Time to Read: Just over a minute
Time to Listen: A little bit more
On Monday 22 April 1861…
Robert E. Lee was named commander of Virginia forces, after turning down the offer to command the entire Union army.
1. He genuinely cared for his men.
In short, Lee turned a rag-tag bunch of men into one of the most impressive fighting forces history has ever known. And, at the end, at Appomattox Court House, with the South a beaten force, Lee chose surrender on terms that would ensure his men had safe passage home, and could keep their horses.
2. He was a brilliant battlefield commander.
not to fight, and instead to march in the other direction, to take Washington, capital of the North.
He inherited the debt-ridden Arlington plantation and streamlined its operations, as a teacher he took a backwater college, Washington, and transformed it into the prestigious Washington and Lee University, and after the war he became a figurehead in uniting the nation.
General Lee.
With love and best wishes to you all
David