Lee of the Union: The Traitorous Robert E. Lee

Typical iconography of Robert E. Lee: A Traitor Beloved by the Lost Cause Aristocrats

Following the subjugation of the South by President Abraham Lincoln's War of Northern Aggression, a new movement arose in the martyred Southern States: the Lost Cause. The Lost Cause was the second great literary movement in the American South and it was lead by the same people who founded the first great literary movement: the antebellum Plantain planters. The Lost Cause authors ( historian Edward Pollard, poet Abram Ryan) protrayed such men as General Robert Edward Lee as a Southern noble. They stated that losses on the battlefield were inevitable due to Northern superiority in resources and manpower. Finally, they wrote that Lee was a perfect commander and that the ONLY reason his army was unable to succeed was because of inept subbordinates. The Lost Cause was, in effect, a collection of very wealthy Southern aristocrats who wanted to ignore the reality that Robert E. Lee was a triator to the Southern cause.

Lee in his Union Man costume: One he secretly wore during the Civil War

We must first look at traitor Robert E. Lee's pre-war experiences. He was the son of "Light Horse Harry" Lee, a close aide to General George Washington during the American Revolutionary War. His mother was Anne Carter Lee, the granddaughter of Southern aristocrat and big time capitalist slave driver Robert "King" Carter. Being raised by his mother, Robert was told to adhere to the dictates of the Union. "Light Horse Harry" Lee would go broke and hightail it to the Caribbean, but still write his son letters about the wisdom of the revolution and the United States government. In 1825 Lee went off to West Point Military Academy to learn about how best to serve his country. As a typical overachiever, he achieved the rank of sergeant after his first year and was such a tight ass that he did not break a single rule in four years. Graduating a brevet second lieutenant of engineers, Lee was sen as a rising Union officer who was meant to do great things for the Union. In 1831 Lee continued on his path of becoming a great Union stooge by marrying Mary Anna Randolph Custis, the great-granddaughter of Martha Washington and the step-great granddaughter of Virginia Federalist John Randolph. Lee had now married into the biggest Union family he could find.

During the Mexican War General Winfield "Old Fuss and Feathers" Scott talked up Lee as his possible successor and Lee was rewarded with being the commandant of West Point. This was yet another plumb government job given to the man who was now making marrying into government his life long profession. Lee was seen as a the new "golden boy" of the Union, known as the "Marble Man" amongst his contemporaries. He was given chief roles in engineering jobs from Texas to California to the Mississippi River. One can only wonder why Lee was unwilling to fight against a government that had given him such favorable treatment. The answer is that Lee never intended to fight against the Union, as his immediate repose following the secession of South Carolina shows.

General David Emanuel Twiggs: A Southern Patriot

When Texas seceded from the Union in February 1861, General David E. Twiggs surrendered all the American forces (4,000 in the Department of Texas) to the Confederate forces of Texas. Twiggs resigned from the U.S. Army and was given a rank in the Confederate Army. Lee, who was a member of the Department of Texas, did not join his fellow Southerners in joining the Confederate fight for independence. Instead, Lee returned to Washington, D.C., as was named a colonel in the First U.S. Calvary in March 1861. President Abraham Lincoln signed Lee's lates6t promotion and offered control of the Union largest army to Lee with the promise of being made a Major General. However, the Union man Lee, who abandoned his compatriots in Texas, had a plan to destroy the new Southern nation and become it's greatest "hero" in the process.

The Arlington House Plot

The Arlington House Plot is what I refer to as the greatest plot against freedom in American history. Robert E. Lee was not a fan of the War for Southern Independence. As late as March 1861 Lee was attacking the Southern cause as "revolutionary" and "A betrayal of the efforts of our founders." As late as March 28, 1861, Lee has accepted a promotion to the rank of colonel in the U.S. Calvary. He ignored an offer of command of Confederate Armies and told an associate that he would, "Never bear arms against the Union." He never did bear arms against the Union, he simply "carried his musket" and put up a good show fight. The Arlington House Plot was when Lee decided to leave the United States Army to begin an aristocratic plot to destoy the Confederacy.

The Battle of Cheat Mountain: The Sell-Out Begins

The Battle of Cheat Mountain showed the type of commander that Robert E. Lee was: a traitor commander. Western Virginia was very important to the early Confederate war strategy as it had the seat of the Virginia Railroad and also had several federal armories. At the Battle of Cheat Mountain, Lee, who was in command, allowed his subordinate officers to stumble around in fog and winding woods and mountains for two days before they all independently attacked an untrained Union force at Fort Milroy. The Union lost only ten fewer men then Lee's force, yet he ordered a complete withdrawal from the area. When General William W. Loring demanded a renewed assault into Western Virginia in later 1861, Lee refused to do so, citing a "Lack of supplies." It is interesting to note that later in the war a "lack of supplies" did not stop Lee from marching. It was Lee's traitorous behavior in Western Virgina that led to the fall of West Virginia and the needed railroad to the Union in 1862.

