Remembering Robert E. Lee: American Patriot and Southern Hero

Huntington News ^ | January 12, 2015 | Calvin E. Johnson, Jr.

[BigReb555]

During Robert E. Lee's 100th birthday in 1907, Charles Francis Adams, Jr., a former Union Commander and grandson of US President John Quincy Adams, spoke in tribute to Robert E. Lee at Washington and Lee College's Lee Chapel in Lexington, Virginia. His speech was printed in both Northern and Southern newspapers and is said to had lifted Lee to a renewed respect among the American people.

[X Fretensis]

Thanks, I read Alexander’s memoirs and he did not mention Longstreet’s input to the conversation. But on the other had, it seems sort of out of character for old Pete. His reputation for the defensive and caution would seem to be in opposition to the concept of guerilla warfare.

[vetvetdoug]

There is a mention of the discussion in To Appomattox by Burke Davis, Copyright 1959, page 352. Alexander, Longstreet, Mahone, and Col Walter Taylor present. Alexander gets the credit for the suggestion but all were there. It is inconceivable that only Alexander and Lee were aware of the discussion.

[servantboy777]

http://scvtexas.org

Sons of Confederate Veterans
Camp 924 Grimes co. grays

[X Fretensis]

As I read it, it was Alexander’s suggestion. In his memoirs, he mentions others at the meeting with Lee, but only discusses his suggestion and General Lee’s rebuttal.
Others present may have contributed to the conversation, but to my understanding, it was Alexander’s idea.

[kiryandil]

And that’s why the south won the war. Oh, wait...

Oh, Good God.

"Amateurs study tactics. Professionals study logistics."

Bullies take pride in five-on-one beatings. "Hey - the guy we beat the crap out of shouldn't have come alone."

I'd rather not be associated with people who think like bullies - and I think most of the Union veterans would have spurned the thoughts of people like you two.

They knew their opponents were worthy.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

Oh, the wail of a loser trying to claim victory. Is there anything so sad?

[kiryandil]

Oooooh!

A PROUD bully!

BTW - the Northerners died by the truckload, so they were too beat up & bloodied to thump their chests overmuch about it.

A punk bully like you can crow, some 150 years later, safe behind your keyboard.

There IS nothing sadder... LOL! :)

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

To my way of seeing it, it's the south who were the bullies, and like most bullies, they couldn't back up their arrogance.

BTW - the Northerners died by the truckload, so they were too beat up & bloodied to thump their chests overmuch about it.

On the contrary, they held a victory parade that took two days. From wikipedia's description of The Grand Review of the Armies.

At 9:00 a.m. on a bright sunny May 23, a signal gun fired a single shot and Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade, the victor of Gettysburg, led the estimated 80,000 men of Army of the Potomac down the streets of Washington from Capitol Hill down Pennsylvania Avenue past crowds that numbered into the thousands. The infantry marched with 12 men across the road, followed by the divisional and corps artillery, then an array of cavalry regiments that stretched for another seven miles. The mood was one of gaiety and celebration, and the crowds and soldiers frequently engaged in singing patriotic songs as the procession of victorious soldiers snaked its way towards the reviewing stand in front of the White House, where President Johnson, general-in-chief Ulysses S. Grant, senior military leaders, the Cabinet, and leading government officials awaited. At the head of his troops, Meade dismounted when he arrived at the reviewing stand and joined the dignitaries to salute his men, who passed for over six hours.

On the following day at 10:00 a.m., Sherman led the 65,000 men of the Army of the Tennessee and the Army of Georgia, with an uncharacteristic semblance of military precision, past the admiring celebrities, most of which had never seen him before. For six hours under bright sunshine, the men who had marched through Georgia and those who had defeated John Bell Hood's army in Tennessee now paraded in front of joyous throngs lining the sidewalks. People peered from windows and rooftops for their first glimpse of this western army. Unlike Meade's army, which had more military precision, Sherman's Georgia force was trailed by a vast crowd of people who had accompanied the army up from Savannah—freed blacks, laborers, adventurers, scavengers, etc. At the very end was a vast herd of cattle and other livestock that had been taken from Carolina farms.

I believe it was the southern armies who limped home beat up and bloodied.

[kiryandil]

To my way of seeing it, it's the south who were the bullies

Yes, you would see it that way, wouldn't you?

