination, and he showed that they were 
 right by improving the discipline and 
 lengthening the course of study to five 
 years. In 1855, it is needless to say 
 without any self-seeking on his part, he 
 was promoted lieutenant colonel of the 
 Second Cavalry, which necessitated his 
 leaving the academy where he had had 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 27 
 
 the pleasure of seeing his son Custis, 
 afterward a Confederate general and 
 president of Washington and Lee Uni 
 versity, graduate at the head of his 
 class. 
 
 Lee s new position had been secured 
 to him through the increase of the army, 
 due to the acquisition of territory from 
 Mexico and to the repeated Indian upris 
 ings. After being recruited at Jefferson 
 Barracks, the Second Cavalry, under 
 Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston, pro 
 ceeded to Western Texas, where Lee 
 joined them in March, 1856. He took 
 firm charge of the parleyings with Ca- 
 tumseh, a troublesome chief, and pursued 
 his bands, consoling himself for the mo 
 notony of his ordinary camp life by his 
 study of the flora and fauna of the in 
 teresting region. He also kept close 
 to his family by means of tender 
 letters, and to his God by solitary 
 services in his tent. On Easter Day, 
 1857, he seems specially to have felt his 
 
28 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 loneliness. In July the command of the 
 regiment devolved upon him, Johnston 
 being called to Washington ; and three 
 months later he himself was summoned 
 home on account of the death of his 
 father-in-law, Mr. Custis. In due time 
 he returned, and continued his command 
 until the autumn of 1859, when he ob 
 tained leave to visit his family. 
 
 During this visit the famous John 
 Brown raid occurred, and the govern 
 ment at once ordered Lee from Arling 
 ton to the seat of the disturbance. He 
 reached Harper 7 s Ferry with a company 
 of marines on October 19, and forthwith 
 informed himself of the situation. He 
 posted his soldiers in the armory, defer 
 ring an attack on Brown and his men 
 until morning, because he had learned 
 that they had taken citizen hostages 
 with them into the engine-house. The 
 next day at sunrise a party of marines 
 broke in, and secured the insurgents and 
 the prisoners, none of the hostages being 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 29 
 
 hurt, but all save four of the lawbreak 
 ers being killed or mortally wounded. 
 Brown had previously refused a propo 
 sition to surrender, offering terms on his 
 part which Lee could not have taken, 
 regarding the old man and his followers, 
 as he naturally did, as flagrant offenders 
 against the peace of the Commonwealth 
 of Virginia. Lee could and did, how 
 ever, protect his prisoners against would 
 be l;ynchers, and, after kindly treatment, 
 duly handed them over to the civil 
 authorities. His diary of the affair 
 shows that he regarded it, as nearly all 
 Southerners did then and have done 
 since, from a social and political point 
 of view, and not at all from a dramatic 
 least of all from a sentimental one. 
 He could not, however, have relished 
 his task ; and we can afford to hurry on. 
 His period of rest was broken early 
 in 1860 by a call to Eichmond to advise 
 the legislature with regard to organizing 
 the militia in view of future invasions, 
 
30 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 and a month later he was ordered to 
 take command of the Department of 
 Texas. Letters, which will be again 
 referred to, show that the rapidly wid 
 ening breach between the sections was 
 filling much of his thoughts during his 
 last year of service in the army of the 
 United States ; but he also had occupa 
 tion in securing forage and in pursuing 
 a troublesome bandit named Cortinas. 
 Several months were passed in San An 
 tonio, where he took interest in the 
 building of an Episcopal church ; but, 
 when all is said, it seems a most un 
 eventful twelvemonth for a great hero 
 to spend, before Providence would per 
 mit him fairly to enter upon his mighty 
 life-work. But at last, with the seces 
 sion of Texas, his recall to Washington 
 came in February, 1861 5 and, after a 
 short passage through the Valley of the 
 Shadow, he emerged upon the sunlit 
 plains of the heroic epoch of his life. 
 
III. 
 
 IT would be superfluous to attempt 
 to enter here upon any discussion of the 
 causes that led to the formation of the 
 Southern Confederacy and to the conse 
 quent War for the Union. It must be 
 clearly understood, however, that the 
 compact theory of the origin of the 
 Union was almost universally held 
 throughout the South, and had been 
 so held since 1789, as indeed it had 
 been partly held by New England in 
 1812. In view of this theory the right 
 of a State to withdraw from the Union 
 for good cause was maintained by al 
 most every Southerner, and a feeling 
 had been growing for many years that 
 the attitude of the people of the North 
 toward the institution of slavery con 
 stituted such a cause. Abolitionist agi 
 tation during the thirties, divided policy 
 with regard to the Mexican War during 
 the forties, the squabble over the newly 
 
32 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 acquired territory and the Fugitive Slave 
 Law in the fifties, had brought extremists 
 to the front in both sections, and had 
 made the Presidential election of 1860 
 practically a test vote as to whether 
 the time-honored policy of compromise 
 should be further tried or a separation 
 be resorted to. The election of Mr. 
 Lincoln, according to the logic of pas 
 sion which rules in such matters, led by 
 inevitable necessity to South Carolina s 
 secession in December, 1860. The same 
 logic determined the far Southern and 
 South-western States to imitate her ex 
 ample, and the Border States to follow 
 suit when Mr. Lincoln proposed to 
 march his troops through them for the 
 crushing of the new Confederacy. There 
 was not a little of the logic of passion 
 in the zeal with which the North pre 
 pared to do battle for the cause of 
 Union ; and the important point to re 
 member is that, while the political the 
 orist must use a different sort of logic, 
 
ROBERT E. LEE 33 
 
 the impartial historian must give the 
 logic of passion its full weight in his 
 endeavor to judge men and nations who 
 have been actuated by it. It shows an 
 almost naive lack of human experience 
 to argue as so many historians, North 
 ern and Southern, do from the charac 
 ter of a cause viewed in the abstract to 
 the character of the passionate flesh- and- 
 blood actors therein. Such a proced 
 ure is safe enough in the case of plain 
 violations of municipal and moral laws 
 that have obtained the sanction of man 
 kind at large, but it is unsafe in almost 
 every other case. Hence it follows that 
 nearly all the popular judgments passed 
 in condemnation upon this or that prom 
 inent actor in the drama of secession will 
 have to be revised, in so far as such 
 judgments touch the moral character. 
 Even in the case of Mr. Jefferson Davis, 
 who has in the country at large and in 
 the outside world borne much of the 
 obloquy of having represented an un- 
 
34 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 popular cause, the verdict of history 
 will surely be that he was a thoroughly 
 upright, honorable man, who did what 
 he conceived to be his duty, and showed, 
 on the whole, remarkable powers in the 
 performance thereof. 
 
 This, and more than this, the world has 
 long been willing to say of General Bob- 
 ert E. Lee ; but, while Lee s noble genius 
 and character lift him, by quite unani 
 mous consent above all other Confeder 
 ates, it cannot be forgotten that he 
 would never have been willing to be 
 judged apart from the men who fought 
 and labored for the cause that was 
 dear to him, or that in the last analysis 
 there is no real reason for exempting 
 him from any moral condemnation 
 meted out to a man like Mr. Davis. It 
 is true that Lee as we shall soon learn, 
 did not believe in secession or in slav 
 ery, he had freed his own negroes, 
 that he had no share in bringing on 
 the war, and that he cannot be charged, 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 35 
 
 as Mr. Davis and other Southern leaders 
 have been, with bad statesmanship, which, 
 be it remembered, is not bad morals ; but 
 it is equally true that he did not be 
 lieve in the general government s right 
 to invade and coerce the Southern States, 
 that he thought the South aggrieved, and 
 that he accepted the situation in which 
 he found himself, and joined his people 
 with his eyes open. If secession, under 
 the prevalence of the compact theory 
 and the conviction that his right to his 
 slave property was imperilled, casts a 
 moral stain upon any Southerner, it 
 must cast it upon Lee, who willingly 
 fought to sustain the seceders, though 
 he did not accept their arguments fully, 
 and was offered an excellent opportunity 
 to serve the Union cause. Yet very few 
 people have been hardy enough to vent 
 ure even to hint that there is any stain 
 upon the escutcheon of the great soldier 
 who led the heroic Army of Northern 
 Virginia to victory after victory. 
 
36 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 Our conclusion is obvious. In this 
 and in all other matters not settled by 
 the consensus of civilized opinion or the 
 arbitrament of arms neither of which 
 methods of solution had operated by 
 1861 with regard to secession, or indeed 
 completely with regard to slavery it is 
 idle to judge men s moral characters 
 according to our estimate of the cause 
 they serve. We must judge them as 
 men, in accordance with the totality of 
 our knowledge concerning their lives. 
 Judged by this standard, we shall find 
 no purer life ever lived than that of 
 Robert Lee, no matter whether or not 
 we believe secession to have been justi 
 fiable from the point of view of history, 
 or deny the right of a man to let his 
 sentiments get the better of his reason. 
 
 We left Lee recalled to Washington 
 in February, 1861. He reached Ar 
 lington on March 1, in a frame of mind 
 more easily guessed at than described. 
 In his letters home he had for some time 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 37 
 
 been giving his views of the perilous 
 political situation. He did not love the 
 Puritanism of New England any more 
 than most Southerners then did; but, 
 being charitable and discreet, he did not 
 vent his opinions in harsh words. He 
 believed that the South had been ag 
 grieved by the acts of the North, and in 
 this belief wrote as follows to his son, 
 whose political views he refrained from 
 tampering with : 
 
 "I feel the aggression, and am witt 
 ing to take every proper step for re- 
 dress. It is the principle I contend for, 
 not individual or private benefit. As 
 an American citizen, I take great pride 
 in my country, her prosperity and her 
 institutions, and would defend any State 
 if her rights were invaded. But I can 
 anticipate 110 greater calamity for my 
 country than a dissolution of the Union. 
 It would be an accumulation of all the 
 evils we complain of, and^ am willing 
 to sacrifice everything but honor for its 
 
38 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 preservation.* I hope, therefore, that all 
 constitutional means will be exhausted 
 before there is a resort to force. Seces 
 sion is nothing but revolution. The 
 framers of our Constitution never ex 
 hausted so much labor, wisdom, and 
 forbearance in its formation, and sur 
 rounded it with so many guards and 
 securities, if it was intended to be 
 broken by every member of the Con 
 federacy at will. . . . Still, a Union 
 that can only be maintained by swords 
 and bayonets, and in which strife and 
 civil war are to take the place of 
 brotherly love and kindness, has no 
 charm for me. I shall mourn for my 
 country and for the welfare and prog 
 ress of mankind. If the Union is dis 
 solved and the government disrupted, 
 I shall return to my native State and 
 share the miseries of my people, and, 
 save in defence, will draw my sword on 
 none." 
 
 The spirit animating this letter is ob- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 39 
 
 viously beyond praise. Lee could not 
 have had a touch of the " fire-eater" 
 about him, which is one reason why his 
 memory is endeared to so many people 
 in the North ; though, for the matter of 
 that, Mr. Davis was not an ultra- violent 
 man, either, and was chosen President 
 of the Confederacy on account of his 
 moderation. Nor did Lee believe in 
 the right of secession, which seems to 
 argue his possession of a clearer head for 
 political questions than Mr. Davis and 
 many another Southern leader had at 
 that juncture. But, although Lee was in 
 the right according to the logic of ab 
 stract political reasoning, and although 
 he was as little likely to be swayed by 
 the logic of passion as any man that 
 ever lived, there was another logic 
 which, as this letter and the whole 
 course of his life prove, he could 
 not resist, the logic of sympathy. He 
 loved his fellow- Southerners, the people 
 among whom he had been born and 
 
40 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 with whom he had lived for much of his 
 life, the people with whom his dearest 
 interests of family and friendship were 
 bound up. He might deplore the po 
 litical actions of these people ; but he 
 believed they had been wronged, a 
 natural enough belief, considering the 
 trend of public opinion about him, 
 and, in the final test he must stand or 
 fall with them. And, in the last analy 
 sis, he was a States-rights man ; for he 
 " would defend any State if her rights 
 were invaded, 77 much more his mother 
 State, Virginia. 
 
