Robert E Lee The Great Emancipator

[Laurie Verge]

Robert E. Lee's wife and mother had both worked in movements to secure colonization in Liberia for freed slaves. His wife's mother had established a school at Arlington plantation to teach basic education to slave children, and Lee and his wife continued that school even after the State of Virginia declared such institutions illegal.

Lee's father-in-law's will stipulated that his slave property was to be manumitted upon his death IF the estate was financially sound. If not, they would continue as slaves no more than five years hence. Mr. Lee determined that the estate needed more security and that the slaves needed more training in skills that would benefit them when freedom came. That freedom came within the specified five-year period on December 29, 1862 -- beating the deadline of the Emancipation Proclamation (which was ignored by the Virginians anyhow) and the deadline of Lee's father-in-law for manumission.

A key source cited by defenders and critics is Lee's 1856 letter to his wife:

... In this enlightened age, there are few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution, is a moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence.
—Robert E. Lee, to Mary Anna Lee, December 27, 1856

Freeman's [Douglas Southall] analysis places Lee's attitude toward slavery and abolition in a historical context:

This [letter] was the prevailing view among most religious people of Lee's class in the border states. They believed that slavery existed because God willed it and they thought it would end when God so ruled. The time and the means were not theirs to decide, conscious though they were of the ill-effects of Negro slavery on both races. Lee shared these convictions of his neighbors without having come in contact with the worst evils of African bondage. He spent no considerable time in any state south of Virginia from the day he left Fort Pulaski in 1831 until he went to Texas in 1856. All his reflective years had been passed in the North or in the border states. He had never been among the blacks on a cotton or rice plantation. At Arlington, the servants [under the Custises] had been notoriously indolent, their master's master. Lee, in short, was only acquainted with slavery at its best, and he judged it accordingly. At the same time, he was under no illusion regarding the aims of the Abolitionists or the effect of their agitation.

[tblunk]

(06-07-2013 08:54 AM)Laurie Verge Wrote:  In analyzing the Lee incident at the altar rail, I have come to think that the priest was the one who created a potential problem. Lee was an Episcopalian, as am I. When the black gentleman knelt at the altar, the priest was obligated to give him communion (unless the man had crossed his arms over his chest to indicate that he had not been confirmed and, therefore, needed a blessing only). When the priest realized (within about ten seconds) that no one else was rising from their pew, I think he should have administered the wafer and wine to the gentleman and not just stood there waiting to see what was going to happen.

To my mind, Lee's actions diffused a bad situation. He could have remained in his pew and done nothing. For us, whose Christian views are so different from those of our forefathers, to surmise that Lee was making an arrogant gesture instead is unsubstantiated and fairly typical of modern culture that tends to put negative spins on everything.

Sorry, I spent 26 years on the organ stool at my church, starting at age 12. And, I spent most of those years under the "old" Episcopal liturgy and beliefs. I am far from being a modern, liberal Episcopalian; I still prefer the dignity of the original Anglican faith, so you will have to pardon my piety.

I agree that the priest was in a pickle. And Gen'l Lee bailed him out.

I hope that I didn't make it seem as though I was discounting Lee's action. If anyone thought that it was an arrogant gesture, it was Col Broun at the scene. "By this action of Gen. Lee the services were conducted as if the negro had not been present. It was a grand exhibition of superiority shown by a true Christian and great soldier under the most trying and offensive circumstances"

[Rick Smith]

tblunk,

Your response did not seem to be discounting Lee's actions at all.

Colonel Broun's eye witness account, published in the Confederate Veteran, was meant as a highly complimentary commentary on General Lee's actions in a difficult situation.

Rick

[Laurie Verge]

I agree with Rick. I think we are misinterpreting the Victorian verbage of Col. Broun (and I again preach that we need to immerse ourselves in the social, cultural, religious, and political feelings of the era in which we are interested). I suspect that the "offending" word here is SUPERIORITY. If so, the Colonel intended it to mean that Lee rose above the prevailing attitudes of those in the congregation (and the South in general) and proved himself superior to the others who obviously watched in disdain.

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Named Kate: In response to your previous questions on this thread concerning racial issues - IMO, we have not understood human nature for a thousand years; we tend to forget that slavery was not always a black/white issue (whites held whites, blacks held blacks, etc.); and that it is not a system confined only to the history of the U.S.