A Few Fortuitous "Accidents": Two Johnston's are Denied Generalship of the Army of Richmond

Friendly fired seemed to follow General Lee wherever he and Traveler rode throughout the Civil War. After his traitorous behavior in Western Virginia, Lee was put out to pasture in Richmond to dig some ditches. It looked as if the Arlington House Plot had failed and the South would succeed in it's war for independence. However, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, a West Pointer like Lee, decided that the Union loving Lee would make a good chief strategist for him. General Joseph E. Johnston, the master of the strategic retreat who had won the Battle of Bull Run, was doing an outstanding job keeping General George Brinton McClellan at bay during the Peninsula Campaign of Spring 1862. Through a series of withdrawals, General Johnston saves his fighting force until he fought the far larger Army of the Potomac to a standstill at the Battle of Seven Pines.

The fact that Johnston's outnumbered two-to-one army fought the Union force away from Richmond is a testament to Johnston's military genius, but Johnston was not liked by President Davis or General Lee. Strangely Johnston, who was not harmed in much thicker fighting at the Battle of Bull Run, was injured at the Battle of Seven Pines and replaced by Robert E. Lee, who had failed to show any leadership acumen during his time in Western Virginia. Why didn't President Davis withdraw General Albert Sidney Johnston from the losing battle in Tennessee and send him out East? After all, A.S. Johnston outranked Lee under the Confederate order of new generals. This has never been answered, and the fact that friendly fire killed Albert Sydney Johnston at the Battle of Shiloh further makes an inquisitive mind wonder what really put Lee in charge of the Army of the James (renamed by Lee the Army of Northern Virgina).

Rest in Pace Old Stonewall Jackson

Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson is one of the most beloved commanders of the American Civil War. His brilliant encompassing of the Union right-flank at the Battle of Chancellorsville still amazes military historians to this day. One of the reasons that General Jackson was able to lead amazing assaults on Union armies was his ability to gather intelligence and make night assaults. In fact, his night assaults were legendary north and south. This is why it is fishy that on the night of May 2, 1863, Confederate soldiers inexplicably fired on Jackson and his staff as they were riding on a twilight reconnaissance after the Battle of Chancellorsville. Government historians claim that a Major Berry was afraid that the oncoming horsemen, of whom they should have been familiar with, were Union soldiers. "It's a damned Yankee trick," is the stock statement that government historians claim Major Berry said in response to the fact that Jackson and his riders had positively identified themselves. A band of North Carolina riflemen then inexplicably opened fire on a band of riders. This does not match ANY protocol of how to deal with riders during the Civil War. NO regiment would fire a volley, and then a second volley, into a cavalcade of riders after a positive identification. Additionally, why was this Major Berry not charged by the Confederate government with disorderly conduct for firing on a small contingency of horsemen? There was no proof that these horsemen were anything more than message carriers and under the the accepted conduct of war in the 1860s you were punished if you "shot the messenger."

James Longstreet: Lee's Constant Foil

Why did Robert E. Lee invade Pennsylvania in June 1863? The history books have put forth several scenarios. The generally forgotten reason is that the Gettysburg Campaign would lead General Ulysses S. Grant to send soldiers from the Army of Tennessee to the east to protect the nation's capital from a Confederate assault through Pennsylvania and Maryland. This would weaken Grant's foothold outside of the Confederate Gibraltar at Vicksburg, Mississippi. General Lee, in my opinion, released that a successful invasion of Pennsylvania was a very long shot for his army and a gift for Northern forces. After all, soon after Lee's invasion of Pennsylvania the Union replaced General Joe Hooker with General George Gordon Meade, a Pennsylvanian who knew the area of Gettysburg very well. Lee was walking into a trap in Pennsylvania and he knew it. It was what the Union spy Lee wanted. This is why he turned down several much better plans by General James Longstreet, who was the commander of the First Corp of the Army of Northern Virginia.

Following the assassination of Stonewall Jackson at Chancellorsville, James Longstreet argued that all or part of his corp should be sent to Tennessee for the Summer 1863 campaign season. General Longstreet argued to Lee that if General Braxton Bragg, Commander of the Department of the Mississippi, could be reinforced by his corp the Army of the Ohio under General William Rosecrans, a Union officer and German immigrant, could then be overwhelmed and the Army of the Ohio would no longer be in Tennessee to guard Grant's supply lines at the Central Railway. With his supply trains captured and the Union held government at Memphis, Tennessee (under future president Andrew Johnson) threatened by Bragg's army Grant would be forced to withdraw from Vicksburg to defend Tennessee and resupply his army. This was the best plan for victory but Lee ignored it. It had historical precedent (see the early Vicksburg Campaign) and made tactical sense to Confederate Secretary of War James Seddon. However, Lee insisited on his long shot invasion of Pennsylvania. As Longstreet wrote in his autobiography, "His plan or wishes announced, it became useless and improper to offer suggestions leading to a different course."