 But why, it may be and has been 
 asked, did not Lee act as two other 
 Virginians Winfield Scott and George 
 H. Thomas acted, and uphold the gov 
 ernment he had sworn to defend ? With 
 out criticising the motives of these two 
 distinguished soldiers, we may reply by 
 maintaining that they were not men of 
 the stamp of Lee, they were not men 
 likely to be greatly influenced by the 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 41 
 
 logic of sympathy. Their motives in 
 clinging to the Union had probably 
 the moral level consonant with their 
 general characters : Lee s motives in sur 
 rendering his commission and siding with 
 his State had also the moral level conso 
 nant with his general character. It 
 takes little psychological insight, how 
 ever, to perceive that, eminent as Scott 
 and Thomas were, they were not men of 
 the same splendid moral and spiritual 
 class with Lee, whose utterances some 
 times have the ring of a great moralist, 
 like Epictetus.* Hence, when General 
 Garfield in his eulogy on Thomas, in com 
 paring Lee with the latter, confidently 
 appealed "from the Virginia of to-day 
 to the Virginia of the future ? ? to reverse 
 her judgment passed upon the respective 
 merits of her two great sons, he was 
 
 *Cf., for example, these words from the fine letter of 
 March 6, 1864, apropos of the Dahlgren prisoners: "I 
 think it better to do right, even if we suffer in so doing, 
 than to incur the reproach of our consciences and pos 
 terity." 
 
42 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 more eloquent than wise. Virginia s 
 verdict will never be reversed, because 
 her sons even the few who, like the 
 present writer, have little sympathy with 
 the political ideals of the generation just 
 gone have taken Lee to their hearts as 
 a peerless exemplar of all that is honor 
 able and pure and exquisite and noble 
 in. human life and character. They have 
 never put General Scott or General 
 Thomas, however much they may re 
 spect and admire them, in any such 
 category ; and, should they ever do it, it 
 would be a clear sign that the Mother of 
 Presidents, or perhaps here we should 
 say of generals, is in her intellectual 
 dotage. 
 
 Returning now to Lee s outward life, 
 we may be very sure that President 
 Lincoln had no more anxious watcher 
 during the first few weeks of his trying 
 administration than the quiet soldier at 
 Arlington. Whether Lee at that time 
 understood Lincoln s intentions fully or 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 43 
 
 at all gauged his powers may be doubted, 
 but we have evidence that the President 
 through General Scott had formed a high 
 opinion of Lee. On April 18, Mr. F. P. 
 Blair, at the suggestion of the Executive, 
 visited Colonel Lee, and offered him the 
 command of the army destined for the 
 subjugation of the Confederacy. There 
 can be no question as to the substantial 
 accuracy of this statement ; for Lee s 
 famous letter of Feb. 25 ? 1868, to Mr. 
 Eeverdy Johnson is too explicit on the 
 point to leave room for any denials. 
 Lee s word is unassailable, and his clear 
 mind and innate modesty forbid us to 
 believe that he misunderstood the pur 
 port of Mr. Blair s visit. Besides, in 
 view of General Scott s high opinion of 
 him, and of the fact that he had not 
 been in haste to resign his commission, 
 there was every reason why the offer 
 should have been made him. But it 
 came in vain. " After listening to his 
 remarks," wrote Lee to Mr. Johnson, 
 
44 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 "I declined the offer he made me to 
 take command of the army that was to 
 be brought into the field, stating, as 
 candidly and courageously as I could, 
 that, though opposed to secession and 
 deprecating war, I could take no part in 
 an invasion of the Southern States. " 
 
 It was a great renunciation, for Lee 
 had no illusions as to the power of the 
 Union and the weakness of the Confed 
 eracy ; and he loved his united country 
 and the army which, instead of leaving, 
 by a twist of his conscience, he might 
 have commanded. That conscience 
 however, was not made to be twisted ; 
 and he quietly put his temptation be 
 hind him. Then he went to General 
 Scott, and told him of his decision in 
 what must have been, considering their 
 relations, a still more trying interview. 
 It has indeed been claimed that Scott 
 had sent for Lee, in order to get him 
 to declare himself on one side or the 
 other. This may or may not be true, 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 45 
 
 but any effort to represent Lee as vacil 
 lating is idle. He was merely waiting 
 for an overt act of invasion, waiting 
 in a sort of dread calm. It is equally 
 idle to argue that, because he sent in 
 his resignation from the recently ac 
 quired colonelcy of the First Cavalry 
 on the 20th of April in a most touching 
 letter to Scott, and on the 22d went to 
 Richmond to receive on the following 
 day the command of the military forces 
 of Virginia, he acted with an easy con 
 science. Between the 18th ? the date of 
 the interviews with Blair and Scott, and 
 the 20th, the date of Lee s resignation, 
 acts amounting in the latter s opinion, 
 as we learn from a letter to his brother 
 Sidney Smith, to a beginning of hostil 
 ities had actually taken place. The 
 President had declared a blockade of 
 Southern ports, a Massachusetts regi 
 ment had entered Maryland, Pennsyl 
 vania troops were guarding Washing 
 ton. To Lee this meant the invasion. 
 
46 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 against which he intended to fight, and 
 on this view of the matter it would have 
 been absurd for him to wait to hear of 
 . the fate of his resignation. For aught 
 he knew, Scott might arrest him ; yet 
 gentlemen have been known to argue, 
 seemingly, that he should have waited 
 for this consummation. It would be as 
 near the truth to argue that the man 
 who had written those touching letters 
 of April 20 to Scott and to his sister, 
 Mrs. Marshall of Baltimore, who, al 
 though her husband was a Union man 
 and her son fought for the North, was 
 fully persuaded that no one could 
 "whip Bobert" letters breathing the 
 tenderest regret at the step he was tak 
 ing, was seduced by the bauble of a 
 major - generalship in the Virginian 
 army, and was in unbecoming haste to 
 rush to Bichmond and get it. 
 
 Get it he did, but in the most dignified 
 way. On April 23 he was introduced 
 to the Virginia convention, and was ad- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 47 
 
 dressed by its President in fitting terms. 
 His own reply was worthy of Washing 
 ton, and must be given entire : 
 
 "Mr. President and Gentlemen of the 
 Convention, Deeply impressed with the 
 solemnity of the occasion on which I 
 appear before you, and profoundly 
 grateful for the honor conferred upon 
 me, I accept the position your partiality 
 has assigned me, though I would greatly 
 have preferred that your choice should 
 have fallen on one more capable. Trust 
 ing to Almighty God, an approving con 
 science, and the aid of my fellow- citizens, 
 I will devote myself to the defence and 
 service of my native State, in whose be 
 half alone would I have ever drawn my 
 sword. " 
 
 If ever words bore the accents of high 
 truth and holy purpose, these words bear 
 them. It is no wonder that the conven 
 tion heard them with delight, and that 
 the eyes of all were fastened with pleas 
 ure and wonder upon the stalwart, manly 
 
48 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 soldier that uttered them. Alexander 
 H. Stephens, Vice- President of the Con 
 federacy, witnessed the ceremony, and 
 was so struck by the hold Lee had upon 
 his fellow- citizens that he feared that, 
 unless the new general should be willing 
 to run the risk of losing his rank in 
 the forces of the Confederacy, it would 
 be difficult to get Virginia to join the 
 former. An interview with the modest 
 officer soon convinced him, however, 
 that in Lee ? s mind place and power 
 were always subordinate to duty, a 
 word which he once declared to be the 
 sublimest in the language. On May 25 
 Lee ceased to be Virginia s major-gen 
 eral, and became a Confederate briga 
 dier, no higher title having been yet 
 created in the Southern service. He 
 had filled the interim by endeavoring 
 to organize troops and arm them, en 
 countering and subduing in these labors 
 far greater difficulties than were ever 
 presented to him by his ambition. 
 
)r 
 IV. 
 
 LEE found Virginia totally unpre 
 pared for the conflict at hand. Volun 
 teers in large numbers were forthcoming, 
 but there was a woful lack of arms. 
 Fowling-pieces and rifles had to be used, 
 and the cavalry were at first supplied 
 with roughly made lances instead of 
 sabres. The condition of the entire 
 South in this respect was almost as bad, 
 as we learn from the report of the chief 
 of ordnance, General Josiah Gorgas. 
 Powder especially was lacking in the 
 arsenals, practically only two small 
 stores, relics of the Mexican War, being 
 accessible. Yet both Gorgas and Lee 
 triumphed over their difficulties ; and by 
 the end of May, by working steadily 
 and with great patience at his office in 
 Eichmond, the latter, in the words of his 
 chief biographer, General Long, "had 
 organized, equipped, and sent to the field 
 more than thirty thousand men, and 
 
50 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 various regiments were in a forward state 
 of preparation." At this time Lee was 
 acting Commander-in-chief of the Confed 
 eracy. When President Davis, after the 
 removal of the capital from Montgomery 
 to Richmond, took charge of all military 
 movements on June 8, the Virginian 
 general remained by his side as a con 
 stant and trusted adviser. This was 
 particularly desirable, not only on ac 
 count of Lee s success as an organizer, 
 but because of his knowledge of the to 
 pography of his State, which was evi 
 dently destined to become the theatre 
 of the first operations of the Union 
 forces. Though he chafed at not being 
 able to take the field, he gave no one an 
 opportunity to say that he was not will 
 ing to do the duty that lay plainly be 
 fore him. 
 
 Against the long defensive line of the 
 Confederacy which stretched from the 
 swamps of the seaboard to the Allegha- 
 nies, the authorities at Washington, after 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 51 
 
 some hesitation, directed two main move 
 ments, one southward toward Rich 
 mond under General McDowell, the other 
 under General George B. McClellan 
 against the forces of Generals Garnett 
 and Wise, gathered in the mountains of 
 what is now West Virginia. President 
 Davis gave his attention to the first 
 movement, General Lee to the second. 
 The latter had in many ways the 
 harder task. Garnett was soon de 
 feated and killed, McClellan being 
 left master of North-western Virginia. 
 Re -enforcements were hurried to the 
 Confederates, and General Loring was 
 sent to take command. Meanwhile the 
 defeat of Manassas on July 21 had 
 caused McClellan s transference, with a 
 considerable portion of his troops, to the 
 Army of the Potomac, and had infused 
 an unwarranted confidence into the en 
 tire Southern people. Even the calm 
 Lee, although not dazed, was greatly 
 delighted, and wrote his congratulations 
 
52 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 to Beauregard and Joe Johnston with 
 out a trace of envy at their good fort 
 une. But McClellan s early success 
 had seriously weakened the Confederate 
 chances of holding to the Southern 
 cause the mountain people, who had no 
 sympathy with slavery ; and the Con 
 federate forces in the region were small, 
 and ineffectively handled by generals 
 who in two cases, at least, were aspiring 
 politicians. Under these circumstances 
 it seemed best to send Lee to command 
 in "West Virginia, where he arrived 
 early in August. He must have fore 
 seen the difficulties of the campaign, 
 though hardly its ultimate failure. 
 
 There is no need to describe in detail 
 the vexatious weeks that followed. The 
 two rival political brigadiers were tact 
 fully treated, but in vain ; for Lee, 
 uncertain of the administration at Rich 
 mond, did not assert his authority to 
 the full. Being the gentle, considerate 
 man he was, he could hardly have acted 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 53 
 
 otherwise; but one feels that Washing 
 ton would have been more strenuous, and 
 one discovers here the single weak point 
 in Lee s character as a soldier, but per 
 haps the chief cause of his charm, nay, 
 his glory as a man. He could not be 
 harsh ; and so he let time slip away, ac 
 cepting Loring s excuse that he was un 
 prepared to move his troops for lack of 
 wagons. Then incessant rains came on, 
 the ordinary difficulties of the region 
 were vastly increased, and sickness of all 
 sorts more than decimated the troops. 
 Lee wrote his wife on Sept. 26, 1861 : 
 "We are without tents, and for two 
 nights I have lain buttoned up in my 
 overcoat. To-day my tent came up, and 
 I am in it ; yet I fear I shall not sleep for 
 thinking of the poor men." Still, he 
 preserved his courage and his equanim 
 ity, and, remembering his Mexican War 
 days, did some most venturesome scout 
 ing. But he could not do everything 
 himself, as he learned on September 12, 
 
54 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 when he planned to attack the Union 
 forces under General Reynolds at Cheat 
 Mountain. His dispositions were well 
 conceived 5 but, as so often in his career, 
 they were foiled by the failure of a sub 
 ordinate to do his part ; for a certain 
 colonel, on account of false reports as 
 to the number of the enemy s troops in 
 trenched on the mountain, did not attack 
 as ordered. A flanking movement was 
 thus rendered impossible, a direct assault 
 seemed out of the question, and the total 
 operation amounted to nothing. Yet 
 Lee had no reproaches for his subor 
 dinate ; and his letter to Governor 
 Letcher, describing his own mortifica 
 tion, is a greater tribute to his character 
 than any victory would have been. 
 
