Removal of Confederate Monuments

[David Lockmiller]

I think that the statues of General Lee with his horse Traveller should remain standing wherever they are now. The following are a few stories of interest regarding General Lee and his horse Traveller. (And, as you will see, the horse’s name is not misspelled.)

“My brother then offered him the horse as a gift, which the General promptly declined, and at the same time remarked: ‘If you will willingly sell me the horse, I will gladly use it for a week or so to learn its qualities.’ Thereupon my brother had the horse sent to General Lee’s stable. In about a week the horse was returned to my brother, with a note from General Lee stating that the animal suited him, but that he could not longer use so valuable a horse in such times, unless it was his own; that if he (my brother) would not sell, please to keep the horse, with many thanks. This was in February, 1862. At that time I was in Virginia, on the sick list from a long and severe attack of camp fever, contracted in the campaign on Big Sewell mountains. My brother wrote me of General Lee’s desire to have the horse, and asked me what he should do. I replied at once: ‘If he will not accept it, then sell it to him at what it cost me.’ He then sold the horse to General Lee for $200 in currency, the sum of $25 having been added by General Lee to the price I paid for the horse in September, 1861, to make up the depreciation in our currency from September, 1861, to February, 1862.

“In 1868 General Lee wrote to my brother, stating that this horse had survived the war–was known as ‘Traveller’ (spelling the word with a double l in good English style), and asking for its pedigree, which was obtained, as above mentioned, and sent by my brother to General Lee.”

The most notable incident occurred in the Wilderness on May 6, [1864]when soldiers of the Texas Brigade surrounded Traveller and shouted, ‘Lee to the rear!’ That day Traveller carried Lee until well after midnight, and when they finally returned to camp, Lee dismounted, and overcome with exhaustion, he threw his arms around Traveller’s neck to hold himself up.

One afternoon in July of this year [?], the General rode down to the canal-boat landing to put on board a young lady who had been visiting his daughters and was returning home. He dismounted, tied Traveller to a post, and was standing on the boat making his adieux, when someone called out that Traveller was loose. Sure enough, the gallant grey was making his way up the road, increasing his speed as a number of boys and men tried to stop him. General Lee immediately stepped ashore, called to the crowd to stand still, and advancing a few steps gave a peculiar low whistle. At the first sound, Traveller stopped and pricked up his ears. The General whistled a second time, and the horse with a glad whinny turned and trotted quietly back to his master, who patted and coaxed him before tying him up again. To a bystander expressing surprise at the creature’s docility the General observed that he did not see how any man could ride a horse for any length of time without a perfect understanding being established between them.

Here is how General Lee felt about Traveller… this excerpt is from a letter to his daughter when she had commissioned an artist to paint Traveller:

I purchased him in the mountains of Virginia in the autumn of 1861, and he has been my patient follower ever since — to Georgia, the Carolinas, and back to Virginia. He carried me through the Seven Days battle around Richmond, the Second Manassas, at Sharpsburg, Fredericksburg, the last day at Chancellorsville, to Pennsylvania, at Gettysburg, and back to the Rappahannock. From the commencement of the campaign in 1864 at Orange, till its close around Petersburg, the saddle was scarcely off his back, as he passed through the fire of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, and across the James River. He was almost in daily requisition in the winter of 1864-65 on the long line of defenses from Chickahominy, north of Richmond, to Hatcher’s Run, south of the Appomattox. In the campaign of 1865, he bore me from Petersburg to the final days at Appomattox Court House. You must know the comfort he is to me in my present retirement….Of all his companions in toil, ‘Richmond,’ ‘Brown Roan,’ ‘Ajax,’ and quiet ‘Lucy Long,’ he is the only one that retained his vigor. The first two expired under their onerous burden, the last two failed. You can, I am sure, from what I have said, paint his portrait. R.E. Lee

Lee spent his final years as president of Washington College in Lexington, Va., where Traveller was allowed to graze the campus. He lost numerous hairs from his mane and tail as admirers plucked them for souvenirs. I read a letter from General Lee to his daughter where he stated that Traveller is going BALD from all the students grabbing hair samples!

Lee became ill in September 1870, and on October 12 he died at his home in Lexington.

Traveller walked behind the hearse at Lee’s funeral and continued to be well cared for up until his death in June 1871. After stepping on a nail and contracting tetanus, commonly known as lockjaw, Traveller was euthanized.