Glory Hallelujia!
Proud to be an America!
Posted on 01/18/2005 5:57:53 PM PST by wagglebee
All the South has ever desired was that the Union, as established by our Forefathers, should be preserved, and that the government, as originally organized, should be administered in purity and truth.
--Robert E. Lee
Why do Americans continue to remember their past?
Perhaps it is because it was a time when truth was spoken. Men and women took their stand to give us the freedoms we now enjoy. God bless those in military service, who do their duty around the world for freedom.
The Hall of Fame for great Americans opened in 1900 in New York City. One thousand names were submitted, but only 29 received a majority vote from the electors. General Robert E. Lee, 30 years after his death, was among those honored. A bust of Lee was given to New York University by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Let America not forget January 19, 2005, the 198th birthday of General Robert E. Lee.
Robert E. Lee was born at Stratford House, Westmoreland County, Virginia, on January 19, 1807. The winter was cold and fireplaces were little help. Robert's mother, Ann Hill (Carter) Lee, was suffering from a severe cold.
Ann Lee named her son Robert Edward after her two brothers.
Robert E. Lee undoubtedly acquired his love of country from those who had lived during the American Revolution. His father, "Light Horse" Harry, was a hero of the revolution and served as governor of Virginia and as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives. Members of his family also signed the Declaration of Independence.
Lee was educated in the schools of Alexandria, Virginia. In 1825, he received an appointment to West Point Military Academy. He graduated in 1829, second in his class and without a single demerit.
Robert E. Lee wed Mary Anna Randolph Custis in June 1831, two years after his graduation from West Point. Robert and Mary had grown up together. Mary was the daughter of George Washington Parke Custis, the grandson of Martha Washington and the adopted son of George Washington.
Mary was an only child; therefore, she inherited Arlington House, across the Potomac from Washington, where she and Robert raised seven children.
Army promotions were slow. In 1836, Lee was appointed to first lieutenant. In 1838, with the rank of captain, Lee fought valiantly in the War with Mexico and was wounded at the Battle of Chapultepec.
He was appointed superintendent of West Point in 1852 and is considered one of the best superintendents in that institution's history.
President-to-be Abraham Lincoln offered command of the Union Army to Lee in 1861, but Lee refused. He would not raise arms against his native state.
War was in the air. The country was in turmoil of separation. Lee wrestled with his soul. He had served in the United States Army for over 30 years.
After an all-night battle, much of that time on his knees in prayer, Robert Edward Lee reached his decision. He reluctantly resigned his commission and headed home to Virginia.
Arlington House would be occupied by the Federals, who would turn the estate into a war cemetery. Today it is one of our country's most cherished memorials, Arlington National Cemetery.
President John F. Kennedy visited Arlington shortly before he was assassinated in 1963 and said he wanted to be buried there. And he is, in front of Robert E. Lee's home.
Lee served as adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis and then commanded the legendary Army of Northern Virginia. The exploits of Lee's army fill thousands of books today.
After four terrible years of death and destruction, General Robert E. Lee met General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox, Virginia, and ended their battles. He told his disheartened comrades, "Go home and be good Americans."
Lee was called Marse Robert, Uncle Robert and Marble Man. He was loved by the people of the South and adopted by the folks from the North.
Robert E. Lee was a man of honor, proud of his name and heritage. After the War Between the States, he was offered $50,000 for the use of his name. His reply was "Sirs, my name is the heritage of my parents. It is all I have and it is not for sale."
In the fall of 1865, Lee was offered and accepted the presidency of troubled Washington College in Lexington, Virginia. The school was renamed Washington and Lee in his honor.
Robert E. Lee died of a heart attack at 9:30 on the morning of October 12, 1870, at Washington-Lee College. His last words were "Strike the tent." He was 63 years of age.
He is buried in a chapel on the school grounds with his family and near his favorite horse, Traveller.
A prolific letter writer, Lee wrote his most famous quote to son Custis in 1852: "Duty is the sublimest word in our language."
On this 198th anniversary let us ponder the words he wrote to Annette Carter in 1868: "I grieve for posterity, for American principles and American liberty."
Winston Churchill called Lee "one of the noblest Americans who ever lived." Lee's life was one of service and self-sacrifice. His motto was "Duty, Honor, Country."
God Bless America!
I disagree. I think he stayed within the boundaries of the Constitution as recognized at the time.
:-)
He suspended habeus corpus for four years to name just one.
I do not condemn him for this. i applaud it. I am grateful as an American he had the courage to do what was needed.
That one quote from John Ford's, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, seems to demonstrate your appreciation of Freeman.