 With equal fortitude he bore his dis 
 appointment in the subsequent move 
 ments in the Kanawha Yalley. The 
 political brigadiers were making no 
 progress against that efficient soldier, 
 General Eosecrans ; and Lee determined 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 55 
 
 that his own presence was necessary. 
 He arrived on the scene early in October, 
 and forced his recalcitrant generals into 
 some sort of union, fortifying himself 
 strongly on a mountain crest parallel 
 with that occupied by Bosecrans, who 
 was taking the offensive. His engineer 
 ing skill stood him in such stead that 
 the enemy postponed attacking until re- 
 enforcements under Loring brought up 
 the Confederate forces to about fifteen 
 thousand, and made the two armies 
 nearly equal. Under these circumstances 
 the Union general remained quiet ; while 
 Lee, who never liked inaction, deter 
 mined to try a well-devised flank move 
 ment. But Eosecrans slipped away by 
 night ; and pursuit, though ordered, was 
 soon abandoned. Winter was now at 
 hand, when operations, difficult enough 
 in summer, would be impossible. There 
 was, then, nothing to do but to acknowl 
 edge the campaign a failure. The Con 
 federate government withdrew its troops, 
 
56 EOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 and sent them elsewhere. Lee, whom 
 the press abused, and even former 
 friends began to regard as overrated, 
 was assigned to command the Depart 
 ment of South Carolina, Georgia, and 
 Florida 5 and her western counties were 
 lost to the Old Dominion forever. It 
 must have been a crushing blow to Lee 
 at the time, but he bore it uncomplain 
 ingly. His biographer can fortunately 
 look at the whole affair in another light. 
 Early failure may have taught Lee the 
 very lessons which their easy success at 
 First Manassas so disastrously failed to 
 teach the Southern people. And, when 
 all is said, no commander, however 
 great, can succeed against bad roads, 
 bad weather, sickness of troops, lack of 
 judgment and harmony among subordi 
 nates, and a strong, alert enemy. Yet 
 this is what Lee was expected to do. 
 We at least need not indulge in such 
 fatuous criticism, and may instead recall 
 the interesting fact that General Lee 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 57 
 
 bought his famous war-horse, Traveller, 
 during this disastrous campaign. Trav 
 eller cuts a much more important figure 
 in the eyes of posterity than the news 
 paper critics of 1861. 
 
 Lee s work in his new command was 
 to be of a sort familiar to him from past 
 experience. It had become apparent 
 that, unless the coast defences were 
 strengthened, Southern ports would soon 
 be effectively blockaded, and Union 
 troops landed at many points. But how 
 were these defences to be rendered avail 
 able with few troops and poor guns? 
 This was Lee s problem ; and with his 
 usual courage, and his remarkable ex 
 ecutive resources, he proceeded to solve 
 it in a very creditable fashion. A call 
 for men was answered by the Carolinians 
 and Georgians ; and a blockade runner 
 brought him rifles and a few, very few, 
 good cannon. Then he made a careful 
 study of the coast line, and, abandon 
 ing exposed situations and islands, con- 
 
58 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 structed a strong interior line of defences 
 against which war- vessels and gunboats 
 could do no damage. He concentrated 
 his strength at points that could easily 
 support one another, laying special 
 stress upon the safety of Charleston 
 and Savannah. For example, to quote 
 in substance General Long, Coosawhat- 
 chie, where Lee 7 s headquarters were, 
 could communicate with either Charles 
 ton or Savannah by railroad in two or 
 three hours, while intermediate posi 
 tions could be re- enforced from positions 
 contiguous to them. 
 
 The results of these plans, which seem 
 as simple as Lee s manners and the tin 
 ware used at the table of his modest 
 headquarters, but which were really 
 masterly in their grasp of the situation 
 and the resources at hand, were soon 
 apparent both to the enemy and to the 
 great soldier s critics. Many of the de 
 fences erected before he took charge had 
 been ineffectual, and points had been 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 59 
 
 captured in BTorth Carolina by the Fed 
 eral forces. Late in 1861 Port Boyal, a 
 most important harbor in South Caro 
 lina, fell an easy victim. The conse 
 quent evacuation of Hilton Head ex 
 posed Savannah, and Charleston was 
 also in danger. But the works erected 
 by Lee, at various points that need not 
 be detailed, soon changed the aspect of 
 affairs. Eeconnoissances sent out by the 
 commanders of the Union fleet were met 
 in every direction by frowning batteries. 
 The Federals could make comparatively 
 little progress, and the spirits of the peo 
 ple of South Carolina and Georgia rose 
 accordingly. Both Charleston and Sa 
 vannah were rapidly fortified, with the 
 result that they did not fall until the 
 close of the war, and that a region ab 
 solutely necessary for the provisioning 
 of the Confederate armies was left free 
 for cultivation. It would of course be 
 unjust to affirm that all this was accom 
 plished by Lee alone; but it is quite 
 
60 BOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 clear that his was the master mind that 
 laid down the plans of defence success 
 fully followed, and that his personal 
 presence at this and that point of the 
 extended line contributed much to the 
 rapidity with which it was made effi 
 cient. But in March, 1862, he was re 
 called to Richmond for more needed 
 work, not, however, before he had vis 
 ited his father 7 s grave on Cumberland 
 Island. 
 
 His return to his native State meant 
 that he was to see his invalid wife once 
 more, but under very trying circum 
 stances ; for beautiful Arlington had been 
 confiscated, and his family were exiles. 
 Even his calm spirit revolted at the fate 
 that had befallen the home of his wife 
 and children; and, in his references to 
 the matter, he came as near to bitter 
 ness as he could come. His strong tem 
 per rebelled still more at such acts of 
 devastation as affected private citizens 
 or communities, for his own ideals as 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 61 
 
 to the proper mode of conducting war 
 were of the highest and noblest kind. 
 He forbade pillage or destruction of any 
 sort, whether he was in the enemy s 
 country or not. What he would have 
 replied to Sheridan s brutal remarks to 
 Bismarck during the Franco-German 
 War on the necessity for devastation 
 remarks at which even the man of 
 " blood and iron" almost winced is 
 not hard to imagine ; but he always 
 ended by controlling his feelings, and 
 by redoubling his energies in order to 
 fight like a master of the art not the 
 trade of war. It was never his habit 
 even to refer to his opponents harshly. 
 His usual name for them appears in 
 a query he once addressed to his sub 
 sequent biographer, "Now, Colonel 
 Long, how can we get at those people f" 
 On one occasion he stated positively 
 that he had never seen the day when he 
 did not pray for them. 
 
 In Eichmond^ Lee settled down to di- 
 
62 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 recting all the military operations of 
 the Confederacy, under the supervision 
 of President Davis, who, being a gradu 
 ate of "West Point and a soldier of dis 
 tinction in the Mexican War, was not 
 disposed to be a merely nominal com- 
 mander-in- chief. It speaks well for 
 Lee s serenity of character that he could 
 work with so little friction in such a 
 situation. Whether he would have ac 
 complished more by a strenuous asser 
 tion of his military genius must always 
 remain a matter in doubt, although such 
 assertion could only have come later. 
 Certain it is, however, that he set dili 
 gently to work to get men and supplies 
 in readiness to meet McClellan s ad 
 vance up the Peninsula. Outside of 
 Virginia the fall of Eoanoke Island and 
 of Forts Henry and Donelson made 
 affairs look gloomy ; but, in the pitched 
 battles likely to ensue, the victors of 
 Manassas found something to look for 
 ward to. 
 
ROBERT E. LEE 63 
 
 There is no need to describe here 
 Stonewall Jackson- s movements in the 
 Valley of Virginia or the slow advance 
 of McClellan toward Kichinond. Lee 
 kept in full communication with Jack 
 son, to whom he gave a free hand ; but 
 he could not agree with the plan of 
 General Joe Johnston, who was to com 
 mand against McClellan, to the effect 
 that a stand should be taken in front 
 of Richmond, with an army made equal 
 to McClellan s by the union with the 
 troops already assigned to the Penin 
 sula service of all available forces in 
 North and South Carolina and Georgia. 
 In other words, Johnston wished to risk 
 the fortunes of the Confederacy on one 
 blow. He proposed to withdraw troops 
 from Norfolk, and would of course have 
 used the forces near Richmond. In 
 short, he would have stripped the At 
 lantic coast region bare. It was a dar 
 ing plan, on which Mr. Davis wished to 
 get all the light he could. So a council 
 
64 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 was held, in which Johnston unfolded 
 his scheme and Lee opposed it. The 
 latter objected to weakening South 
 Carolina and Georgia, which he had 
 just made strong enough to resist at 
 tack ; and he believed that a small 
 army could be well handled in the Pen 
 insula. This opinion which is partly 
 to be explained on the score of Lee s 
 own peculiar genius as a strategist, 
 appealed to Mr. Davis, who naturally 
 did not wish to abandon Norfolk or 
 run serious risks elsewhere. John 
 ston s scheme, indeed, strikes one as 
 grandiose ; but, while it might have led 
 to signal victory and to a temporary 
 paralysis of Union efforts, there is little 
 reason to believe that it would have 
 brought immediate peace. Lee would 
 probably have been nearer to this con 
 summation, had he won at Gettysburg, 
 than Johnston would have been, had he 
 lured McClellan to Eichmond, and then 
 annihilated him. 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 65 
 
 Be this as it may, Johnston was 
 ordered to the Peninsula, where Mc- 
 Clellan did not show himself niggardly 
 in the time expended on taking York- 
 town and Williamsburg. Before the 
 superior hosts of the enemy the Con 
 federate commander retreated steadily, 
 and in his always masterly fashion, to 
 the Chickahominy Eiver, Norfolk being 
 thus, after all, lost to the enemy. 
 Meanwhile Jackson s wonderful dash 
 down the Valley had kept McDowell 
 from joining McClellan ; and upon the 
 latter leader Johnston now turned, as 
 soon as he found that part of the Union 
 forces had crossed the Chickahominy. 
 The great battle of Seven Pines took 
 place 011 May 31, in which there was 
 tremendous fighting with no decisive 
 result. Lee, eager to be upon the field, 
 had volunteered his services to John 
 ston, and rode out from Eichmond with 
 President Davis to the scene of the 
 engagement. He took no part in the 
 
 
66 EOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 fighting; but, when he learned that 
 Johnston had been wounded, and re 
 membered that G. W. Smith, next in 
 command, was in bad health, he would 
 have been more than human, had he 
 not reflected with pleasure that his 
 time had probably come. Sure enough, 
 on the next day, June 1, after some 
 indecisive fighting, the command of the 
 army on the Chickahorniny devolved 
 upon General Eobert E. Lee, now for 
 the first time placed in a position that 
 would enable him to employ to the 
 utmost his splendid military gifts. Late 
 in the day Lee rode to Smith s head 
 quarters, and relieved him ; but the 
 great man in him had previously tri 
 umphed over the warrior, for in the 
 morning he had written Smith a most 
 encouraging letter, inciting him to win 
 a decisive victory before he himself 
 could reach the field. Most men would 
 have desired a victory for their side; 
 but they would have refrained from 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 67 
 
 wishing, even on paper, that that vic 
 tory should be pushed forward a few 
 hours, and thus fall to another com 
 mander. 
 
V. 
 
 LEE S first duty upon assuming com 
 mand of the Army of Northern Virginia 
 was the unpleasant one of having to re 
 sist the general wish and advice of his 
 officers to fall back upon a stronger 
 position nearer to Richmond. He felt 
 that such action was unnecessary and 
 impolitic, but he also felt that he did 
 not yet have the confidence of his offi 
 cers and troops. Under such circum 
 stances it was a bold thing for him, in 
 opposition to the judgment of those 
 whom he usually trusted, to decide to 
 stand his ground; but he did it with 
 excellent results. His decision once 
 reached, he set about obtaining re-en 
 forcements in his usual vigorous fashion. 
 He also sent out that brave cavalryman, 
 General J. E. B. Stuart, to obtain infor 
 mation as to McClellan s forces and situa 
 tion. Stuart executed a brilliant circuit 
 of the whole Union army, and Lee knew 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 69 
 
 that he had another great lieutenant be 
 sides Jackson. He now prepared to take 
 the offensive. 
 
