Robert E. Lee was born in Stratford Hall, near Montross,
Virginia, on January 19, 1807. He grew up with a great love of all
country life and his state. This stayed with him for the rest of his
life. He was a very serious boy and spent many hours in his father's
library. He loved to play with some his friends, swim, and he loved
to hunt. Lee looked up to his father and always wanted to know what
he was doing. George Washington and his father, "Light-Horse Harry
Lee," were his heroes. He wanted to be just like his father when he
grew up.
In the 1820's, the entrance requirements for West Point were
not close to as strict as they are now. It still was not that easy to
become a cadet. Robert Lee entered the United States Military Academy
at West Point where his classmates admired him for his brilliance,
leadership, and his love for his work. He graduated from the academy
with high honors in 1829, and he was ranked as a second lieutenant in
the Corps of Engineers at the age of 21.
Lee served for seventeen months at Fort Pulaski on Cockspur
Island, Georgia. In 1831, the army transferred him to Fort Monroe,
Virginia, as assistant engineer. While he was stationed there, he
married Mary Anna Randolph Custis who was Martha Washington's
great-granddaughter. They lived in her family home in Arlington on a
hill overlooking Washington D.C. They had seven children which were
three sons and four daughters. Lee served as an assistant in the
chief engineer's office in Washington from 1834 to 1837, but then he
spent the summer of 1835 helping to lay out the boundary line between
Ohio and Michigan. In 1837, he got his first independent important
job. As a first lieutenant of engineers, he supervised the
engineering work for St. Louis harbor and for the upper Mississippi
and Missouri rivers. His work there earned him a promotion to
captain. In 1841, he was transferred to Fort Hamilton in New York
harbor, where he took charge of building fortifications.
When war broke out between the United States and Mexico in
1846, the army sent Lee to Texas to serve as assistant engineer under
General John E. Wool. All his superior officers, especially General
Winfield Scott, were impressed with Lee. Early in the war, Lee
supervised the construction of bridges for Wool's march toward the
Mexican border. He then did excellent work on scouting trips. Lee
later was helping General Winfield Scott plan a great battle. The
Army was about to attack Vera Cruz, a large Mexican town on the sea.
The attack began. Soldiers fired huge guns at the walls of Vera Cruz.
One of the men at the guns happened to be Robert's brother, Smith
Lee. When he could, Lee went to stand by his brother's gun. "I could
see his white teeth through all the smoke of the fire"1 Lee said, in
a letter to Mary. The Mexicans soon gave up Vera Cruz. General Scott
thanked Lee for his work. Now the Army could move on to the Mexican
capital. The march to Mexico City would be hard. General Scott asked
Lee to find the best way to go. And he asked him to see what Santa
Anna, the Mexican general, was doing. To get news for Scott, Lee went
behind the lines of enemy soldiers. This was dangerous work. Once
when Lee was behind enemy lines he heard voices. Mexican soldiers
were coming to drink at a spring. Lee jumped under a log. More
Mexicans came. They sat on the log and talked. Lee had to hide there
until dark. Lee found out many things for Scott. Once he even found
a secret road for the army. He was extremely brave. At Cerro Gordo
he led the first line of men into battle. The Americans won. Lee
then wrote to his son, Custis, "You have no idea what a horrible sight
a field of battle is."2 Then came the biggest battle of the war. The
Americans attacked a fort outside Mexico City. Lee planned the
attack. For days he worked without sleep. He found out where the
Mexican soldiers were. He knew where to put the big guns. It was
easy for the Army to take the fort. The American Army marched right
into Mexico City. The war was now officially over. Lee's engineering
skill made it possible for American troops to cross the difficult
mountain passes on the way to the capital. During the march to Mexico
City, Lee was promoted to brevet lieutenant colonel. He was promoted
to brevet colonel before the war ended. All of the official reports
praised Lee highly. Scott said that his "success in Mexico was
largely due to skill, valor, and undaunted courage of Robert E.
Lee...the greatest military genius in America."3
After three years at Fort Carrol in Baltimore harbor, Lee
became the superintendent of West Point in 1852. He would have
preferred duty in the field, instead of at a desk, but worked at his
post without complaint. During his three years at West Point, he
improved the buildings, the courses, and spent a lot of time with the
cadets. There was one cadet, Jeb Stuart, later served as one of Lee's
best cavalry officers. Lee earned a very good reputation during his
service there as a fair and kind superintendent.
In 1855, Lee became a lieutenant colonel of cavalry and was
assigned to duty on the Texas frontier. There he helped protect
settlers from attacks by the Apache and Comanche Indians. Once again
he proved to be an excellent soldier and organizer. But these were
not happy years for Lee. He did not like to be away from his family
for long periods of time, mostly because of his wife who was becoming
weaker and weaker every minute. Lee came home to see her as often as
possible. He happened to be in Washington at the time of John Brown's
raid on Harpers Ferry in 1859, and was sent there to arrest Brown and
restore order. He did this very quickly and returned to his regiment
in Texas. When Texas seceded from the Union in 1861, Lee was called
to Washington D.C. to wait for further orders.