I guess what I'm trying to say is it requires years and years of reading as well as what I stated above about immersing ourselves in all areas of any period in history to even get started on understanding man's injustice to man. There are certainly areas in the world today that are much deeper into present-day slavery and inequality than the U.S. ever was/is. Too bad we can't all solve our problems and move on. Anyone have a magic wand?

[Gene C]

I'm not so sure which way those present interpreted Lee's actions, but he rose above the prevailing attitudes of his time and did what he believed God would have him do. This must have had a powerful effect on those present, since he was the most revered leader in the Confederacy. Just another example of his leadership ability, and why he was so highly respected in both the South and North.

[Rick Smith]

(06-07-2013 11:21 AM)Gene C Wrote:  I'm not so sure which way those present interpreted Lee's actions, but he rose above the prevailing attitudes of his time and did what he believed God would have him do. This must have had a powerful effect on those present, since he was the most revered leader in the Confederacy. Just another example of his leadership ability, and why he was so highly respected in both the South and North.

Gene,

Very well said. Those who do not understand men like Lee & Jackson as Christians, as men of faith, will never fully understand them.

In this case, Lee humbled himself in obedience to God and did what he did regardless of what others might think of him.

Lee said many times that he was but a poor sinner saved by the grace of God and deperately in need of continual prayer.

He was great, in part, because of his humility.

Rick

[Bill Richter]

Robert E. Lee: The Great Emanciaptor

In reading this thread I am reminded that it is said that boys who turn thirteen years of age in the South receive two gifts that mark their entrance into manhood: a .22 cal. Rifle or .410 gauge shotgun and the three volume set of Douglas Southall Freemen’s Lee Lieutenants.

Freeman’s Robert E. Lee is an American icon, the noble leader of the Confederacy even more than Jefferson Davis, a man who fought reluctantly against the nation he had served in the US Army for thirty years, a man of great self-control, who surrendered with dignity once the great cause was lost. This is the Lee the South and many in the North revere and admire. As one of the librarians in Louisiana once told me, he was a gentleman. In Like vein, historian Thomas Connelly called him the Marble Man.

Although an unreconstructed rebel, I much prefer Alan Nolan’s interpretation of the Southern hero in his Lee Considered. He points out that Lee’s resignation for the US Army came only after Lee was guaranteed a position in Virginia’s army; that he was a supporter if slavery as an institution, particularly as a social institution (replaced after the war by the Yankee version of race relations, which came to be called segregation of Jim Crow; a man of a controlled temper that rarely over cam him, but did; a man who sacrificed a generation of Southern boys to a strategy of attack; and all sorts of miscellaneous “evils.”

White Southerners quail at such criticism while Yankees glory in it. But Freeman’s version was so powerful that it caused historian Fawn Brodie to cry out in anguish in a 1962 article in the New York Times, “Who Won the Civil War, Anyway?” But it took 100 years after the Civil War that the North could assert its alleged superiority in historical interpretation of the noble Lee, because it took them that long to win the peace that followed that greatest of all American wars. It was not until the passage of the Civil Rights Law of 1864 and the Voting Rights law of 1965 that the North finally won the war, led by what many in the South still see as a traitor, Lyndon B. Johnson. I have called these historians who criticize the South and the Confederacy as criminal enterprises Neo-Abolitionists.

But was Lee the Great Emancipationist? I say yes. It was Lee who made possible the Emancipation Proclamation and the Thirteenth Amendment. He did not intend to do that but he did--simply by defending the South on the battlefield so well as to extend the war to 1865. Before Lee took over the Army of Northern Virginia in June 1862 and led it to victory after victory, look at where the Confederacy was. New Orleans had fallen, U.S. Grant had driven the Rebels out of all of Middle and Western Tennessee into Northern Mississippi because of Ft Henry and Ft Donelson causing the loss of Nashville, the naval Battle of Plum Run on the Mississippi River had yielded up Memphis, Union troops threatened Chattanooga (remember the Great Locomotive Chase?), and Commodore David Farragut’s fleet was parked just outside of Vicksburg.