 The complicated movements that fol 
 lowed can be given here only in a large 
 way. Jackson was called in with his 
 forces, and attended a council of war 
 in Eichmond along with Longstreet and 
 the two Hills. Lee was determined to 
 leave Eichmond more or less exposed, 
 because, with his faculty for divining the 
 plans and probable actions of his adver 
 sary, he did not believe that McClellan 
 would move upon the city. He seems, 
 however, to have been mistaken, accord 
 ing to some authorities, in his views as 
 to McClellan 7 s ultimate disposition of his 
 troops. However this may be, the Con 
 federates on the 26th of June began a 
 well- conceived attack, which was not 
 successful, owing to Jackson s inability to 
 bring up his men in time to turn the 
 right flank of the Federals. " Stone 
 wall ?? had overestimated the marching 
 
70 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 powers of his fatigued veterans. Thus, 
 as so often, Lee s plans were upset by a 
 subordinate s failure to do his part ; and 
 A. P. Hill s gallant but unwise attack 
 at Beaver Dam Creek was disastrously 
 repulsed. The next day Jackson s ap 
 pearance was partly neutralized in its 
 effects by the general ignorance that 
 seemed to prevail regarding the country. 
 But, finally, he got into the tremendous 
 attack on Porter s corps which goes by 
 the name of the battle of Games s Mill. 
 After several hours of fierce fighting, 
 Lee ordered a general advance ; and the 
 day was won, but with nearly even losses 
 on both sides. It took immense exer 
 tions on the part of the Confederate 
 commander to dislodge Porter s inferior 
 numbers ; but his superiority to his Fed 
 eral adversary, McClellan, is conspicuous, 
 when the latter s failure to support his 
 gallant officer effectively is fully real 
 ized. Lee was thus left in complete 
 command of the north bank of the 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 71 
 
 Chickahominy ; but he had paid dearly 
 for a success which might have been 
 much greater, had he been properly sec 
 onded. Even now McClellan had a fine 
 opportunity to capture Eichmond ; but 
 he was bent upon retreat to the James, 
 so that he might make connection with 
 his gunboats. 
 
 Lee was a comparatively long time 
 (twenty-four hours) in guessing his op 
 ponent s intentions. He has been criti 
 cised for not using his cavalry to ob 
 tain the necessary information, but such 
 use of cavalry does not appear to have 
 been much made at that time, and the 
 breaking up of the York Eiver Eail- 
 road, on which Stuart was engaged, was 
 designed to cut McClellan off from his 
 previous base of supplies. Besides, in 
 structions had been given subordinates 
 to watch the Federals, and report their 
 movements, orders which were not, it 
 would seem, properly obeyed. On the 
 whole, then, Lee must be absolved from 
 
72 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 blame ; and, certainly, the Confederate 
 failure on June 29 to hamper seriously 
 the retreating Federals was due again to 
 the lack of vigor of subordinates, Long- 
 street included. Again on the 30th, at 
 Frazier s Farm, Lee was not properly 
 supported ; and McClellan s army gained 
 Malvern Hill, a position from which 
 it could not be dislodged in spite of the 
 hard fighting of the Confederates on 
 July 1. Yet McClellan retreated in the 
 night, for all the world like a whipped 
 commander, and finally halted only at 
 Harrison s Landing, where he was safe 
 under the fire of his gunboats. Thus 
 ended the famous Seven Days fighting 
 around Eichmond. 
 
 Lee was not satisfied with the results 
 of the campaign, although the Southern 
 people were abundantly so, and made 
 him their hero for once and all. In the 
 main, the results, especially from a polit 
 ical point of view, were superb. Eich 
 mond was relieved ; and the great Army 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 73 
 
 of the Potomac had been driven to seek 
 a new base of supplies, and would not 
 speedily take the offensive again. But 
 Lee thought that his opponent should 
 have been routed. Opinions differ as to 
 whether he did not overrate his chances 
 of success 5 and some of his operations, 
 particularly the attack at Malvern 
 Hill, have been unfavorably criticised. 
 These are matters which the specialists 
 must continue to debate ; but it is hard 
 to resist the conclusion that Lee was 
 right in believing that with proper sup 
 port he could nearly, if not quite, have 
 inflicted a crushing defeat instead of 
 merely checking McClellan and turning 
 him away from Richmond, a result 
 largely due, it would seem, to that com 
 mander s lack of forward-pushing will.* 
 In the fighting of June 30, with McClel 
 lan absent from the field, almost as 
 
 *Tlie reader may be interested to know that General 
 McClellan s headquarters during a portion of this fight 
 ing were at a farm owned by the writer s father. The 
 unfavorable views of McClellan expressed in these 
 
74 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 characteristic a habit of his as that of 
 exaggerating the forces of the Confeder 
 ates, and Stonewall Jackson sluggish 
 in his movements, the goddess of Fort 
 une smiled upon the Union cause in 
 such a bland fashion as to make the 
 efforts of Lee s critics fruitless, when 
 they tell us that he overestimated his 
 powers. There was a chance for a vic 
 tory on that day that might have led to 
 something still more crushing. At any 
 rate, the commander who was not absent 
 from the field appears to our untrained 
 eyes as a magnificent general, ungra 
 ciously hampered by fate. He ap 
 peared to his own soldiers, however, 
 an all- conquering hero ; and he himself 
 in his proclamation to his splendid 
 troops, veterans already and destined 
 to give him as loyal and efficient sup- 
 pagesviews that will seem odd in a Southern book 
 are not due, however, to injuries done to the above-men 
 tioned estate, which, as a matter of fact, suffered nearly 
 as much from subsequent occupation by the Confed 
 erates. 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 75 
 
 port in battle after battle as ever great 
 leader received, returned the compli 
 ment in the most generous fashion. But 
 the army that had retreated had fought 
 superbly, too, and had preserved its 
 fighting qualities better than the elated 
 Southerners then supposed. How could 
 it have been otherwise, when Americans 
 stood pitted against Americans ? 
 
 Meanwhile the Federal government, 
 which was hampering itself by bad 
 methods of raising troops and by an un 
 wise choice of a general military adviser, 
 had organized the Army of Virginia 
 under General John Pope, with whom 
 McClellan was to join when he had 
 extricated his forces. Pope threatened 
 the Piedmont region about Charlottes- 
 ville, and issued proclamations that in 
 censed both his enemies and his own 
 soldiers ; but dislike of the braggart s 
 personality could not blind Lee to the 
 fact that his army was a menace to Eich- 
 mond. He accordingly sent Jackson to 
 
76 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 Gordonsville with about twelve thou 
 sand men, and himself watched over 
 McClellan, who again began to retreat, 
 this time in obedience to directions from 
 Washington. This left Lee free to join 
 Jackson by the middle of August, in 
 order to deal with Pope. It was pro 
 posed to strike the Federals near the 
 Eapidan Eiver ; but captured papers re 
 vealed the Confederate plans, and Pope 
 retreated toward the Eappahannock, on 
 the banks of which river Lee caught up 
 with him by August 21. The move? 
 ments that followed are too complicated 
 for treatment in a sketch like the pres 
 ent. Pope seems to have been bewil 
 dered himself and to have had poor 
 advice from Washington ; while his 
 troops had nothing of the solidarity of 
 a regular army such as that of Lee, 
 which made up for its lack of clothes 
 and food by its enthusiasm and endur 
 ance. Lee, on the other hand, was 
 flushed with success, and knew that with 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 77 
 
 Jackson to help him he could accom 
 plish great results. In his confidence 
 he divided his army, to give Jackson an 
 opportunity to make a flank movement 
 on Pope s rear, and hold him at bay 
 until he himself was ready to offer 
 battle. It was a rash procedure, and 
 might have been dearly paid for if it 
 had been made against a greater antago 
 nist. But after five days the ventur 
 ous chieftain reaped the reward of his 
 courage and of his unerring ability to 
 profit by an opponent s mistakes. The 
 Federal forces were completely routed 
 on August 30 upon the same field of Ma- 
 nassas that had witnessed the first great 
 Confederate victory. Pope s army took 
 refuge at Washington, while Lee paused 
 for a moment to determine what use to 
 make of his great success. In three 
 months he had practically cleared Vir 
 ginia of about two hundred thousand 
 Federal soldiers with less than half that 
 number. Was it not time to carry the 
 war into the enemy s country 1 ? 
 
78 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 Lee was not long in making up his 
 mind that an advance into Maryland 
 with his seasoned, eager troops would 
 certainly postpone Federal attempts to 
 reinvade Virginia, and thus favor the 
 recuperation of the latter State, while, 
 in case of victory, insuring an advan 
 tageous position for future movements, 
 and perhaps inciting the Confederate 
 sympathizers in Maryland to attempt to 
 withdraw that Commonwealth from the 
 Union. His letter to Mr. Davis of Sep 
 tember 3 outlined his plans, and won 
 the executive consent after the army 
 was in motion ; while the shorter one of 
 the 7th, from the neighborhood of Fred 
 erick, indicated that he did not antici 
 pate any permanent success with the 
 Marylanders. He issued to the latter, 
 however, a very fine proclamation, 
 matching the dignified general orders 
 given a few days before to his own 
 confident troops. 
 
 Meanwhile the army of about forty- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 79 
 
 five thousand men, undismayed by short 
 ness of supplies, especially of shoes, 
 began its forward march on September 3. 
 Lee marched also, or rode in ambulance ; 
 for a fall from his frightened horse had 
 injured his right hand to such an extent 
 that it was some time before he could 
 hold a bridle. The Potomac was crossed 
 on the 5th to the tune of " Maryland, 
 my Maryland." From Frederick, Jack 
 son was despatched to capture Harper s 
 Ferry, which he did on the 15th, the 
 Federal commander having been ordered 
 to maintain his position in what proved 
 to be a complete trap. This operation, 
 however, weakened Lee, against whom 
 McClellan was now advancing ; for it 
 delayed any move for the capture either 
 of Harrisburg or of Baltimore, and left 
 him with scattered forces. Yet Lee, as 
 we see from his subsequent report, 
 deemed the reduction of Harper s Ferry 
 absolutely necessary. The correctness of 
 his judgment has been questioned ; but it 
 
80 EOBEKT E. LEE 
 
 does seem that a hostile force of ten or 
 twelve thousand might have been a seri 
 ous menace to the Confederates in case 
 of an enforced retreat over the Potomac 
 in consequence of a Federal victory, and 
 there was an excellent chance of bag 
 ging prisoners. Then, too. Lee probably 
 counted on Federal evacuation of the 
 post, which was only reasonable. Such 
 evacuation took place at the beginning 
 of the Gettysburg campaign. 
 
 It is certain, however, that hostile for 
 tune had more to do with the failure of 
 this Maryland campaign than any mis 
 take made by Lee. Two copies of that 
 commander s order outlining his plans 
 had been sent to General D. II. Hill. 
 One of these, by the merest accident, 
 was found by a Federal soldier and car 
 ried to McClellan. He at once dis 
 played an energy rather unusual for 
 him, and attacked Hill at Boonsborough 
 on Sunday, the 14th. Fortunately, Lee 
 was quick enough to re -enforce his gal- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 81 
 
 lant officer by about four thousand men 
 under Longstreet ; and the Confederates 
 managed to hold their mountain top. 
 But affairs looked desperate until the 
 news came that Harper s Ferry had 
 been taken, and that Jackson was has 
 tening back. Then Lee, with his char 
 acteristic cool rashness, determined to 
 give battle at Sharpsburg, though his 
 divisions were still separated and his 
 enemy was in force. He has been much 
 criticised for not retreating, and has 
 been accused of underestimating the 
 fighting qualities of the soldiers opposed 
 to him. The latter charge is doubtless 
 true, but the fault was not idiosyncratic. 
 It was determined by well-known South 
 ern traits, and should hardly be called 
 a fault, since it has unquestionably led 
 to more victories than defeats. Besides, 
 Lee doubtless counted more on Mc- 
 Clellan s mistakes, a more reasonable 
 ground of confidence ; and, fighting for 
 political motives, he was not inclined to 
 
82 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 throw away even a bare chance of win 
 ning a victory, or at least proving that, 
 though shaken off, he was an antagonist 
 whom it would be prudent to compound 
 with ere he should gather himself for 
 another spring. But, after all, settling 
 or not settling such matters in one s 
 closet is a very different thing from 
 settling them on the field ; and, even if 
 Lee was unduly rash, it is as plain as 
 anything in history that he fought the 
 battle of Sharpsburg, or Antietam, on 
 September 17 with magnificent skill. 
 Mr. John C. Eopes, perhaps his ablest 
 critic, declares emphatically, "Of Gen 
 eral Lee s management of the battle 
 there is nothing but praise to be said." 
 It was an enormously bloody conflict, 
 the Confederates losing about one-fifth 
 of the troops within reach, i.e., eight 
 thousand out of forty thousand, the 
 Federals a slightly less fraction of their 
 seventy thousand within reach, but over 
 a fourth of the forty-six thousand who 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 83 
 
 encountered Lee s thirty -one thousand 
 in desperate grapple. Yet, after all this 
 carnage, it was really only a drawn bat 
 tle ; and the next morning, though Lee 
 was eager to fight, his best lieutenants 
 pronounced against attempting the Fed 
 eral right flank. In the afternoon news 
 came of advancing re-enforcements for 
 McClellan, who, not using all the troops 
 available, had fought his great battle 
 badly enough ; and the brave Army of 
 Northern Virginia had to seek the region 
 that gave them their name. They passed 
 the Potomac in perfect order, McClellan, 
 who with more enterprise would have 
 attacked them on the 18th, doing practi 
 cally nothing to stop them. By October 
 2 Lee was able to issue an address to 
 his soldiers from his headquarters near 
 Winchester, reviewing the prowess of 
 their arms in terms as deserved as they 
 were glowing. Still more remarkable 
 achievements awaited them ; but, politi 
 cally, the campaign just ended had been 
 
84 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 a failure. Splendid fighting could not 
 
 save the isolated and depleted South. 
 