Everyone knows you have a "fondness" for certain leather "accouterments" of the Almighty State. The thought of jackbooting the South stirs up your juices, no doubt. LOL! :)

[kiryandil]

It flat-out amazes me when some freepers admit that they're Big Government proponents on a Constitutional, small government website.

And that the proles that don't like it should get a boot-heel to the teeth.

[Nowhere Man]

My take on the Civil War is that it is one industrial nation of 22 million beating up a more agrarian nation of 9 million. I would have been pro-Confederacy if I was around then, my take is they had legitimate gripes over trade issues. You cannot divorce slavery from the war although it was just a side issue at best although Lincoln did a good job "playing the slavery card." The South's mistake, firing first on Ft. Sumter, unless there are extenuating circumstances most can see, the guy who throws the first punch is seen as wrong.

I seem to remember this quote from Final Fantasy VIII, a Playststion game done in anime style (I'm a Japanese anime junky): "Right and wrong are not what separate us and our enemies. It's our different standpoints, our perspectives that separate us. Both sides blame one another. There's no good or bad side. Just two sides holding different views." - Squall Leonhart. OK, if anime wisdom is not for you, I remember back in high school (graduated 1985) when we were studying terrorism, the USSR and so on, one of my teachers made the point where "one man's terrorist (or traitor) is another man's hero." When you think about it, many times that is true, I guess it boils down to the issue of whose ox is getting gored at the time.

Lastly about the slavery issue and the issue in general, we are judging 1860's people by our 20th and 21st Century standards. Things like slavery and other stuff that went on at that time was considered "normal" although in the case of the first the "times were a-changing." I think with or without the Civil War, the days of slavery were numbered. Within a generation, maybe a smidge more, the internal combustion engine will have been perfected as well as the electric motor. Why have people slaving away on the farm when you can have more efficent "slaves" with names like John-Deere, Ford, Allis-Chalmers and Westinghouse? These new "slaves" only need fuel/electric power, periodical maintenance and so on. Slavery would have died by 1900 or, 1920 at the worst case scenario.

I think the point is that the Civil War is the crux where it is mainly a battle between the powers of the individual States vs. the leviathan of the Federal Government. If the Confederacy had won, would they adopt their own big federal system, who knows, but I think that and trade were the main issues of the disagreement.

[Huaynero]

I award you “Post of the Day” honors!
You cut through the back ‘n forth of postings to illustrate how the character of Marse Robert applies to US today.

[XRdsRev]

So....I am just stating facts. Sorry they don’t perfectly align with your opinion.

[Jimmy Valentine]

The battle of Chancellorsville says you are wrong. No general ever did more with less than Lee

[central_va]

Rommel used tactics from the US civil war because their military academies study our civil war and use it in their curriculum.

[central_va]

Do I think some Southerners hate the US? Yup.

It is no wonder the local constable won't give you a CCW permit. You are a little off in the head. It is obvious to him I'm sure.

[SkyDancer]

I as well am stating facts ... sorry they don’t align with your opinion either.

[Partisan Gunslinger]

There are still a couple of Civil War widows getting veterans’ benefits and about 17 children of Civil War Vets still around. For another thing Sherman’s March and the yankee reconstruction/retribution on the South was so harsh that we still hate the North.

I've spent a few vacations in the South and have seen no evidence anyone hates me for having northern plates. I think you and your few holdouts just like to have something to irrationally hate.

[Vermont Lt]

You guys all come on here, still arguing about a war where YOUR side rebelled against the legitimate government. Then you whine like twelve year old girls because that same government kicked your butts from east to west, north to south. Your side surrendered and you all skulked home like the beaten army that you were.

Then you complain about being treated like the losing side.

And then you complain about how you should have won, and would have won if only.....

And you rail against that government to this day.

And this is all about a war that happen 150 years ago.

And you think I am unhinged?

You discuss how the results of that war were bad. And you talk about the “South rising again.”

Yes, I think the folks who think along the lines I described detest the government of the United States. I say this because their words are not said in jest. There is a small percentage of southerners, like yourself, who hold such a grudge that you would be happy to secede again, establish your own country, and be happy to be done with the U.S.

Tell me where I am wrong.

Wait, don’t. Because you have the intellect of a gnat. And I have better things to do with my time.

[Partisan Gunslinger]

Nowhere man is a good name for you. The slavery issue had been raging for decades before the Civil War. Those who still clung to it, as the Declarations of Secession proved slavery was the cause of secession and therefore the attack on Sumter and the war, had plenty of time to disavow it. They didn’t disavow it, but promised to perpetuate it.