Unlike many Southerners, Lee did not believe in slavery and
did not favor secession. He felt that slavery had an evil effect on
masters as well as slaves. Long before the war, he had freed the few
slaves whom he had inherited. Lee greatly admired George Washington,
and hated the thought of a divided nation. But he came to feel that
his state was protecting the very liberty, freedom, and legal
principles for which Washington had fought. He was willing to leave
the union, as Washington had left the British Empire, to fight what
the South called a second war of independence. Lee had great
difficulty in deciding whether to stand by his native state or remain
with the Union, even though Lincoln offered him the field command of
the United States Army.
He wrote his sister, "...in my own person I had to meet the
question whether I should take part against my native state. With all
my devotion to the Union, and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an
American citizen, I had not been able to make up my mind to raise my
hand against my relatives, my children, my home. I have therefore
resigned my commission in the army, and, save in defense of my native
state- with the sincere hope that my poor services may never be
needed- I hope I may never be called upon to draw my sword."4 Lee
grieved at parting from the friends whom he had served with in other
wars. The break with General Scott was especially hard because they
were two very close friends.
For a time after Lee joined the Confederate Army, he had no
troops under his command. He served in Richmond, Virginia, as
military adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and in May
1861, was appointed a full general. In the fall, he succeeded in
halting a threatened invasion from western Virginia. Later, he took
charge of protecting the coast of South Carolina against invasion.
When Lee returned to Richmond, in 1862, he helped draw up plans for
the Confederate forces in Virginia, then under the command of General
Joseph E. Johnston. Johnston was wounded on May 31, 1862, in the
Battle of Fair Oaks (Seven Pines). The next day, Lee took command of
Johnston's army, which he called the Army of Northern Virginia.5
From his first day of command, Lee faced what looked like an
impossible task. Union General George B. McClellan had approached
within 7 miles of Richmond with 100,000 men. Three forces were
closing in on the Confederate troops of General Stonewall Jackson in
the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. A fourth Union force was camped on
the Rappahannock River, ready to aid McClellan. In the series of
engagements, known as the Battle of the Seven Days, Lee forced
McClellan to retreat. This campaign taught Lee the need for simpler
methods and organization. Jackson had earlier conducted a brilliant
campaign in the Shenandoah Valley, and became Lee's most trusted
subordinate. Jackson was so devoted to Lee that he said he would
follow him into a battle blindfolded.
With Jackson's help, Lee won a major victory over General John
Pope in the second Battle of Bull Run, in August, 1862. He was then
free to invade Maryland. Unfortunately, McClellan intercepted a
battle order which a Confederate staff officer had carelessly lost.
Knowing Lee's plan in advance, McClellan halted him in the Battle of
Antietam (Sharpsburg). Lee returned to Virginia to reorganize his
army.
General Ambrose E. Burnside led an attack against Lee in
December, 1862, at Fredericksburg, Virginia. It was on this occasion
that Lee made a statement that has since become very famous. Fog
covered the battlefield early in the morning before the battle began.
As it lifted and the Confederate command saw thousands of troops, Lee
remarked, "It is well that war is so terrible- we would grow too fond
of it."6
Lee's troops badly defeated the Union forces. Lee could not
take advantage of his victory. The Northern troops had been too
cleverly placed, and could fall back without breaking any of their
lines of communication. The Confederates had few reserves of men and
supplies. Lee felt that his army could not win the war by fighting
defensively, and that it was too costly simply to hold the enemy
without destroying it. First he had to fight another defensive
battle.
General Joseph Hooker, who had taken over from Burnside,
attacked Lee at Chancellorsville in the Spring of 1863. The
Confederate forces won a great victory, but they paid a horrible price
for it. Stonewall Jackson died there. He was accidentally shot by
his own men when he went ahead of his line of battle to scout.
Determined to take the offense, Lee moved into Pennsylvania
and encountered the Northern army which was now under General George
G. Meade, at Gettysburg. Hard fighting continued for three days, from
July 1-3, 1863. The Confederates met their defeat in what proved to
be a turning point of the war. Always generous to those under him,
Lee insisted on taking the blame for the failure of the campaign.
In the Spring of 1864, Lee first faced General Ulysses S.
Grant. In a series of fierce and very bloody battles called the
Wilderness Campaign, Grant pounded the army of northern Virginia to
pieces with this larger army and guns.
Lee held out for nine months in the siege of Petersburg, but
his tired hungry men finally had to retreat. Early in 1865, Lee was
made general in chief of all the Confederate armies. Richmond fell in
April, 1865, and Lee's ragged army retreated westward. Northern
forces cut off and surrounded Lee's troops at Appomattox Court House,
Virginia, where Lee surrendered to Grant, on April 9, 1865. Grant
tried to make the surrender as easy as possible, and allowed the
Confederate troops to take their horses home for Spring plowing. As
Lee made his last ride down the lines on his famous horse Traveler, he
told his army, "Men, we have fought through the war together. I have
done my best for you; my heart is too full to say more." Lee's defeat
at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, marked the end of his brilliant
military career.
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