James Longstreet was a constant enemy of Lee's because he wanted to fight a defensive war that would have led to victory for the Southern cause, which was the exact opposite of what Lee wanted. Longstreet urged Lee that throughout the Pennsylvania Campaign, "We should work so as to force the enemy to attack us, in such good position as we might find in our own country." Even during an invasion wise General Longstreet wanted a defensive war. After the first day of Battle at Gettysburg, Longstreet advised Lee to withdraw from the field of battle and to set up fortifications at, "Ground more accommodating to our side." Longstreet saw at Gettysburg a Chancellorsville in reverse- The Union had the high ground and had strategically set up cannon on Cemetery Hill, thus denying the Confederates the ability to take that most strategic of hills. Longstreet advised Lee to withdraw to York, Pennsylvania, a city that Generals Jubal Early and "Extra Billy" Smith had captured three days previous. Despite his "Lost Cause" record of being a tactical genius, Lee turned down this wise advice to focus on a suicide mission called Pickett's Charge (more appropriately Pickett-Trimble-Anderson's Charge). In Lee's tactical traitor plan he would throw three divisions at the well-fortified Union position of Cemetery Hill. IN order to find a scapegoat for this travesty, Lee selected Longstreet. Despite the fact that only one division in the charge (that of George Pickett) belonged to Longstreet's Corp, Lee gave his constant foil the unenviable task of sending three divisions to sure destruction. Lost Cause writers have since blamed Longstreet, the man who opposed Lee's traitorous behavior, for Confederate defeat at Gettysburg.

It is interesting to note that after the fall of Vicksburg, when it didn't even matter, Lee allowed Longstreet to go to Tennessee with his corp. Had Lee allowed this to occur in June 1863 it is likely that Vicksburg would not have fallen and Lincoln would have had no victory to run on in the 1864 presidential election. To conclude the case against Lee with Mr. Longstreet as a witness, on May 4th, 1864, Longstreet was wounded during the Battle of the Wilderness, accidentally shot by his own men only about 4 miles away from the place where Jackson suffered the same fate a year earlier.

Lee is congratulated for a plot well delivered by General and future president Ulysses S. Grant

On April 9th, 1865, General Lee decided that his charade had gone on long enough. Despite the fact that General Joseph E. Johnston could have teamed up with the Army of Northern Virginia and fought on. Despite the fact that Confederate raiders wanted to wage a guerrilla war. Despite the fact that the people of the Confederacy welcomed more war and President Davis called for a continuation of the war effort from Danville, Virginia, on April 7th, 1865, Lee still decided to surrender to Ulysses S. Grant, a man he had been accommodating since 1863.

It is interesting to note that Grant did not take Lee prisoner after the surrender. This is rather unprecedented because Grant was known for taking Confederate generals prisoner (see the Battles of Fort Henry and Donnelson, 1862) and because of the simple fact that Lee was the leader of the largest army in a four year rebellion against the established government of the United States. It is far more than Grant's questionable magnanimity that led him to give extremely favorable treatment to Lee's Army. After all, Grant was known for his love of unconditional surrender and total defeat of armies, that is why President Lincoln gave him control of the Army of the Potomac in March 1864.

Additionally, Lee is the only defeated general of a rebel army that did not flee the nation in which he led the unsuccessful revolt. After the defeat of the Cavaliers in the English Civil War, the royalists fled to France. After the defeat of the anarchist trade union in the Spanish Civil War, the anarchists fled to France. However, after the defeat of the Confederate States of America, Lee, the leader of it's largest army, did not flee to Mexico or Canada, even though he was given the chance on multiple occasions. President Davis and Secretary of War John C. Breckenridge attempted to flee to Mexico (Breckenridge would eventually end up in Brazil and Canada), but Lee did not flee. Instead, he was never put on trial and immediately reapplied for United States citizenship, an act that is unprecedented in the history of revolution.

Lee as an old traitor: He destroyed the South, his work was done.

In conclusion, Robert Edward Lee was a Union spy who took control of the Southern Cause to lead the new agrarianism nation to certain defeat. The South could have won the Civil War by fighting a defensive war, as General Ngyuen Giap and George Washington won the Vietnam War and the Revolutionary War respectively. Lee was a Union golden boy who fought as a Union agent against the Southern cause.