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d55ce1d
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In her opinion, Alexander Graham Bell and Clarence Birdseye are the two greatest Americans that ever lived excluding Robert E. Lee. She believes we never lost the War Between the States, that General Lee thought was the butler and just naturally handed him his sword.
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ulysses-s-grant
robert-e-lee
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Fannie Flagg |
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c154929
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"On Lee as commander: "He had a cheerful dignity and could praise them (his men) without seeming to court their favor."
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leadership
encouragement
american-civil-war-biography
confederate-army
robert-e-lee
dignity
confederate-states-of-america
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Shelby Foote |
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a20ef13
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"Worse, Lee felt isolated. In Texas he skipped meals with others to avoid "uninteresting men," wishing he was back by his campfire on the plains eating his meals alone.211 He avoided sharing quarters and found that he "would infinitely prefer my tent to my-self."212 In a group he felt more alone than out on the prairie, and that "my pleasure is derived from my own thoughts." --
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american-civil-war-biography
confederate-army
robert-e-lee
union-army
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William C. Davis |
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297969f
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Both men lost speech in their last days and hours. Both died at age sixty-three, Lee long since weary of life, and Grant ready to live it again. Their war made them national icons, and their war reputations dictated the balance of their lives, careers, and posterity.
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american-civil-war-biography
confederate-army
robert-e-lee
union-army
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William C. Davis |
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f461082
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Notwithstanding our boastful assertions to the world, for nearly a century, that our government was based on the consent of the people, it rests upon force, as much as any government that ever existed. - Robert E. Lee
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american-civil-war-biography
confederate-army
robert-e-lee
union-army
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William C. Davis |
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94af456
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Grant was forty-two and Lee fifty-seven, Grant at the peak of health and energy, while Lee feared his weakening body and lagging faculties. Each was defending his notion of home. Grant by now was the most popular man in the Union, arguably more so even than Lincoln. Lee was easily the most important man in the Confederacy, his popularity and influence, had he chosen to use it, far outstripping Davis's. Unquestionably, they were at this moment the preeminent military figures in America, and arguably the world.
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american-civil-war-biography
confederate-army
robert-e-lee
union-army
confederate-states-of-america
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William C. Davis |
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6d07022
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The mythology serves purposes darker than sentiment, nothing more so than the currently popular, and arrantly nonsensical, assertion that Lee freed his inherited slaves in 1862 before the war was over, while Grant kept his until the Thirteenth Amendment freed them in 1865. The subtext is transparent. If Southerner Lee freed his slaves while Northerner Grant kept his, then secession and the war that followed can hardly have had anything to do with slavery and must instead have been over the tariff or state rights, or some other handy pretext invented to cloak slavery's pivotal role.
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slavery
confederate
slavery-in-the-united-states
american-civil-war-biography
robert-e-lee
confederate-states-of-america
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William C. Davis |
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b382152
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None of this means of course that Robert E. Lee wasn't influenced by his father, or didn't inherit some of his better characteristics. Like Henry Lee, Robert was tall, physically strong, a born horseman and soldier, and so courageous that even his own soldiers often begged him to get back out of range, in vain of course. He had his father's gift for the sudden flank attack that would throw the enemy off balance, and also his father's ability to inspire loyalty--and in Robert's case, virtual worship--in his men. On the other hand, perhaps because of Henry Lee's quarrels with Jefferson and Madison, Robert had an ingrained distrust of politics and politicians, including those of the Confederacy. But the most important trait that influenced Robert was a negative one: his father had been voluble, imprudent, fond of gossip, hot-tempered, and quick to attack anybody who offended or disagreed with him. With Henry Lee, even minor differences of opinions escalated quickly into public feuds. Robert was, or forced himself to be, exactly the opposite. He kept the firmest possible rein on his temper, he avoided personal confrontations of every kind, and he disliked arguments. These characteristics, normally thought of as virtues, became in fact Robert E. Lee's Achilles' heel, the one weak point in his otherwise admirable personality, and a dangerous flaw for a commander, perhaps even a flaw that would, in the end, prove fatal for the Confederacy. Some of the most mistaken military decisions in the short history of the Confederacy can be attributed to Lee's reluctance to confront a subordinate and have it out with him on the spot, face to face.
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confederacy
general-lee
henry-lee
robert-e-lee
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Michael Korda |