n officer of
engineers upon his staff. He was four times brevetted for gallant
conduct and came back famous. When Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston led the
Utah expedition in 1858 there marched on foot in his columns Lieut.
WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE, the son of Robert E. Lee. He was not a
soldier by education, but by instinct. A graduate of Harvard College and
the stroke oar of his class, he was well prepared for military life, and
the third of his line to bear arms for the United States. But no war
ensued; the canker of a long peace was settling on military aspirations.
Lieut. LEE resigned, married, and settled on his farm, the White House,
on the Pamunkey. With the prattle of little children around his knees
and pastoral scenes before him, his prospects were those of domestic
tranquillity and joy.
What a rush was there to the standards when war broke out in 1861!
Americans acted like Americans. They divided in conviction. They did not
differ as to the method of dealing with conviction. To divide was the
propulsion of conditions, to fight the law of blood. Not one of the Lees
had provoked war, but not one stood back. The whole family of Lees
became representative soldiers of their people; Gen. Robert E. Lee
commanded the greatest of the Southern armies and his brother became an
admiral of the Southern navy. His sons and nephews were soldiers and
sailors.
The nephew of Northern identity kept place with the North. The more
numerous class of Southern identity kept place with the South; the boy,
a private in the ranks or cadet on shipboard, the young men leading
companies and regiments and winning brigades and divisions, the sire and
chief commanding all. Their names are interwoven with war's dread story
and splendid deed. Not one had any reproach; not one struck a blow below
the belt. The woman, the child, the captive found a fortress in the hand
of Lee, the foeman met his peer. The history of two continents and many
centuries was written over again on fields of blood.
WILLIAM H.F. LEE raised a company of cavalry at the beginning of the war
and surrendered as a major-general of cavalry at Appomattox. He fought
his way to his rank and suffered all of war's vicissitudes save death.
His men believed in him and followed him. He was wounded; he was twice a
prisoner; he was held as a hostage in solitary confinement with death
impending. His wife and his children died while he lay wounded and in
prison. Whatever man may suffe
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