Don't you think it is a bit cynical to characterize Freeman's work as only meaningful when it agrees with what the 'reputable historians' want to believe. "Never let the facts get in the way" seems to be your opinion.
You would deconstruct Freeman's work of Lee into distortions, exaggerations, and misrepresentations that were simply in defense of Lee's detractors.
It is obvious that you have a problem with Freeman, and certainly feel free to continue on with your problem. But do not use your imagination as to whether or not I agree with him, or characterize the comments of others here on the history of Lee's contributions to American history as re-cycled anecdotes and uninformed assessments.
"Maybe that should change, and someone should call you on these things when you stumble into prejudice or hate speech."
I see you are throwing an incendiary in order to "bolster your weak arguments".
For most of the war suspensions of habeas corpus were done under the authority Congress voted in 1862 or 63. And I would point out that there is nothing in the Constitution that states the President may not suspend habeas corpus and the Supreme Court has never ruled on the subject.
Well, we are on the same side here, just viewing things a little different. In my opinion, they are niggling details. The larger truth overpowers the remainder.
Proud to be an America!
Uhmm...that should have been "Proud to be an AMERICAN!"
Bad fingers...bad!
Even the most conservative of us have grown accustomed to a strong federal government, but almost no state government. Most state "pride" is generally reserved for sports team (except of course the Texans). And all of this is unfortunate, because we don't realize how much state sovereignty we have handed over to Washington. Abortion for instance should certainly be a state issue (as murder is), but everyone seems to believe it is a federal issue; on the other hand gun rights, which IS a federal issue (we have the Constitutional right to have them), has somehow been turned over to the states (my right to carry a gun in Virginia does me know good in another state, which makes no sense).
LOL! Now you begin to understand the southern viewpoint!
The framers of our constitution never exhausted so much labor, wisdom, and forbearance in its formation, and surrounded it with so many guards and securities, if it was intended to be broken by every member of the Confederacy at will. It was intended for "perpetual union" so expressed in the preamble, and for the establishment of a government, not a compact, which can only be dissolved by revolution, or the consent of all the people in convention assembled. It is idle to talk of secession. Anarchy would have been established, and not a government, by Washington, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, and the other patriots of the Revolution.”
– Robert E. Lee, January 21, 1861
The fact that only a small percentage of Southerners owned slaves helped seal the doom of the CSA. The South was not united behind the Confederacy. Many people had no desire to fight for what they saw as the slave oligarchy's interests. Almost 20% of Southern soldiers in the war fought in the Union army. And many soldiers in the Confederate army had Union sympathies but were caught in the draft and forced to fight against their convictions. This contributed to the disintegration of the Confederate army and the CSA itself.
sure: ROBERT E LEE, CHRISTIAN.
Thanks, Stand. I'll look for it.
free dixie,sw
Stonewall Jackson and John Hunt Morgan towered above Grant, both as men, and as military officers.
Sounds terrific!
I agree that Lee, Grant and Lincoln were three great Americans who came out of the war. I'd add a fourth in General Sherman. He fought a hard war, but it was what was needed to end the bloodshed and preserve the Union. He showed the spirit of magnanimity to his Southern brothers by his generous terms to Joe Johnston. Sherman gets a bad press by many, but he was only a hard soldier and was not motivated by the anti-Southern hate that characterized Sheridan.
Unusual capacity.......yes.
You have already received this, however, you did not learn.
Sherman was a mass murderer, his troops raped and slaughtered their way across Georgia & South Carolina - meeting token resistance from feeble old men, women and children.
Their homes and crops were destroyed, they were robbed of their personal property including jewelry, silverware and monies. Women and children were captured and sent into Northern slavery.
Sherman though the country was swarming with Jews, and even issued an order expelling them. Regarding Southerners, he wrote his wife of "extermination, not of soldiers alone". To which his dutiful wife responded that she wished for a war of extermination and that all Confederates would be driven like "swine into the sea".
After the war Sherman waged war on the Native Americans, "even to their extermination, men, women and children." He gave orders that "soldiers cannot pause to distinguish between male and female, or even discriminate as to age."
Some hero.
42 posted on 01/20/2004 10:43:39 AM EST by 4ConservativeJustices
But Grant and Freeman spoke well of him.
So the southron myth machine would have us believe. The publishers of "Civil War Times" and "Military History" did a special edition last month focusing on 1864. One of the articles was on Sherman's campaign in Georgia and the article noted, "Circumstances point to the conclusion that actual plundering of nonedible property was minimal during the march to the sea, and possibly less than what confederates destroyed in Pennsylvania." Property of no value to the southern war effort was generally left alone, houses were for the most part respected, and civilians were not harmed. More and more the truth is coming out, and the southron myths are being unmasked.
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