CHAPTER II

BOYHOOD

WESTMORELAND COUNTY, Virginia, is a little county lying between the Rappahannock and Potomac Rivers, which was originally cut off from Northumberland County. It is not more than thirty miles long and about half as broad, but it has probably produced more great men than any other spot of its size in the United States. George Washington was born there, and James Monroe, as were also the famous LeesRichard Henry, Francis Lightfoot, Arthur, and "Light Horse Harry." James Madison was born not far away in Prince George County, which adjoins Westmoreland.

Stratford, the Lee home, was one of the most beautiful and interesting of the Colonial mansions of Virginia. Its timbers were of solid hewn oak of great size, and the brick used in the building were brought from England. The walls of the first floor were two and a half feet thick and those above were two feet. The house was meant to be a permanent family home, after the fashion of English houses, and was very stately. It contained seventeen rooms besides the great hall, and on

the roof were two pavilions or summer houses made with the chimneys for columns and connected by a gallery. From them was visible the broad expanse of the stately Potomac, and there at night in the olden time promenaded the ladies and gentlemen, while a band of negro servants played for them. Around the house were great oaks, cedars, and maples, and the drive through the grounds skirted a magnificent grove of the maples. There were, in addition to the house, four large offices, the kitchen, and stables to accommodate perhaps a hundred horses. The buildings cost about eighty thousand dollars at a time when the purchasing power of money was much greater than it is now. The house is still standing.

In this home, on January 19, 1807, was born Robert Edward Lee. The room in which he was born was the same one in which two signers of the Declaration of Independence had first seen the light. All the surroundings were full of tradition, and all suggested culture and refinement, and stood for honor, sincerity, and patriotism. Here was a fit nursery of greatness, and the mind of the small boy, who was surrounded by books, by portraits of soldiers and statesmen, by beautiful silver and china and mahogany, must have been impressed to his future advantage.

It has been seen that all of Lee's half-brothers and sisters save one died early. The one excep

tion, Henry Lee, was already a grown man when Robert Lee was born. Of his own mother's children, he was the fourth. The others were Algernon Sydney, who died in infancy, Charles Carter, and Sydney Smith, and two girls, Anne and Mildred, both younger than himself.

Charles Carter Lee, after graduation at Harvard, became a lawyer, and was one of the most talented and popular men in Virginia. Sydney entered the navy at fifteen years of age and served with distinction for many years. He commanded Commodore Perry's flagship in the famous expedition to Japan; was in command for a time of the navy yard at Philadelphia; and, at the time that Virginia seceded, was commandant of the Naval Academy at Annapolis. True to the traditions of his race, he resigned and entered the Confederate Navy. He was the father of General Fitzhugh Lee, of the Confederate Army, who was later, during the war with Spain, a majorgeneral in the United States Army. Anne married Judge William Marshall, of Baltimore, and Mildred married Edward Vernon Childe, of Massachusetts, and spent most of her later life in Paris.

When Robert was four years old, his father moved with his family to Alexandria that his children might have better opportunities for education; but as the boy grew older he was often

at Stratford and spent much time at Shirley on the James River, which was the beautiful home of his mother's father, Charles Carter, a man of lofty character and princely generosity. At both places the past was vividly presented to him, not only by the things which surrounded him, but also by the old family servants who talked to him of its greatness. At both places he found companions in the many visitors, to whom the doors were always open wide, or, on the rare occasions when there were no visitors, in the little darkies, who loved to do "young master's" bidding, and act either as servants or as play-fellows to him. At both places he took part in the sports and games of rural Virginia: shot partridges, ducks, and geese; fished, rowed, and sailed; swam in the summer, and skated in the winter. He spent much time on horseback and became an expert horseman. He roamed freely through the woods and fields and came to have a love for the open which he never lost. In later years he often recalled running the fox on foot all day.

It was not strange that he never lost his love for these two old places. In 1861, after the seizure of Arlington, he wrote his daughter:

Stratford is endeared to me by many recollections and it has always been the desire of my life to purchase it. And now that we have no other home, and the one we so loved has been so foully polluted, that

desire is stronger in me than ever. The horse-chestnuts you mention in the garden were planted by my mother. You do not mention the spring, one of the objects of my earliest recollections. How my heart goes back to those early days.

In 1867, he wrote:

I wanted, if possible, to pass one day at Shirley. I have not been there for ten years. It was the loved home of my mother and a spot where I have passed many happy days in early life, and one that probably I may never visit again.

It was two years after the Lees moved to Alexandria that General Henry Lee went to the West Indies, that journey from which he never returned to Virginia. When he died, five years later, Robert was only eleven and he never saw his father's grave until 1861. He was at that time in charge of the Confederate defenses of the Southern coast. One who was with him says: "He went alone to the tomb and after a few moments of silence plucked a flower, and slowly retraced his steps, leaving the lonely grave to the guardianship of the crumbling stone and the spirit of the restless waves that perpetually beat against the shore." A few months before his death, he again visited the grave, this time with his daughter, who covered the mound with flowers.

Although Robert's father went out of his life so early, his mother was left to him. She was his intimate friend, for she was the sort of mother a boy