 A young British soldier, afterward 
 famous as Lord Wolseley, who visited 
 Lee ? s headquarters near Winchester, 
 which were pitched in a rocky place, 
 because Colonel Long was vexed that 
 Lee would not occupy a farm-yard, 
 much less a farm-house, for fear of dis 
 turbing the occupants, has given an in 
 teresting description of the simple way 
 the great commander lived, when his 
 troops were at rest. Simplicity in its 
 best sense was indeed Lee s distinguish 
 ing note. Save the three stars on his 
 collar, which a colonel might also wear, 
 he wore no finery. He did not even 
 carry a sword, though not because such 
 weapons were not presented to him by 
 admirers. He was reserved in de 
 meanor, and was treated with great def 
 erence by his officers and men, who 
 behind his back, however, gave him a 
 name that stirs the survivors to-day, and 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 85 
 
 sums up as much affection and admira 
 tion as any leader has ever received, 
 the homely name of "Marse Bobert." 
 Yet he cracked jokes with his staff, as, 
 for example, about his favorite beverage, 
 buttermilk, which was too mild for 
 some of his young officers. And when 
 ever, as rarely happened, he lost pa 
 tience with any of them, he was sure to 
 seize a speedy opportunity to do some 
 little courteous, kindly act that would 
 make its recipient glad that he had un 
 wittingly stirred that temper so seldom 
 ruffled. In other words, Lee s whole 
 deportment was that of an infinitely 
 modest gentleman, General Grant s sub 
 sequent description of him as austere 
 being amusingly wide of the mark. 
 Certainly, austerity is about the last 
 quality to be found in the private let 
 ters Lee was writing at this time, in 
 which he poured out his heart with re 
 gard to the destitution of his troops; 
 nor do austere commanders, as a rule, 
 
86 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 trouble themselves to write about and 
 distribute troopers socks knit by their 
 own daughters and female friends, or to 
 devote part of their valuable time to 
 obtaining permission from their govern 
 ment to return a fallen adversary s 
 sword and horse to his widow. 
 
 Lee occupied his rest in beseeching 
 the administration, now in sore financial 
 straits, for supplies, sometimes he had 
 to plead for soap, and in recruiting 
 and disciplining his army. He was also 
 forming plans for an onward movement, 
 and wishing McClellan would do some 
 thing that would employ the Confeder 
 ate troops, who, since a recent revival 
 of religious enthusiasm, were another 
 "New Model. 77 Toward the last of 
 October McClellan moved, wisely choos 
 ing to penetrate between Lee ? s army and 
 Eichmond, which that army had to 
 guard at all hazards. In November he 
 was superseded by Burnside, whose 
 movements made it plain that he could 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 87 
 
 be met on the Bappahannock at Freder- 
 icksburg, though Lee would have pre 
 ferred, with the consent of the Eich- 
 mond authorities, to do his fighting on 
 more interior lines, in the hope, in case 
 of victory, of more completely cutting 
 off his antagonist from his base of sup 
 plies. Fredericksburg, however, was de 
 cided upon, and Lee moved Longstreet 
 from Culpeper where Burnside ought 
 probably to have sought him to the 
 Eappahannock, to dispute the Federal 
 passage of that river. Jackson, whose 
 corps had been for some time in the Val 
 ley, was ? after much wavering corre 
 spondence, brought within reach, Lee 
 again proving himself to be right in 
 counting on his adversary s inaction 
 for a period in which a greater general 
 might have accomplished much. Fi 
 nally, after having effected the crossing 
 of the river by his powerful army, Burn- 
 side began on December 13 one of the 
 most tremendous battles of the whole 
 
88 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 war, by ordering an attack on the Con 
 federate right, where Jackson s thickly 
 massed troops stood undefended. The 
 movement resulted in complete failure, 
 though several times renewed. The at 
 tempt on the left, strongly intrenched 
 on Marye s Hill, was equally disastrous, 
 the fighting toward evening becoming 
 terrific. By nightfall the Federals had 
 lost over twelve thousand men, the Con 
 federates less than five thousand. Burn- 
 side would have fought again the next 
 day ; but his officers dissuaded him, nor 
 was Lee in a condition to take the offen 
 sive. The Federals recrossed the river, 
 and for the nonce the two armies 
 watched one another amid the increas 
 ing discomforts of the winter. 
 
 The battle of Fredericksburg was as 
 picturesque as it was terrible ; and, as 
 Lee took his station on the hill since 
 called by his name, his heart must have 
 been filled with exultation when he 
 heard the roar of the batteries and 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 89 
 
 saw the gayly advancing columns hurled 
 back, whether by Jackson s or by Long- 
 street s veterans. But he might also have 
 felt that Fortune was kind in giving 
 him an ineffective opponent like Burn- 
 side, though he could hardly have 
 guessed that he was soon to have another 
 taste of her favors in the choice of Gen 
 eral Joseph Hooker as Burnside s suc 
 cessor. His family letters show, how 
 ever, that he ascribed his success to God, 
 not to Fortune. 
 
 After a trying winter, varied only by 
 cavalry raids and pathetic attempts to 
 secure supplies, Lee sprang into life and 
 energy when he found that Hooker, with 
 an army over twice as large as his, was 
 preparing to cross the Eappahannock. 
 The Federal commander had thought to 
 deceive Lee as to his real movements, 
 but the latter saw through his schemes. 
 Hooker s plans seem, however, to have 
 been good ; and he unquestionably got 
 Lee into a dangerous position, when the 
 
90 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 latter 7 s reduced forces are taken into 
 account. Some writers go so far as to 
 deny that Lee divined Hooker s move 
 ments 5 but it is at least clear that, after 
 beginning well, the Federal commander 
 lost his head in a manner to be ac 
 counted for only by physiological con 
 siderations. 
 
 Hooker gained at Chancellorsville 
 a clearing on the edge of the great thicket 
 known as the Wilderness his desired 
 position in Lee s rear, and thought he 
 had that general at his mercy. Lee, 
 however, was never more alert ; and on 
 the night of May 1 he suggested to Jack 
 son a circuitous march that enabled that 
 superb corps commander to fall upon 
 Hooker s rear unexpectedly, and inflict 
 one of the most crushing defeats known 
 to history. It was purchased, however, 
 as the world knows, by the loss of the 
 life that after Lee s the South could least 
 spare. Stonewall, while reconnoitring 
 for another attack, was shot in the dark 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 91 
 
 by his own men. When he heard of 
 Jackson s wound, Lee sent him word 
 that the great victory of May 2 be 
 longed not to himself, but to the man 
 who had surprised the enemy so com 
 pletely and disastrously. This was mag 
 nanimous, and therefore like Lee 5 but it 
 is not fair. He himself was in the thick 
 of the fighting of the 3d ; and the sol 
 diers who stopped for a moment, in their 
 uncontrollable desire to cheer him as he 
 rode to the front, showed that they knew 
 well enough who the real head of the 
 Army of Northern Virginia was, and 
 who was entitled to the crowning glory 
 of its every victory. Jackson was great, 
 and his loss ever after hampered his 
 superior; but General Fitzhugh Lee is 
 clearly right in claiming Chancellors- 
 ville as his uncle s victory, and, perhaps, 
 his most wonderful battle. Lee also 
 practically claimed it for himself in a 
 letter to Dr. A. T. Bledsoe, as fine a 
 letter as one could wish to read. 
 
92 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 The fighting that followed May 3d 
 need not be described. The 6th revealed 
 to Lee the fact that Hooker had used the 
 stormy night to retreat beyond the Eap- 
 pahannock. The losses on both sides 
 during the successive fights had been 
 very heavy and proportionally even; 
 but in spite of the fact that losses were 
 bound to tell more disastrously upon him 
 than upon his opponent, and in spite of 
 his constant lack of supplies, Lee, actu 
 ated by his standing desire to destroy 
 the Army of the Potomac, determined 
 to draw Hooker from his position by 
 once more invading the North. The 
 rightful confidence of a born soldier in 
 his own powers and in those of his tried 
 veterans, and the political necessity for 
 striking rapid and disheartening blows, 
 may perhaps justify plans which few 
 commanders would have dreamed of, 
 much less dared to follow 5 but the wis 
 dom of the Gettysburg campaign, even 
 if victory had fallen to the Confederates 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 93 
 
 in the great battles of July, will always 
 furnish historians with matter for dis 
 cussion. It must be remembered, how 
 ever, that Lee s proposal to have Beau- 
 regard brought up to Virginia to threaten 
 Washington was an integral part of his 
 scheme, and that it was beyond his 
 power to force the Confederate authori 
 ties to accede to his wishes. 
 
 The bold and well-executed move 
 ments by which Lee gathered his forces 
 for the passage of the Potomac, and drew 
 Hooker northward, must be passed over, 
 although it should be noted that through 
 a reorganization the Army of Northern 
 Virginia, with its three corps under 
 A. P. Hill, Longstreet, and Ewell, was 
 equal to three armies of about twenty- 
 five thousand each. By June 26 Cham- 
 bersburg was reached ; and the next day 
 General Order No. 73 was issued, which 
 closed with an injunction against unnec 
 essary destruction of private property. 
 But now want of information with re- 
 
94 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 gard to Hooker s movements began to 
 be felt ; for Stuart, through a great 
 blunder, had allowed the Federal army 
 to cut him off from his own commander. 
 Lee s orders are said to have been in 
 definite ; but, after all, one does not pre 
 sumably need to counsel able lieutenants 
 not to commit felo de se. 
 
 On June 28 Lee learned that he was 
 to have a far better soldier than Hooker 
 against him, General George Gordon 
 Meade. No dismay was felt at the 
 news, but Meade s swift marching ren 
 dered a rapid concentration of the Con 
 federate forces necessary. By July 1 
 both armies were near Gettysburg, and 
 some fighting advantageous to the Con 
 federates had been done, Lee in the 
 mean while having been kept anxious 
 by Stuart s absence. In fact, the great 
 pivotal battle now to be fought was pre 
 cipitated through Lee s lack of requisite 
 information. Had he been at liberty 
 to choose his time and place, the result 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 95 
 
 might have been different. As it was, 
 the Federals had taken a strong position 
 on Cemetery Eidge ; and Lee would have 
 to do the dislodging, though, as a mat 
 ter of fact, Meade, too, would have liked 
 to choose a different field of operations. 
 On the morning of July 2 dislodgment 
 was attempted ; but Longstreet, a slow 
 mover, failed to come up in time, al 
 though he had only four miles to trav 
 erse. This unforeseen delay enabled 
 the Federals to intrench themselves still 
 more strongly, and by the close of the 
 day their various corps had reached 
 the scene of action without having been 
 attacked in detail. The blame for the 
 Confederate remissness seems to attach 
 to Longstreet, who was plainly out of 
 sympathy with Lee s plans. Whether 
 the latter ought to have removed his 
 lieutenant is one of those questions no 
 one can settle, yet it is at least clear 
 that the ever- consider ate Lee was not 
 the man to take such a step. 
 
96 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 But at last in the afternoon a fierce 
 attack was delivered. Both sides made 
 a dash for a hill, Little Bound Top, 
 which through a gross error on General 
 Sickles s part had been left unoccupied; 
 but the Federals reached the summit 
 first, and Hood s brave Texans could 
 not dislodge them. Meanwhile Sickles s 
 corps at the weakest point of the Fed 
 eral line was forced backward by a ter 
 rible assault from Longstreet s men, and 
 by seven o clock Meade s left wing had 
 been badly crippled. But the Confeder 
 ates did not follow up their success, and 
 night fell leaving Lee still sanguine of 
 an eventual victory. If Longstreet had 
 let his superb troops get into action 
 earlier, and if Hill and Ewell had sup 
 ported him properly when he did begin, 
 the much debated story of Meade s in 
 tention to retreat would never have 
 occupied subsequent writers. In other 
 words, if Lee had had three Jacksons, 
 he might practically have won Gettys- 
 
BOBBET E. LEE 97 
 
 burg on the second day ; but he must 
 not be blamed for his choice of corps 
 commanders, for they were probably as 
 good as any he could have secured, all 
 charges of favoritism in their appoint 
 ments to the contrary notwithstanding. 
 That such charges should ever have 
 been made against a man like General 
 Lee is a crowning proof of the fact 
 that military controversies almost neu 
 tralize the glory of honorable warfare. 
 
