The Confederates knew Lincoln might fight to keep the country together. They asked Lee to be a general in their army. Lee said no. He thought states had no right to leave the Union. He hoped Virginia would not do it. “If Virginia stands by the Union, so will I,” he said.
In the South, Confederates began taking over United States forts.
Lincoln said the South had to stay in the Union. He said the forts must be given back. But in April, 1861, Confederates fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina. War had begun.
It was a hard time for Robert E. Lee. President Lincoln wanted him to lead the Union Army. Again, Lee said no. Virginia might join the Confederacy. Lee could never lead an army against his own state. He loved the United States. But he felt his first duty was to Virginia. He could not forget his father’s words, “Virginia is my country.”
Lee left the United States Army. He said he would not fight again unless Virginia needed him.
On April 17 Virginia joined the Confederacy. Lee was asked to lead Virginia’s army. He could not say no.
He went to Richmond, the capital of Virginia. The city was crowded. Men from all over the state had come to join the army. They were sure the South would win. They said the war would be short and glorious.
Lee did not think so. The North had more guns and men. Lincoln would fight hard to save the Union.
Lee had to get his men ready. He had to dig defenses. Digging was not glorious. People said he was afraid. They called him “Granny Lee.”
Richmond became the Confederate capital. Jefferson Davis thought the Union Army might attack the city. He told Lee to protect Richmond.
Robert E. Lee was still there when the first battle of the American Civil War was fought.
Bull Run: July 21, 1861
Into Virginia marched 30,000 Union soldiers. They attacked an army of 20,000 Confederates. The two armies fought by a stream called Bull Run.
Fighting was fierce. But the Union army was winning. Then 9,000 more Confederates arrived. Most ran into battle. But General Thomas Jackson led his men to the top of a hill.
“Steady Men!” Jackson cried. “Hold your fire until they’re on you. And when you charge, yell like furies.” The Union soldiers attacked again. Confederate soldiers fell back. On came the Union men, their flags and guns shining in the sun.
Then down the hill came Jackson’s men, screaming the strange “Rebel yell.” Union soldiers were terrified. They threw down their guns and ran.
The Confederacy had won the first battle! Jackson was a hero! Soldiers said he had stood “like a stone wall.” They called him Stonewall Jackson. For now, General Lee was forgotten.
8
The Army of Northern Virginia
Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis rode toward the sound of the battle. Bull Run had been a great victory for the South. But since then things had gone badly. Confederate armies had lost many battles in the West. And now a Union army was just a few miles from Richmond.
For a year Lee had been helping Davis plan the war. This was the first battle he had seen.
The road was filled with wounded soldiers leaving the battle. Just then a wounded man was carried by. It was the Confederate general.
Now the army needed a new leader.
On the way back to Richmond, Jefferson Davis turned to Robert E. Lee. He asked him to lead the army.
In June, 1862, General Lee became the leader of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.
The men in Lee’s army were from all over the South. Some were rich men who brought their own guns and horses. Most were poor farm boys.
Lee tried to get to know his men. He often went among them. The men looked forward to seeing their tall, handsome leader ride by on his great gray horse, Traveler. Lee made his men work hard. But he was always fair with them. And the men came to love him.
Lee’s army was much smaller than the Union army. He knew it would be hard to push the Union army away from Richmond. But he had a plan.
Most of the time Confederate armies had waited for Union armies to attack. This time Lee was going to attack first.
The attack began. Again and again the Confederates charged. Again and again they were beaten back.
Stonewall Jackson and his men arrived. “That fire is very heavy,” said Lee. “Do you think your men can stand it?”
“They can stand almost anything,” said Jackson. Into battle they went.
Still the Confederates could not push the Union men back. Lee turned to General John B. Hood. He asked him to lead a charge.
Ahead of Hood’s men was a hill. There, three lines of Union riflemen waited. On top of the hill were Union cannons. Hood charged. The rifles cracked. The cannons roared. Many of Hood’s men fell. But the rest kept coming. They did not yell. They did not fire. They just ran.
Up the hill they came. The Union soldiers dropped their guns and ran. Then Hood’s men fired. Union soldiers fell everywhere.
The Union army had been pushed back. Lee had won his first battle.
Lee drove the Union army away from Richmond. Now he had to push it out of Virginia.