In the East, Union troops occupied the Sea Islands of South Carolina, the USS Monitor had defeated the CSS Virginia, Joseph Johnston’s rebel army was in the trenches out side of Richmond, Union General George B. McClellan’s forces had just moved to the south side of the Chickahominy, seriously wounded Johnston with a shot in the chest, and could see the spires and hear the church bells in the Confederate capital. Richmond’s fall was eminent.

Jefferson Davis turned to the only man available, his military advisor, Lee. In a matter of twelve months Lee smashed the Union army in the Seven Days, driving it away from Richmond, beat the Yankees at Second Bull Run, fought then to a stand-still at Antietam, embarrassed them at Fredericksburg, humiliated them at Chancellorsville, and was plummeling them in the first two days at Gettysburg.

In December 1862 Lincoln has presented a plan to free the slaves in a matter of 50 years. Everyone in the North laughed. So did Europe. So did the South. In September, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation. If the Confederates did not come back into the Union in three months, he would free the slaves in the Confederacy over which he had no control by presidential proclamation. I reality, he gave the South 90 days to make a deal with him and pledged not to disrupt slavery in the states. The South refused. Lincoln offered to buy the freedom of loyal slave states still in the Union. They refused. Forced confiscation of slaves through Emancipation was the only answer.

How many slaves the Proclamation freed and whether it was legal, do not matter. Lincoln had become an abolitionist. He corrected his legal stance by having Congress pass a proposed Thirteenth Amendment, which ended slavery completely. He was able to do all of this because Robert E. Lee kept the Confederacy alive for two critical years forcing Lincoln to act to deny the South its labor force and the North to accept this reality. In his own way, Lee was the Great Emancipator. He forced Lincoln to act to end slavery to win the war.

[My Name Is Kate]

I read on the wikipedia site (no less) the following:

"While at Washington College, Lee told a colleague that the greatest mistake of his life was taking a military education."

I wonder what he meant by that.

[J. Beckert]

He was probably thinking along the same lines as Sherman. "War is Hell" . I've heard there was a Civil War General who, after the war, always ordered his meat well done as he couldn't stand the sight of blood on his plate. Is that true?

[HerbS]

It is probably true,War and blood are tough to take! I hate to drive by accident scenes and my meat is always-Well-Done!

[Laurie Verge]

I swear Bill Richter! Just as I'm making progress getting Yankee Joe to appreciate us Southerners, it appears that you, Unreconstructed Rebel, are becoming a Yankee!!! Am I going to have to start sending you Moon Pies too??

[Bill Richter]

The problem Laurie, is never lose a war. I am more unreconstructed than most but I am not a sycophant. Lee was human, not a god.

[Rick Smith]

(06-07-2013 04:07 PM)william l. richter Wrote:  The problem Laurie, is never lose a war. I am more unreconstructed than most but I am not a sycophant. Lee was human, not a god.

I think it was Rev. William Jones, a Confederate Chaplain, who said of Lee, "He took everyone seriously, except himself."

Lee certainly knew he was but a man and acknowledged it often.

Another reason that he was admired by so many.

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(06-07-2013 04:00 PM)Laurie Verge Wrote:  I swear Bill Richter! Just as I'm making progress getting Yankee Joe to appreciate us Southerners, it appears that you, Unreconstructed Rebel, are becoming a Yankee!!! Am I going to have to start sending you Moon Pies too??

Laurie,

I am not even sure that Joe is a Yankee anymore; but if he still is, he is one of the best.

Good work.

Rick

[L Verge]

I never implied that Lee was a god, just a good man. The exact same thing that I would say about Lincoln. They both had faults, but they were the products of their time; and I think their good traits outweigh their weaknesses in the end.

[Eva Elisabeth]

...products of their time, this is something one often forgets when judging. And of their circumstances. Developement is one more keyword. To be able to reconsider believes, to learn from mistakes and weaknesses and to try to grow. I think, Lincoln did that, Lee obviously, too.

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(06-07-2013 03:00 PM)J. Beckert Wrote:  He was probably thinking along the same lines as Sherman. "War is Hell" . I've heard there was a Civil War General who, after the war, always ordered his meat well done as he couldn't stand the sight of blood on his plate. Is that true?

At least they knew what they did, they experienced the bloodshed, not just on the screen or from another safe place. Today warbusiness is much cleaner for those in responsible positions.