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Bible Encyclopedias
Robert Edward Lee
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
or ROBERT EDWARD LEE (1807-1870), American soldier, general in the Confederate States army, was the youngest son of major-general Henry Lee, called "Light Horse Harry." He was born at Stratford, Westmoreland county, Virginia, on the 19th of January 1807, and entered West Point in 1825. Graduating four years later second in his class, he was given a commission in the U.S. Engineer Corps. In 1831 he married Mary, daughter of G. W. P. Custis, the adopted son of Washington and the grandson of Mrs Washington. In 1836 he became first lieutenant, and in 1838 captain. In this rank he took part in the Mexican War, repeatedly winning distinction for conduct and bravery. He received the brevets of major for Cerro Gordo, lieut.- colonel for Contreras-Churubusco and colonel for Chapultepec. After the war he was employed in engineer work at Washington and Baltimore, during which time, as before the war, he resided on the great Arlington estate, near Washington, which had come to him through his wife. In 1852 he was appointed superintendent of West Point, and during his three years here he carried out many important changes in the academy. Under him as cadets were his son G. W. Custis Lee, his nephew, Fitzhugh whom he led was extraordinary. No student of the American Lee and J. E. B. Stuart, all of whom became general officers in i Civil War can fail to notice how the influence of Lee dominated the Civil War. In 1855 he was appointed as lieut.-colonel the course of the struggle, and his surpassing ability was never to the 2nd Cavalry, commanded by Colonel Sidney Johnston, more conspicuously shown than in the last hopeless stages of with whom he served against the Indians of the Texas border. the contest. The personal history of Lee is lost in the history In 1859, while at Arlington on leave, he was summoned to cornof the great crisis of America's national life; friends and foes mand the United States troops sent to deal with the John alike acknowledged the purity of his motives, the virtues of his Brown raid on Harper's Ferry. In March 1861 he was made private life, his earnest Christianity and the unrepining loyalty colonel of the 1st U.S. Cavalry; but his career in the old army with which he accepted the ruin of his party.
ended with the secession of Virginia in the following month. See A. L. Long, Memoirs of Robert E. Lee (New York, 1886); Fitzhugh Lee was strongly averse to secession, but felt obliged to conform Lee, General Lee (New York, 1894, "Great Commanders" series); to the action of his own state. The Federal authorities offered R. A. Brock, General Robert E. Lee (Washington, 1904); R. E. Lee, Recollections and Letters of General R. E. Lee (London, 1904); H. A.
Lee the command of the field army about to invade the White, Lee (" Heroes of the Nations") (1897); P. A. Bruce, Robert E. South, which he refused. Resigning his commission, he made Lee (1907); T. N. Page, Lee (1909); W. H.Taylor, Four Years with Gen- s way to Richmond and was at once made a major-general in eral Lee; J. W. Jones, Personal Reminiscences of Robert E. Lee (1874)
hi the Virginian forces. A few weeks later he became a brigadier- LEE (or [[Legh) Rowland]] (d. 1543), English bishop, belonged general (then the highest rank) in the Confederate service. to a Northumberland family and was educated at Cambridge. The military operations with which the great Civil War opened Having entered the Church he obtained several livings owing Wolsey; 1861 were directed by President Davis and General Lee. to the favour of Cardinal olsey; after Wolsey's fall he rose in Lee was personally in charge of the unsuccessful West Virginian high in the esteem of Henry VIII. and of Thomas Cromwell, operations in the autumn, and, having been made a full general serving both king and minister in the business of suppressing on the 31st of August, during the winter he devoted his ex the monasteries, and he is said to have celebrated Henry's secret perience as an engineer to the fortification and general defence marriage with Anne Boleyn in January 1533. Whether this of the Atlantic coast. Thence, when the well-drilled Army of be so or not, Lee took part in preparing for the divorce pro Potomac was about to descend upon Richmond, he was ceedings against Catherine of Aragon, and in January 1534 the hurriedly recalled to Richmond. General Johnston was wounded he was elected bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, or Chester at the battle of Fair Oaks (Seven Pines) on the 31st of May 1862, as the see was often called, taking at his consecration the new and General Robert E. Lee was assigned to the command of the oath to the king as head of the English Church and not seeking an s Army of Northern Virginia which for the next three confirmation from the pope. As bishop he remained in Henry's famous years "carried the rebellion on its bayonets." Little can be said personal service, endeavouring to establish the legality of his of Lee's career as a commander-in-chief that is not an integral marriage with Anne, until May 1534, when he was appointed part of the history of the Civil War. His first success was the lord president of the council in the marches of Wales. At this "Seven Days' Battle" (q.v.) in which he stopped McClellan's time the Welsh marches were in a very disorderly condition. advance; this was quickly followed up by the crushing defeat Lee acted in a stern and energetic fashion, holding courts, of the Federal army under Pope, the invasion of Maryland and sentencing many offenders to death and overcoming the hostility the sanguinary and indecisive battle of the Antietam, of the English border lords. After some years of hard and The year ended with another great victory at Fredericksburg successful work in this capacity, "the last survivor of the old Th v.), Chancellorsville (see Wilderness) won against odds martial prelates, fitter for harness than for bishops' robes, for ( q of two to one, and the great three days' battle of Gettysburg a court of justice than a court of theology," died at Shrewsbury o (q.v.), where for the first time fortune turned decisively against in June 1543. Many letters from Lee to Cromwell are preserved the Confederates, were the chief events of 1863. In the autumn in the Record Office, London; these throw much light on the fought a war of manoeuvre against General Meade. The bishop's career and on the lawless condition of the Welsh marches Lee tremendous struggle of 1864 between Lee and Grant included in his time.