 On the morning of the 3d, Longstreet 
 was again tardy in supporting Ewell, 
 and the Confederates suffered severely 
 in consequence. In the afternoon there 
 was a great artillery duel ; and, when 
 this slacked, Pickett, as Lee had ordered, 
 began to move his chosen troops forward. 
 When they had traversed half of the 
 fourteen hundred yards between them 
 and Cemetery Eidge, the Federal guns 
 again opened fire $ but the Confederates 
 had nearly exhausted their ammunition 
 without Lee s knowledge, and their guns 
 
98 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 did not support the advancing columns 
 as he had intended. Fifteen howitzers 
 did indeed move after them, but the 
 ammunition chests on the caissons were 
 not filled ! 
 
 Of the "wild charge ?? now made, 
 there is little need to speak; for the 
 world has never been able to forget it. 
 Such of Pickettf s men as the terrific 
 Federal fire left on their feet gained 
 the crest and the breastworks, but their 
 success was only for a moment. Heth s 
 division had not been able to face the 
 fire, and the other supports planned did 
 not become effectual. So the great 
 charge has gone down to history as 
 merely a charge, whereas there are 
 reasons for believing that, if Lee s orders 
 had been followed, Meade s compara 
 tively weak centre would have been 
 forced with permanent results. Pickett s 
 first report would have brought this out, 
 had not Lee, with his usual magnanim 
 ity, urged him to destroy it and write 
 
BOBEET k lEEl 99 
 
 another. The great soldier, but greater 
 man, preferred to take upon himself the 
 total responsibility for the failure of 
 his brilliant plans. Thus the greatest 
 defeat of his life is the chief glory of his 
 noble character. 
 
 Meade s army was seemingly too much 
 shattered for him to venture the next 
 day upon the offensive, although Lee 
 stood ready for him. Under these cir 
 cumstances, and while he still had about 
 fifty thousand eager men, the Confederate 
 leader, knowing that his ammunition was 
 short, and fearing that his communica 
 tions might be cut off, began to retreat. 
 He moved calmly, and reached the Po 
 tomac without serious molestation, but 
 found it swollen and unpassable. Meade 
 followed, but intrenched himself, and 
 did not venture an attack. The Potomac 
 having subsided, Lee got his army across 
 with masterly skill 5 and the great cam 
 paign of invasion, which represented 
 more of a political than a physical de 
 feat, was concluded. 
 
100 BOKEBT E. LEE 
 
 The Federal commander crossed over 
 into Virginia shortly after, but no events 
 of importance took place in that State 
 during the remainder of the year. Else 
 where the Confederacy suffered great 
 losses. Yicksburg fell before Grant s 
 sturdy blows, and Federal control of 
 the Mississippi was thus established. 
 Things went badly for the South in Ten 
 nessee also, and Charleston was closely 
 pressed, both commanders in Virginia 
 furnishing troops for the respective oper 
 ations. In September, 1863, it was pro 
 posed to send Lee to Tennessee ; but the 
 effects of his absence from Virginia were 
 too much feared to permit the experi 
 ment. Lee himself, feeling that a crisis 
 was at hand, and, perhaps, weary of 
 bearing criticism, suggested early in 
 August that Mr. Davis should relieve 
 him by a younger man 5 but the Con 
 federate President properly replied, 
 "To ask me to substitute you by some 
 one, in my judgment, more fit to com- 
 
KOBEET E: LEE 101 
 
 mand, or who would possess more of the 
 confidence of the army or of the reflect 
 ing men of the country, is to demand an 
 impossibility. 77 
 
 So Lee remained in charge, and raised 
 his army to nearly fifty-nine thousand, 
 which he depleted by thirteen thousand 
 the next month by detaching Longstreet 
 for Tennessee and Pickett for Peters 
 burg. With his reduced force he stood 
 against Meade on the Bapidan, and 
 early in October crossed over to seek 
 battle. Finding his rear threatened, the 
 Federal general retreated beyond the 
 Bappahannock. Lee followed, and vari 
 ous manoeuvres ensued, Meade at one 
 time marching South to get at Lee, while 
 the latter was moving in the opposite 
 direction to get at Meade. Once or 
 twice the Confederates got into nasty 
 situations ; but when, finally, the two 
 armies late in November found them 
 selves opposed on the little stream 
 known as Mine Bun, it became ap- 
 
102 EOBE&T E. LEE 
 
 parent to Meade who had expected an 
 easy victory, but had been subjected to 
 his rival 7 s fate of having a subordinate 
 fail him, that Lee had intrenched him 
 self too strongly to be worth disturb 
 ing. He accordingly withdrew to Cul- 
 peper, arid the campaign was over, both 
 generals having shown much ability, 
 Meade, however, as was natural, gaining 
 more prestige than Lee, from whom men 
 now expected masterly achievements in 
 every situation. 
 
YI. 
 
 NEVER had Lee s troops suffered 
 greater privations than they did during 
 the winter of 1863-64 in their defences 
 behind the Eapidan. They kept their 
 guns pointing steadily toward the Fed 
 erals at Culpeper Court-house, and they 
 kept their spirits up within their own 
 camp ; but they had a hard time keep 
 ing hunger down. Even their com 
 mander, whose small tent was pitched 
 on a hillside in their midst, allowed 
 himself meat only twice a week, and 
 sent every delicacy that came to him to 
 the hospitals. But he maintained his 
 dignity, his courage, and his faith in 
 God 5 and he presents almost, if not quite, 
 as sublime a picture as Washington at 
 Valley Forge. His fellow- citizens, al 
 though they, too, were in the depths of 
 privation, felt such admiration for him 
 that it was a pain to them not to be able 
 to show it in a concrete form. But he 
 
104 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 would take nothing ; and his letter to the 
 City Council of Eichmond, who had en 
 deavored to make him accept a house 
 for his family, throws a splendid light on 
 his character. And, as if to try him 
 more severely, sore family afflictions 
 beset him. 
 
 "With the spring, however, came the 
 stir and strain of action he was always 
 craving. Grant, the hero of the West 
 and commander-in-chief of all the Union 
 forces, had taken actual charge of the 
 Army of the Potomac, which was nomi 
 nally under General Meade, and meant 
 to fight the war out to an end. Grant 
 was a great general ; but he was to find 
 a still greater antagonist, even if a mor 
 tal one, as he encouraged himself by 
 thinking. Being mortal, Lee could be 
 " hammered ?? out ; and, as that was the 
 only way to subdue him and end the 
 war, Grant was, politically at least, 
 justified in taking it, although it may 
 be contended that he really gained his 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 105 
 
 point by pressing Lee flat by means of a 
 siege. His success does not, however, 
 entitle him to wear Lee s laurels ; for it 
 is as clear as anything can be that in 
 the campaigns briefly to be described 
 the general who was finally defeated 
 was a greater master of the art of war 
 than his opponent, that, if he had had 
 Grant s task to perform, even against a 
 general as great as himself, he would 
 have done it more expeditiously and 
 with less loss of life than Grant did. 
 Such, at least, will always be the belief 
 of many of us, in spite of our genuine 
 admiration for Grant, both as a general 
 and as a man. 
 
 The Army of the Potomac at the 
 opening of the campaign numbered 
 nearly one hundred and twenty thou 
 sand, and was admirably equipped. 
 Lee had less than sixty-two thousand 
 ragged veterans. He was fighting on 
 the defensive, however, in a country 
 most difficult for an attacking enemy 5 
 
106 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 and these facts must be allowed to neu 
 tralize much of Grant s numerical su 
 periority. Yet we should not forget 
 that the masterly man is the one who 
 knows how to use his opportunities to 
 the best advantage ; and this, judging 
 by the delays and losses he caused Grant, 
 Lee appears to have done. Grant did 
 not do it, seemingly, when on May 4, 
 1864, he set his army in motion across 
 the Eapidan, and halted in the tangled 
 thickets of the Wilderness; for he there 
 gave Lee the field of operations that best 
 suited him. On the afternoon of the 
 5th the Federal right and the Confeder 
 ate left came upon one another in the 
 brush ; and the latter, being in position, 
 sent the former reeling back with loss. 
 On the right Hancock failed to drive 
 A. P. Hill from his position. Early on 
 the morning of the 6th Hill was again 
 assailed, and was saved only by the 
 happy but tardy arrival of Longstreet. 
 It was in this fight that Gregg s Texas 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 107 
 
 Brigade, recognizing Lee riding along 
 with them to their charge, cried out to 
 a man: "Go back, General Lee! Go 
 back!" He had just before, carried 
 away by the battle-fever, shouted out 
 to them, "My Texas boys, you must 
 charge." That was how they answered 
 him as they ran. Lee still pressing on, 
 the shout of protestation was redoubled 5 
 and a sergeant nerved himself to seize 
 his bridle-rein. Then, disappointed but 
 assuredly proud at heart, the great 
 leader dropped behind. 
 
 The Confederate success secured by 
 Longstreet s advance against Hancock 
 was much checked by the formers 
 wounding at the hands of his own men, 
 which forced Lee to take charge in per 
 son. Hancock s troops were now in 
 trenched behind logs, however ; and, 
 although the Confederates carried a por 
 tion of his defences, they were finally 
 driven out, and the battle was practi 
 cally over. The losses had been heavy 
 
108 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 on both sides ; but Grant s determina 
 tion to withdraw to Spottsylvania Court 
 house showed that the advantage rested 
 with Lee, if indeed any advantage could 
 come out of such an Inferno, in which 
 men of the same blood fought hand to 
 hand in the tangled brush like wild 
 beasts contending for a lair. 
 
 The Federals, in their advance upon 
 Spottsylvania Court-house, naturally 
 thought that they had left Lee fifteen 
 miles to the rear ; but he had again 
 guessed and forestalled his adversary s 
 plans, and had sent General E. H. An 
 derson with Longstreet s corps by a cir 
 cuitous route to plant himself across 
 Grant s line of march toward Eichmond. 
 General Long is not far out of the way 
 when he describes these movements as 
 Napoleonic. Nor need Napoleon have 
 been ashamed of the hard fighting done 
 on either side for the next five days 
 (May 8-12), during which Grant was 
 extricating himself from the difficult 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 109 
 
 country in order to effect a junction 
 with Butler on the James. Manoeuvr 
 ing being impracticable. Grant simply 
 had to fight his way out 5 but his attacks 
 on the intrenched Confederates, although 
 delivered with heroic energy and deter 
 mination, were usually repulsed with 
 great loss. On the 12th, however, a 
 breach was made in the Southern lines 
 at the famous Salient. This led to tre 
 mendous efforts on Lee s part to check 
 the advance of the Federal masses. The 
 carnage was tremendous, but the Feder 
 als were at last forced to desist from 
 their efforts. Lee, as at the Wilderness 
 and as at Spottsylvania on the 10th, tried 
 to charge at a desperate moment during 
 this contest of the 12th ; but he was 
 again forced to retire by his troops. 
 
 From May 13 to 18 Grant tried no 
 more fighting, and sent for re- enforce 
 ments, while the Confederates were glad 
 to rest. On the 18th and 19th he again 
 attacked Lee s line, looking for weak 
 
110 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 places, but failed to find them. On the 
 20th, having received large re-enforce 
 ments, he followed his former plan of 
 a flank march ; but Lee was again too 
 quick for him, and reached Hanover 
 Junction a day before him. Here Grant 
 had to cross the North Anna River; 
 and, when this had been done with loss, 
 he found that Lee had wedged his centre, 
 which rested on the river, between the 
 two Federal wings. Such a position 
 promised nothing even for a hammerer ; 
 and he hastened on to the Parnunkey, 
 Lee again using his advantage of operat 
 ing on interior lines to arrest any ad 
 vance on Richmond, by taking up a 
 position on the Totopotomoy. Again 
 Grant shrank from a general attack, and 
 moved on ; and again Lee kept pace with 
 him. There was skirmishing of course, 
 and heavy fighting at Bethesda Church, 
 and finally, on June 1 and 2, very severe 
 fighting and skirmishing took place on 
 the old battle-ground of Cold Harbor, 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 111 
 
 near the Chickahominy. A desperate 
 assault on the Confederate works was 
 made on June 3, and Grant, according 
 to the most reliable figures, lost about 
 ten thousand men to his opponent s 
 two thousand. Undismayed, the Union 
 leader would have renewed the attack 
 the next day ; but even as bold a fighter 
 as Hancock used his discretion, and rested 
 his men. The hammering was too much 
 for the subordinate generals, when they 
 had to deliver blows with such rapid 
 ity. They preferred the slower strokes 
 of a siege, and Grant finally showed 
 by his change of plans that he agreed 
 with them. It was high time $ but reg 
 ular approaches could not keep Lee from 
 sending troops against Hunter in the 
 Valley, and on June 12 Grant moved 
 toward the James. He was now com 
 pelled to join Butler s already harassed 
 force, and to reach Bichrnond by first 
 taking Petersburg. In other words, he 
 had made miscalculations that had dam- 
 
112 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 pened the spirits of his splendid army, 
 had lost nearly fifty-five thousand men 
 between the Eapidan and the James, and 
 had been outgeneralled by Lee at almost 
 every turn. It is true that one would 
 not gather this from his " Memoirs. " 
 Yet he was nearer his goal, although 
 the Confederates, flushed with victory, 
 hardly perceived it. Twenty thousand 
 men could not be lost with impunity by 
 the cooped-up South 5 and the survivors 
 who fought under Lee were mortal, like 
 their commander, and would not know 
 how to conquer that fell foe, hunger. 
 Lee was in reality playing a masterly 
 game of chess with an inferior adver 
 sary, who, however, had the privilege 
 of replacing his pieces as fast as they 
 were taken. 
 
