Someone said, "Confederate General Robert E. Lee was against slavery."
Where This Comes Up
Sometimes if someone argues that the War couldn't have been about slavery because the major players in the Confederacy were against it. One example is Lee, who some argue was against slavery and secession but supported Virginia above all.
When This Started
The first instance I saw of this in print instead of implied is the 1880s. It picked up momentum in the early 20th century.
What Part Is True
We have several writings, both public and private, where Lee says he is against secession.
In an oft-quoted letter to his wife, Lee said "slavery as an institution is a moral & political evil in any Country."
Why It's Complicated
- Lee owned slaves.
- Even when Lee didn't own slaves on paper, his wife's family did, and he was in charge of the enslaved people in his home.
- Lee inherited slaves. When three slaves ran away because they thought they would be freed upon their old master's death, Lee allegedly had them returned and whipped.
- Lee privately denied allegations of cruelty against anyone he enslaved. He never made public statements about any allegations.
- Lee manumitted his slaves in December 1862, after the Emancipation Proclamation was announced but two days before it went into effect.
- The quote from above requires some context. In the next sentence, Lee continues, "It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly interested 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." In other words, slavery is worse for a white man's spirit than a Black man's humanity.
- Lee continued, "The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things...Their emancipation will sooner result from the mild & melting influence of Christianity, than the storms & tempests of fiery Controversy." In other words, enslavement is a good thing and emancipation would only be possible once Black people are subdued and Christianized, and not through war.
Who Talked About It
"[W]e were immediately taken before Gen. Lee, who demanded the reason why we ran away; we frankly told him that we considered ourselves free; he then told us he would teach us a lesson we never would forget; he then ordered us to the barn, where, in his presence, we were tied firmly to posts by a Mr. Gwin, our overseer, who was ordered by Gen. Lee to strip us to the waist and give us fifty lashes each, excepting my sister, who received but twenty; we were accordingly stripped to the skin by the overseer, who, however, had sufficient humanity to decline whipping us; accordingly Dick Williams, a county constable, was called in, who gave us the number of lashes ordered; Gen. Lee, in the meantime, stood by, and frequently enjoined Williams to lay it on well, an injunction which he did not fail to heed; not satisfied with simply lacerating our naked flesh, Gen. Lee then ordered the overseer to thoroughly wash our backs with brine, which was done."
Click Here to read Lee's resignation letters as well as personal letters about his decision to resign.
Click Here to read Lee's letter to his wife in which he calls slavery a "moral & political evil."
Click Here to read Garnet Joseph Wolseley's full Macmillan’s Magazine article from 1887.
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