Lee's soldiers, well versed as all Americans are in the history of their forefathers' struggle against King George the Third, and believing firmly in the justice of their cause, saw the same virtue in one rebellion that was to be found in the other. Washington's stalwart soldiers were styled rebels by our king and his ministers, and in like manner the men who wore the grey uniform of the Southern Confederacy were denounced as rebels from the banks of the Potomac to the head waters of the St.
General lee free#
On the other hand, I can recognise the chivalrous valour of those gallant men whom I led to victory: who fought not only for fatherland and in defence of home but for those rights most prized by but for those rights most prized by free men. It is the quality to which the Anglo-Saxon race is most indebted for its great position in the world. It is a virtue to which the United States owed its birth in the last century, and its preservation in 1865. On one side I can see, in the dogged determination of the North persevered in to the end through years of recurring failure, the spirit for which the men of Britain have always been remarkable. Outsiders can best weigh and determine the merits of the chief actors on both sides but if in this attempt to estimate General Lee's character I offend any one by the outspoken expression of my opinions, I hope I may be forgiven. Twenty-one years have passed since the great Secession war ended, but even still, angry remembrances of it prevent Americans from taking an impartial view of the contest, and of those who were the leaders in it. I desire to make known to the reader not only the renowned soldier, whom I believe to have been the greatest of his age, but to give some insight into the character of one whom I have always considered the most perfect man I ever met. It is my wish to give a short outline of General Lee's life, and to describe him as I saw him in the autumn of 1862, when at the head of proud and victorious troops he smiled at the notion of defeat by any army that could be sent against him. It was but natural that all Americans should be proud of the empire which the military genius of General Washington had created, despite the efforts of England to retain her Colonies. At the same time, of Englishmen who believe that “union is strength,” and who are themselves determined that no dismemberment of their own empire shall be allowed, few will find fault with the men of the north for their manly determination, come what might, to resist every effort of their brothers in the south to break up the Union.
The unprejudiced outsider will generally admit the sovereign right, both historical and legal, which each State possessed under the constitution, to leave the Union when its people thought fit to do so. It is not my intention to enter upon any narrative of the events which led to that fratricidal war. It will be read with interest as coming from the pen of one who was Lee's military secretary, and its straightforward, soldier-like style will commend it to all readers. General Long's work on the great Confederate general is a contribution towards the history of that grand but unsuccessful struggle by the seceding States to shake off all political connection with the Union Government. THE HISTORY of the war between the Northern and Southern States of North America is yet to be written. Lee: His Military and Personal History, by A. 321–31), published in London and New York, which in turn was taken from Memoirs of Robert E. In addition to his contributions to the major journals of his day, his books include The Life of John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough to the Accession of Queen Anne (2 vols London: Richard Bentley and Son, 1894) The Decline and Fall of Napoleon (Botston: Roberts Brothers, 1895) and The Story of a Soldier's Life (2 vols New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, and London: Archibald Constable & Co., 1903) The following is taken from the March 1887 issue of Macmillan's Magazine (vol. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and James Longstreet, and of whom he left his reminiscences. In 1862, while in Canada, he decided to inquire firsthand into the American Civil War and traveled south, where he met Generals Robert E. Note: Field Marshal Garnet Joseph Wolseley, 1st Viscount Wolseley (1833–1913), of Dublin, Ireland, was a career officer in the British army.