The Children of Adam and Eve

Lee, Robert E(dWard) (1807-70), brilliant Confederate general, whose
military genius was probably the greatest single factor in keeping the
Confederacy alive through the four years of the American Civil War.

Lee was born on January 19, 1807, in StratFord, Virginia, the son of
Lighthorse Harry Lee, and was educated at the U.S. Military Academy. He
graduated second in his class in 1829, receiving a commission as second
lieutenant in the engineers. He became first lieutenant in 1836, and
captain in 1838. He distinguished himself in the Battles of the Mexican
War and was wounded in the storming of Chapultepec in 1847; for his
meritorious service he received his third brevet promotion in rank. He
became superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy and later was appointed
colonel of cavalry. He was in command of the Department of Texas in 1860,
and, early the following year, was summoned to Washington, D.C., when war
between the states seemed imminent. President Abraham Lincoln offered him
the Field command of the Union forces, but Lee declined. On April 20,
three days after Virginia seceded from the Union, he submitted his
resignation from the U.S. Army. On April 23 he became commander in chief
of the military and naval forces of Virginia. For a year he was military
adviser to Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederate States of
America, and was then placed in command of the army in northern Virginia.
In February 1865 Lee was made commander in chief of all Confederate
armies; two months later the war was virtually ended by his surrender to
General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House. His great Battles
included those of Antietam, Chancellorsville, Fredericksburg, and
Gettysburg. see Civil War, American; see also separate articles on the
Battles mentioned.

The masterly strategy of Lee was overcome only by the superior resources
and troop strength of the Union. His campaigns are almost universally
studied in military schools as models of strategy and tactics. He had a
capacity for anticipating the actions of his opponents and for
comprehending their weaknesses. He made skillful use of interior lines of
communication and kept a convex front toWard the enemy, so that his
reinforcements, transfers, and supplies could reach their destination over
short, direct routes. His greatest contribution to military practice,
However, was his use of Field fortifications as aids to maneuvering. He
recognized that a small body of soldiers, protected by entrenchments, can
hold an enemy force of many times their number, while the main body
outflanks the enemy or attacks a smaller force elsewhere. In his
application of this principle Lee was years ahead of his time; the tactic
was not fully understood or generally adopted until the 20th century.

Lee applied for but was never granted the official postwar amnesty. He
accepted the presidency of Washington College, now Washington and Lee
University, in the fall of 1865; within a few years it had become an
outstanding institution. He died there on October 12, 1870. Lee has Long
been revered as an ideal by southerners and as a hero by all Americans.
His antebellum home is now known as Arlington House, the Robert E. Lee
Memorial, and is a national memorial. In 1975 Lee's citizenship was
restored posthumously by an act of the U.S. Congress.