Lee’s soldiers wore rags. Some had no guns or shoes. They needed food. Union armies had guns and food. But still Lee won battle after battle.
Lee’s “scarecrow army” fought bravely. And their general planned battles well. In the South he was a hero. Even in the North people said he was the best general in the war.
9
Chancellorsville
Union soldiers were talking and playing cards. The sun was going down. The soldiers were sure Lee and Jackson would not attack today.
The dinner call came. Soldiers put away their guns and went to eat.
Just then deer jumped out of the woods and ran by. Rabbits hopped out after them. The men laughed and cheered.
Suddenly rifle shots came from the woods. The cheering stopped.
Out of the forest rushed Stonewall Jackson’s men, yelling as they came.
The Union soldiers ran in terror.
To the east, Stonewall heard the sound of firing. Lee was attacking the other side of the Union army. Lee’s battle plan was working well.
The moon rose. Jackson wanted to see if the time was right for another attack. He and a few men rode ahead. They saw that the Union men were still running. They turned back toward the Confederate army.
Suddenly there were shots. The Confederates were firing at them! They thought Jackson’s men were Union soldiers. Jackson was hit!
The next day General Lee rode through the battlefield. When his soldiers saw him, they began to cheer. The cheering grew and grew. It had been General Lee’s greatest battle. The Union army was twice as big as his. But he and Stonewall had beaten it. It should have been a great day for Lee. But he was very sad. Many brave men had died. And in a little house a few miles away, his best general lay badly wounded.
At first Jackson seemed to get better. But this did not last. One afternoon, in a fever, he began to call out orders to his men. Then he stopped and smiled. “Let us cross over the river,” he said, “and rest under the shade of the trees.” And then he died.
The death of Stonewall Jackson was a terrible loss to General Lee.
10
Gettysburg
General Lee decided to fight in the North. He led his men into Pennsylvania. They met a Union army near the town of Gettysburg.
This was not where Lee wanted to fight. It was not a battle he had planned. But he knew that if he won here, he might win the war.
After two days of fighting, Lee decided it was time for a great attack. He rode out to see his men. This time they could not cheer him. That would show the Union army where they were. But as he passed, they quietly took off their hats.
The Confederates were hidden behind some trees. In front of them were open fields. Across the fields was a line of hills. There the Union army waited.
Out of the woods the Confederates charged. But this time the Union men did not run. They fired and kept on firing. Thous
ands of brave Confederates died in that terrible charge. The rest were driven back.
A great cheer went up from the Union lines. They had beaten Lee!
The next day a heavy rain began to fall. Sad and tired, Lee took his army back to Virginia.
Now the North was sure it could win the war. And Lincoln thought he had found the man to do it. This general had beaten the Confederate armies in the West. His name was Ulysses S. Grant.
In May, 1864 Grant was ready. A huge Union army moved toward Richmond. Lee was waiting. Grant lost 60,000 men in three terrible battles. Lee lost half that many. But Grant did not give up.
Grant marched south. He planned to attack Richmond from the other side. But Lee hurried to stop him.
To reach Richmond, Grant had to get by the town of Petersburg. There Lee met him. Line after line of Union soldiers charged Lee’s army. But Lee held them off. Still Grant did not give up. Lee’s army was in Petersburg, and Grant was not going to let it get away. He was going to keep on attacking until General Lee was beaten for good.
11
The Fall of the Army of Northern Virginia
“General, I have no shoes,” said a soldier. “I haven’t enough to eat,” said another. Lee rode sadly among his men. His brave army had just pushed Grant back again. But the men could not last much longer.
It was the winter of 1865. For months Lee’s army had been under attack in Petersburg. Union cannons had fired without stop. Union men had even dug a tunnel under Lee’s lines and exploded a huge bomb. Still Lee’s men held Grant off.
Grant lost thousands of men. But he could get more. Lee could not.
By now Lee’s army was half as big as Grant’s. And many of his best generals had been killed.
Lee’s men were weak from hunger. Many were barefoot in the snow. Many were sick. Some soldiers could stand no more and ran away. But most of the ragged little army kept on fighting.
The men loved Lee. They would fight as long as he asked them to.
Grant attacked again and again. Lee saw that he could not save Richmond. He had to escape.