 By the evening of June 18, Lee had 
 joined his forces with those of Beaure- 
 gard for the defence of Petersburg, and 
 the last stage of the war had begun, the 
 Federals having meanwhile lost upward 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 113 
 
 of ten thousand men through, attacks 
 upon the troops behind Beauregard s 
 trenches. It seemed as if Grant had for 
 gotten his lesson; but he had not, and 
 was soon intrenching himself for the 
 siege of Petersburg. Lee from this time 
 felt that the struggle was hopeless, so far 
 as Eichmond was concerned; yet the 
 Confederate authorities persisted in be 
 lieving that the South s fortunes stood 
 or fell with her capital. Lee had not 
 been strenuous enough to make himself 
 a dominating power, like Cromwell or 
 Washington. So there was nothing for 
 him to do but fight it out to the bitter 
 end, and lose his gallant army and his 
 well-served cause, but not his enduring 
 fame and honor. It is idle to wish that 
 he had taken matters in his own hands, 
 and retreated to the Yalley. That 
 would not have been in consonance with 
 that exquisiteness of character that gives 
 him his chief charm, and it would only 
 have protracted a doomed struggle. 
 
114 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 For, although in this summer of 1864 
 the Forth seemed to waver in its Her 
 culean task, there is little reason to be 
 lieve that any success Lee might have 
 had by luring Grant into the mountains 
 would have brought peace and Con 
 federate independence. 
 
 There is no need to describe the siege 
 of Petersburg, which lasted from June, 
 1864, to the end of March, 1865, or to 
 recount the contemporary movements 
 farther South by which Sherman slowly 
 crushed out all chance of succor for Lee 
 and his veterans. Grant s strong works 
 protected him, and his ample supplies 
 rendered his ultimate victory certain. 
 Yet his efforts against the Weldon Rail 
 road in the summer and autumn cost 
 him dearly, as did also his famous at 
 tempt late in July to blow up the Con 
 federate works in front of Petersburg. 
 The ensuing battle of the Crater proved 
 that Lee s veterans were still invincible, 
 and that the Federals still had subordi- 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 115 
 
 nate generals, who had learned nothing 
 by experience. But the bravery of the 
 Confederate private soldier and the gen 
 ius of their commander, and the spirit 
 and dash of subordinates like Early, were 
 all unavailing. Nor was it now worth 
 while to give Lee the empty honor of the 
 commandership-in- chief of the Confeder 
 ate armies (February, 1865), a position 
 which should have been his long before. 
 That he would have filled it admirably 
 is clear from the suggestions as to opera 
 tions far afield that he had been continu 
 ally making in his letters. Probably 
 the final result would not have been dif 
 ferent, but posterity would have had the 
 satisfaction of knowing that the right 
 man was in the right place. 
 
 Yet was not this true, after all? Was 
 not the right man in his place amid 
 those wintry, shelterless trenches around 
 Petersburg as commander of those 
 ragged, frozen, starved, but unconquered 
 troops who held their thirty-five or forty 
 
116 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 miles of defences with a thousand men to 
 the mile? What other American save 
 Washington would have been the right 
 man there f And how can any man or 
 woman, who loves courage and genius ; 
 and unselfishness and gentleness and im 
 plicit trust in God, not love Lee, what 
 ever may be thought of the losing cause 
 he served ? Who among us does not envy 
 the opportunity of that Bichrnond lady 
 to show her love, who made him drink 
 the last cup of tea she had, and com 
 placently sipped the muddy water of 
 James River, that he might not detect 
 her sacrifice and refuse to accept her 
 homage $ 
 
 But we must hasten to the closing 
 scene of the great drama. Late in 
 March, 1865, Lee planned a desperate 
 attack upon Grant s right; but, as so 
 often before, his subordinates failed him. 
 Then Grant tried the Confederate right ; 
 and Lee, guessing his intention, took the 
 initiative in order to frustrate him, but, 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 117 
 
 finding the Federals too strongly massed, 
 had to retire to his works. On April 2 
 the Federals broke the weak Confederate 
 lines 5 and, Lee s position becoming un 
 tenable, he resolved, if possible, to lead 
 his thirty thousand men to some defensi 
 ble point in the interior. Notice was 
 given to Eichmond, and that city sur 
 rendered on the 3d. Lee pressed on to 
 Amelia Court-house, where he had or 
 dered supplies to be in waiting. In some 
 unexplained way his directions failed to 
 take effect ; and the provision train 
 passed through Amelia, and was un 
 loaded in Eichmond. It was a bitter 
 disappointment. Grant was fast ap 
 proaching with a large part of his forces, 
 and yet the Confederates had no food to 
 support them either for a last fight or for 
 a swift retreat. Nevertheless, it is hard 
 to say which bore the disappointment 
 more bravely, the commander or his 
 troops. Finally, on April 7, Grant sent 
 a most courteous note, asking for a sur- 
 
118 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 render. Lee still hoped to secure sup 
 plies at Appomattox Court-house, and 
 replied that he did not consider his cause 
 hopeless, but that in order to save a 
 useless waste of blood he should like to 
 know Grant s terms. Further corre 
 spondence followed, and on the evening 
 of the 8th Lee learned that his hoped- 
 for stores had been captured. He then 
 took his last chance of war, and ordered 
 his remnant, only ten thousand strong, 
 to break through the enemy in front, 
 unless the latter s infantry were found 
 too heavily massed. On the morning 
 of the 9th the devoted forces moved 
 forward ; but, after a little fighting, 
 Gordon reported the dreaded presence 
 of preponderant infantry barring his 
 advance, and demanded re-enforcements, 
 doubtless intending no irony. Lee had 
 nothing left to do but to send a flag 
 of truce to Grant, with the declara 
 tion to those about him that he would 
 rather die a thousand deaths than go 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 119 
 
 through the necessary interview. But 
 he had resolved that it was his duty to 
 surrender, and duty was always para 
 mount with him. 
 
 The meeting with Grant took place a 
 little before noon on the same morning 
 (April 9, 1865) at a private residence 
 in the village of Appomattox Court 
 house. Nothing could have exceeded 
 Grant s courtesy. Indeed, he rose to the 
 full stature of a hero ; and the scene of 
 the greatest surrender in American his 
 tory ought to be remembered with pride 
 by every citizen of our now united 
 country, for it illustrates, as perhaps 
 no similar event has ever done, the es 
 sential nobility of human nature. 
 
 The rest is soon told. Grant gener 
 ously allowed the Confederate privates 
 to keep their horses for their spring 
 ploughing 5 and Lee rode away to be 
 surrounded by his ragged veterans, who 
 still refused to believe he would sur 
 render, and who sobbed in anguish when 
 
120 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 he told them that the struggle was over. 
 The tears stood in his eyes ; and they 
 stand in the eyes of those who love him, 
 as to-day they read over or recall the 
 pathetic scene. On the following day 
 he issued to the survivors of the Army of 
 Northern Virginia as dignified an ad 
 dress as any commander, victorious or 
 defeated, has ever written. After re 
 ceiving visits from old friends like Gen 
 eral Meade, pathetic visits, which yet 
 show how much human nature, with its 
 godlike capacities, ought to be above the 
 brutal necessity of settling disputes by 
 war, he mounted Traveller, and rode 
 slowly toward Eichmond. Halting at 
 the house of his brother, Charles Carter, 
 in Powhatan County, he insisted, in 
 spite of the rain, on spending a last 
 night in his old tent. What poet will 
 tell us of his thoughts? Arrived in 
 Eichmond, he was greeted with wild en 
 thusiasm, in which Northern troops who 
 had fought against him joined heartily. 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 121 
 
 Finally, he escaped from demonstrations 
 trying to him, but inspiring to every 
 lover of his kind, by entering the modest 
 house where his family was waiting to 
 receive him. He had left that family 
 four years before, the hope of his native 
 State. He returned to it the chosen 
 hero of the Southern people. He will 
 remain the hero of that people and of 
 thousands of men and women throughout 
 the world who love valor and virtue in 
 supreme combination. Those who place 
 strenuous power in its rightful position 
 of supremacy among human capacities, 
 when it is joined with spotless virtue, 
 will put Washington, but Washington 
 only of all Americans, above him in the 
 rolls of fame. But Lee would have been 
 prompt to assert Washington s unique 
 grandeur; while Washington, could he 
 speak to us, would assert Lee s unique 
 charm. To the historian the one man 
 will be the greater, to the dramatist the 
 other 5 nor will the poet ever cease to 
 
122 EGBERT E. LEE 
 
 affirm that on the field of Appomattox 
 the mighty battle-axe struck down the 
 keen Damascus blade. 
 
VII. 
 
 LEE remained in Bichmond until 
 June, when he retired with his family 
 to a quiet country place. In the city 
 he had been subject to all sorts of inter 
 ruptions, for friend and foe wished to 
 see and hear him. While he was too 
 great a man to feel bitterness and 
 too dignified to be placed in much 
 embarrassment, it was only natural that 
 he should long for retirement, although 
 such devotion as that shown by the 
 ragged troopers, who wished to spirit 
 him away to the mountains and there 
 shield him against threatened arrest, 
 must have touched him deeply. He 
 was still more touched, however, by the 
 helpless condition of his people, and 
 never showed himself greater than when 
 he applied for pardon, and urged all 
 citizens to adapt themselves as far as 
 possible to the new regime and to de 
 velop whatever resources their stricken 
 
124 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 section possessed. He withdrew his ap 
 plication for amnesty when it looked as 
 if he would be tried for treason, but this 
 last indignity was not offered him in 
 face of Grant s characteristic opposition. 
 He proposed to spend his country 
 leisure in preparing a history of his 
 campaigns 5 but, unfortunately, materials- 
 were hard to collect, and the world has 
 been deprived of a valuable and, con 
 sidering Grant s achievement, perhaps 
 a very great book. Offers of other and 
 more lucrative employment came to him 
 from all sides. Even from England he 
 had the tender of an estate. But he 
 would take no gifts 5 and he would not 
 sell his name to any enterprise, even 
 an honorable one. He would attempt 
 nothing for which he did not feel quali 
 fied ; and this fine scrupulousness al 
 most kept him from taking a position 
 which he afterward adorned, the presi 
 dency of Washington College at Lexing 
 ton, to which he was elected in August, 
 
EGBERT E. LEE 125 
 
 1865. How this institution, which had 
 been founded on funds bequeathed by 
 Washington, could resume its duties 
 amid the general depression was hard to 
 see. Indeed, there is an amusing story 
 told as to the difficulty with which a 
 suitably dressed trustee was secured for 
 a necessary interview with General Lee. 
 But the installation of the new president 
 took place on October 2, and the saying 
 that where there s a will there s a way 
 received a fresh confirmation. 
 