One of his contemporaries was Edward Lee (c. 1482-1544) arch the battles of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, North Anna, bishop of York, famous for his attack on Erasmus, who replied to Cold Harbor and the long siege of Petersburg, in which, him in his Epistolae aliquot eruditorum virorum. Like Rowland, almost invariably, Lee was locally successful. But the steady Edward was useful to Henry VIII. in the matter of the divorce of of his unrelenting opponent slowly wore down his Catherine of Aragon, and was sent by the king on embassies to the pressure strength. At last with not more than one man to oppose to emperor Charles V. and to Pope Clement VII. In 1531 he became g pP archbishop of York, but he came under suspicion ae one who dis Grant's three he was compelled to break out of his Petersburg liked the king's new position as head of the English Church. At lines (April 1865). A series of heavy combats revealed his Pontefract in 1536, during the Pilgrimage of Grace, the archbishop, and Grant pursued the dwindling remnants of Lee's was compelled to join the rebels, but he did not sympathize with purpose army t o the westward. Headed off by the Federal cavalry, rising and in 1539 he spoke in parliament in favour of the six Y Y y, articles of religion. Lee, who was the last archbishop of York to and pressed closely in rear by Grant's main body, General Lee coin money, died on the 13th of September 1544.
had no alternative but to surrender. At Appomattox Court LEE, Sidney (1859-), English man of letters, was born House, on the 9th of April, the career of the Army of Northern in London on the 5th of December 1859. He was educated Virginia came to an end. Lee's farewell order was issued on the at the City of London school, and at Balliol College, Oxford, following day, and within a few weeks the Confederacy was at where he graduated in modern history in 1882. In the next an end. For a few months Lee lived quietly in Powhatan county, year he became assistant-editor of the Dictionary of National making his formal submission to the Federal authorities and Biography. In 1890 he was made joint-editor, and on the urging on his own people acceptance of the new conditions. In retirement of Sir Leslie Stephen in 1891 succeeded him as editor. August he was offered, and accepted, the presidency of WashingHe was himself a voluminous contributor to the work, writing ton College, Lexington (now Washington and Lee University), a some Boo articles, mainly on Elizabethan authors or statesmen. post which he occupied until his death on the 12th of October While he was still at Balliol he wrote two articles on Shake 1870 He was buried in the college grounds. spearian questions, which were printed in the Gentleman's For the events of Lee's military career briefly indicated Magazine, and in 1884 he published a book on Stratford-on-Avon. in this notice the reader is referred to the articles American His article on Shakespeare in the fifty-first volume (1897) of the Civil War, &c. By his achievements he won a high place Dictionary of National Biography formed the basis of his Life amongst the great generals of history. Though hampered by of William Shakespeare (1898), which reached its fifth edition lack of materials and by political necessities, his strategy was in 1905. Mr Lee edited in 1902 the Oxford facsimile edition of daring always, and he never hesitated to take the gravest risks. the first folio of Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories and Tragedies, On the field of battle he was as energetic in attack as he was followed in 1902 and 1904 by supplementary volumes giving constant in defence, and his personal influence over the men details of extant copies, and in 1906 by a complete edition of Shakespeare's Works. Besides editions of English classics his works include a Life of Queen Victoria (1902),(1902), Great Englishmen of the Sixteenth Century (1904), based on his Lowell Institute lectures at Boston, Mass., in 1903, and Shakespeare and the Modern Stage (1906).
These files are public domain.
Chisholm, Hugh, General Editor. Entry for 'Robert Edward Lee'. 1911 Encyclopedia Britanica. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/bri/r/robert-edward-lee.html. 1910.