General Lee led his men out of Petersburg. He marched them toward a small town by a railroad. From there they could move by train out of Virginia. They would join a Confederate army in North Carolina. Then they could attack Grant again.
But Grant and his men followed Lee out of Petersburg.
Lee had ordered food for the army. But when the soldiers arrived in the town, no food was there.
Lee led his starving army south. Grant’s army followed close behind.
On April 6 Union soldiers caught up. They attacked. That night only 15,000 men were left in Lee’s army. But still they tramped on. Grant and 80,000 men came after them.
Lee wanted to reach Appomattox Station. Food trains were waiting there. He could feed his army and escape. But by the time the army arrived, Union armies were all around the town. Lee was trapped.
When Virginia had gone to war Lee had agreed to fight. But now he saw that his state would be ruined if the fighting went on. Most of his men would be killed. It was time to give up the fight. He would surrender.
Appomattox: April 9, 1865
Ulysses S. Grant never looked like a great general. Today his beard was wild. His clothes were muddy from a long ride. He entered the farmhouse.
Inside was a man in a fine uniform. A beautiful sword hung by his side. It was General Robert E. Lee.
The two men shook hands. They sat down and General Grant wrote out the surrender. It was very fair. General Lee signed it.
As General Lee left, Grant and his men raised their hats in salute.
Lee rode back to his army. Sadly he told his men he had given up. The men crowded around Traveler to give their general a last cheer. They reached out to touch his hand. One soldier cried, “I love you just as well as ever, General Lee.” Tears were in Lee’s eyes as he rode away.
12
The Last Years
Robert E. Lee had led the people of the South through the war. They would still turn to him for help in the hard years that followed. He told them to forget the war. He said they should work to build up their country again.
A Confederate soldier told Lee he wanted to leave America. “Do not leave Virginia,” Lee begged. “Our country needs her young men now.”
Everyone wanted to see what Lee would do. He was offered many jobs. But he turned them all down. Then he was asked to be the president of a small college in Lexington, Virginia. He said yes. He wanted to lead young men of the South in peace as he had led them in war.
Lee loved his work at Washington College. He knew all the students. He was kind and fair with them, as he had been with his soldiers. And like his soldiers, they loved him.
The college had been badly hurt by the war. Many buildings were ruined. When Lee came, there were only four teachers and 45 students.
Lee worked hard. He got people to give money. And the college grew.
The Lees had their own house near the college. And General Lee could ride Traveler in the hills around Lexington. Life was happy for the first time in many years.
By 1866 there was a new law in the United States. No state could allow slavery. Lee was very glad. He said he “rejoiced” when the law passed.
In 1870 Lee was 63. But he looked much older. Long years of war and hard work at the college had tired him. He was not well. Friends said he should go away to a warm place. In March he set off on a long trip through the South.
People from all over the South came to see their great hero. They crowded at train stations when he came through. Old friends and soldiers from his army came. People brought babies named after him.
Lee visited his father’s grave on an island off Georgia. He stayed with cousins and friends. Then he moved slowly back through Virginia. He came home in May, very tired.
Lee was not well that fall. One wet afternoon he went to a church meeting. It was cold and damp. He sat wrapped in an old army coat.
When Lee came home, he was very weak and had to be put to bed. His doctor came. He told Lee to hurry and get well. He said Traveler would get fat with no one to ride him.
But General Lee would never ride Traveler again. For a week the old soldier lay in bed. Mrs. Lee stayed near him. One day he began to call out to his soldiers. Then on October 12, 1870, he said softly, “Strike the tent.” He was telling his men to take down his tent. Those were his last words. General Lee was dead.
The band played a slow, sad march. Once every minute a cannon boomed.
Through Lexington marched soldiers and students, the men Robert E. Lee had led in war and in peace.
Two soldiers led Traveler. The tall, gray horse had carried General Lee over battlefields and quiet hills. His saddle was on his back. But today he had no rider.
The Funeral of General Lee
13
After Robert E. Lee
He was a simple man. He loved his family and Virginia. He had a simple faith in God. And he always did what he thought was his duty.
Robert E. Lee was the last great man of old Virginia. In many ways he was closer to his hero, George Washington, than he was to men of his own time.
Washington College was named after George Washington. After Lee died, the college was given a new name. It was called Washington and Lee.
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