 Lack of space forbids us to describe at 
 any length the five years General Lee 
 devoted to his new task. Perhaps as 
 clear a proof of his administrative 
 capacity as could be desired is furnished 
 by the fact that, although a soldier by 
 training and profession and a former 
 superintendent of West Point, he did 
 not seek to cramp the college by intro 
 ducing features of discipline and study 
 with which he was familiar. Other 
 Southern colleges that called old sol- 
 
126 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 diers to their chairs were not so fortu 
 nate; but, then, there was no other 
 General Lee to be had. From the ma 
 terial side Lee s presidency was soon 
 seen to be a success ; from the intellect 
 ual side equal progress was made, for 
 the scheme of studies was enlarged most 
 liberally and in the line of modern re 
 quirements ; while from the moral side 
 it would have been impossible to obtain 
 finer results. Lee s character as a Chris 
 tian and a man dominated the academic 
 community ; nor has his influence in all 
 likelihood ceased to be felt, although a 
 generation has passed away. He knew 
 his students personally, and a word from 
 him was sufficient to control the wildest 
 spirits among them. In short, he was 
 an ideal president of a typical American 
 college ; and there is no reason to believe 
 that he would not have been equal to 
 the responsibilities of a great university. 
 He was probably right in declining to 
 be made Governor of Virginia, for his 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 127 
 
 distinct executive genius hardly seems 
 to have been political in character. Yet 
 this is by no means certain. What is 
 certain is that, much as in Washing 
 ton s case, his splendid moral character 
 has for many people cast somewhat in 
 the shade his great intellectual powers. 
 The opinion is widely prevalent that 
 neither Lee nor Washington had a great 
 mind; but it may be safely contended 
 that this is an utter mistake, due to a 
 common inability to recognize greatness 
 when mental qualities and capacities are 
 admirably balanced. 
 
 Lee s family life during his career at 
 Lexington seems to have been so pure 
 and beautiful that we may well forbear 
 to touch it. It was troubled only by his 
 own failing health. Since his exposure 
 in 1863 he had suffered from, rheuma 
 tism of the heart, and by the fall of 1869 
 he began to show plain signs of giving 
 way. The winter tried him severely, 
 and in the spring of 1870 he took a trip 
 
128 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 to Georgia with no permanent good re 
 sults. After a summer at the springs he 
 resumed his duties at the college with 
 somewhat of his old ardor ; but on Sep 
 tember 28 he had to preside at a vestry 
 meeting in a damp, cold church and to 
 go home late through the rain. With 
 characteristic generosity he had promised 
 to make up a deficit in the clergyman s 
 salary; and with equally characteristic 
 piety he stood that evening at his tea 
 table to say grace, when suddenly his 
 voice failed him and he sank into a 
 chair. For several days he lingered and 
 almost seemed to improve ; but on Octo 
 ber 10 he grew worse, and at nine 
 o clock on the morning of the 12th he 
 died, "a prisoner of war on parole," 
 with the pathetic exhortation upon his 
 lips, "Tell Hill he must come up." 
 How often he had waited for his subor 
 dinates to come up ! IsTow he himself 
 had answered his Master s summons as 
 calmly and as grandly as he had obeyed 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 129 
 
 His commands throughout his long, glo 
 rious life. 
 
 If it remained only to tell of the 
 gloom cast over the South by his death, 
 of the tributes to his worth that came 
 spontaneously from friend and foe, of 
 the homage paid his worn-out body in 
 Lexington, of the solemn funeral given 
 him, of the monuments that have since 
 been reared in his honor, our task 
 would be comparatively easy. It is ob 
 vious, however, that we must take leave 
 of such a man with an attempt to sum 
 up his character and achievements $ and 
 this is a task from which any historian 
 or biographer might well shrink. The 
 present writer must frankly confess his 
 inadequacy to its performance, but he 
 would be false to himself and his hero, 
 did he not claim for the latter a place 
 among the greatest and finest spirits 
 that have ever trod this earth. With 
 the supreme men of action, the small 
 
130 EOBEET E. LEE 
 
 group of statesmen- conquerors, which in 
 cludes Caesar, Alexander, Charlemagne, 
 Cromwell, Frederick, Napoleon, Wash 
 ington, and perhaps one or two more, 
 he cannot be ranked, because he never 
 ruled a realm or a republic, and actually 
 shrank in 1862 from assuming the 
 responsibilities of commander-in-chief. 
 We know, indeed, from his own words 
 that he would not have wished to resem 
 ble any of these men save Washington ; 
 and we know, also, that he could not 
 have entered their class without losing 
 the exquisite modesty and unselfishness 
 that give him his unique charm. But 
 do we, his lovers, wish to put Lee in 
 any class, even the highest ? Should we 
 not prefer him to stand alone 1 ? If we 
 do, we have our wish ; for no one class 
 contains him. There is, seemingly, no 
 character in all history that combines 
 power and virtue and charm as he does. 
 He is with the great captains, the su 
 preme leaders of all time. He is with 
 
EOBEET E. LEE 131 
 
 the good, pure men and chivalrous gen 
 tlemen of all time, the knights sans 
 peur et sans reproche. And he is not 
 only in these two noble classes of chosen 
 spirits, but he is, in each case, either a 
 plain leader or else without any obvious 
 superior. But where can another such 
 man be found! Of whom besides Lee 
 may it be justly said that he is with 
 Belisarius and Turenne and Marlborough 
 and Moltke on the one hand, and on the 
 other with Callicratidas and Saint Louis, 
 with the Chevalier Bayard and Sir 
 Philip Sidney? 
 
BIBLIOGEAPHY. 
 
 The mass of books and articles that 
 deal more or less directly with General 
 Lee is so large that to attempt even a 
 partial enumeration of them would be 
 to attempt a bibliography of the war 
 for the Union. Most of the chief gen 
 erals, both of the Army of Northern 
 Virginia and of the Army of the Poto 
 mac, have either composed memoirs or 
 had their lives written ; while numerous 
 books and monographs have been de 
 voted to special campaigns and battles. 
 The general reader will of course pass 
 by much of this rapidly accumulating 
 literature ; but he will do well to con 
 sult Colonel William Allan s "The 
 Army of Northern Virginia in 1862" 
 (Boston, 1892: Houghton, Mifflin & 
 Co.) ; "The Battles and Leaders of the 
 Civil War (4 vols. New York, 1887 : 
 The Century Company) ; the Comte de 
 Paris 7 s "History of the Civil War in 
 
BIBLIOGKAPHY 133 
 
 America ? (Philadelphia, 1875-1888 : 
 J. H. Coates & Co.) ; General Grant s 
 " Personal Memoirs " ( New York, 1885: 
 C. L. Webster & Co. ) ; and J. C. Kopes s 
 "The Story of the Civil War" (New 
 York, 1898 : G. P. Putnam s Sons) 5 as 
 well as the chief books relative to the 
 careers of Generals J. E. Johnston, T. J. 
 Jackson, Beauregard, Longstreet, Stuart, 
 Meade, McClellan, etc. The volumi 
 nous war records, the papers of the 
 Southern Historical Society, and the 
 two series of monographs known as 
 " Great ^Commanders ? ? (New York: D. 
 Appleton & Co.) and " Campaigns of 
 the Civil War" (New York: Chas. 
 Scribner s Sons) should also be men 
 tioned. 
 
 Of specific books and articles dealing 
 primarily with the biography of General 
 Lee, the lives and accounts by 
 
 I. James Dabney McCabe (Atlanta, 
 1866 : National Publishing Company), 
 
134 BIBLIOGBAPHY 
 
 II. E. A. Pollard (New York, 1871: 
 E. B. Treat & Co.), 
 
 III. John Esten Cooke (New York, 
 1871 : D. Appleton & Co.), and 
 
 IY. Emily Y. Mason (Baltimore, 1874 : 
 J. Murphy & Co.) 
 
 were early attempts to supply popular 
 information to the people of the South 
 about their chosen hero. 
 
 Y. PERSONAL BEMINISCENCES, ANEC 
 DOTES, AND LETTERS OF GENERAL BOB- 
 ERT E. LEE (New York, 1874 : D. Ap 
 pleton & Co. ) is not a formal life, but is 
 very useful as a source of materials. 
 
 YI. FOUR YEARS WITH GENERAL LEE, 
 by Colonel W. H. Taylor (New York, 
 1878 : D. Appleton & Co. ), is valuable 
 as being the record of one of Lee s staff 
 officers. 
 
 VII. MEMOIRS OF GENERAL BOBERT E. 
 LEE, by General A. L. Long (New 
 
BIBLIOGEAPHY 135 
 
 York, 1887: J. M. Stoddart & Co.), is 
 one of the fullest and most important of 
 all the biographies. General Long was 
 one of Lee s military secretaries and one 
 of his most intimate friends. 
 
 VIII. THE GREAT COMMANDERS SERIES 
 (New York, 1894 : D. Appleton & Co. ) 
 contains a good though brief biography 
 of General Lee by his nephew, General 
 Fitzhugh Lee, and 
 
 IX. THE HEROES OF THE NATIONS SE 
 RIES (New York, 1897 : G. P. Putnam s 
 Sons) one by Professor Henry A. White, 
 of Washington and Lee University. 
 
THE BEACON BIOGRAPHIES. 
 
 M. A. DEWOLFE HOWE, Editor. 
 
 The aim of this series is to furnish brief, read 
 able, and authentic accounts of the lives of those 
 Americans whose personalities have impressed 
 themselves most deeply on the character and 
 history of their country. On account of the 
 length of the more formal lives, often running 
 into large volumes, the average busy man and 
 woman have not the time or hardly the inclina 
 tion to acquaint themselves with American bi 
 ography. In the present series everything that 
 such a reader would ordinarily care to know is 
 given by writers of special competence, who 
 possess in full measure the best contemporary 
 point of view. Each volume is equipped with 
 a frontispiece portrait, a calendar of important 
 dates, and a brief bibliography for further read 
 ing. Finally, the volumes are printed in a form 
 convenient for reading and for carrying handily 
 in the pocket. 
 
 SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY, Publishers. 
 
THE BEACON BIOGRAPHIES. 
 
 The following volumes are issued : 
 
 Louis Agassiz, by ALICE BACHE GOULD. 
 John James Audubon, by JOHN BURROUGHS. 
 Edwin Booth, by CHARLES TOWNSEND COPELAND. 
 Phillips Brooks, by M. A. DEWOLFE HOWE. 
 John Brown, by JOSEPH EDGAR CHAMBERLIN. 
 Aaron Burr, by HENRY CHILDS MERWIN. 
 James Fenimore Cooper, by W. B. SHUBRICK CLYMER. 
 Stephen Decatur, by CYRUS TOWNSEND BRADY. 
 Frederick Douglass, by CHARLES W. CHESNUTT. 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson, by FRANK B. SANBORN. 
 David G. Farragut, by JAMES BARNES. 
 John Fiske, by THOMAS SERGEANT PERRY. 
 Ulysses S. Grant, by OWEN WISTER. 
 Alexander Hamilton, by JAMES SCHOULER. 
 Nathaniel Hawthorne, by Mrs. JAMES T. FIELDS. 
 Father Hecker, by HENRY D. SEDGWICK, Jr. 
 Sam Houston, by SARAH BARNWELL ELLIOTT. 
 " Stonewall " Jackson, by CARL HOVEY. 
 Thomas Jefferson, by THOMAS E. WATSON. 
 v Robert E. Lee, by WILLIAM P. TRENT. 
 Henry W. Longfellow, by GEORGE RICE CARPENTER. 
 James Russell Lowell, by EDWARD EVERETT HALE, Jr. 
 Samuel F. B. Morse, by JOHN TROWBRIDGE. 
 Thomas Paine, by ELLERY SEDGWICK. 
 Daniel Webster, by NORMAN HAPGOOD. 
 Walt Whitman, by ISAAC HULL PLATT. 
 John Greenleaf Whittier, by RICHARD BURTOM. 
 
THE WESTMINSTER BIOG 
 RAPHIES. 
 
 The WESTMINSTER BIOGRAPHIES are uniform in plan, 
 size, and general make-up with the BEACON BIOGRAPHIES, 
 the point of important difference lying in the fact that 
 they deal with the lives of eminent Englishmen instead 
 of eminent Americans. They are bound in limp red cloth, 
 are gilt-topped, and have a cover design and a vignette title- 
 page by BERTRAM GROSVENOR GOODHUE. Like the Beacon 
 Biographies, each volume has a frontispiece portrait, a 
 photogravure, a calendar of dates, and a bibliography for 
 further reading. 
 
 The following volumes are issued : 
 
 Robert Browning, by ARTHUR WAUGH. 
 
 Daniel Defoe, by WILFRED WHITTEN. 
 
 Adam Duncan (Lord Camperdown), by H. W. WILSON. 
 
 George Eliot, by CLARA THOMSON. 
 
 Cardinal Newman, by A. R. WALLER. 
 
 John Wesley, by FRANK BANFIELD. 
 
 SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY, Publishers. 
 
14 DAY USE 
 
 RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED 
 
 LOAN DEPT. 
 
 This book is due on the last date stamped below, or 
 
 on the date to which renewed. 
 Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. 
 
 ^ : : r. 
 
 4-a 
 
 -mf 
 
aks a 
 
 YA 
 
 K 
 
 
 284483 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA