Robert E. Lee was born into a distinguished family of Virginia planters whose Dad squandered most of the family's money. It didn't detract unduly from their aristocratic status. "Lighthorse Harry" Lee had been a hero in the American Revolutionary War. Robert was a handsome young graduate of West Point, graduating high in his class, excelling at math, and a gentleman to boot. So it probably was class endogamy rather than just money that prompted him to pursue and marry Mary Custis, another aristocrat who was a descendant of George Washington. There's more to being upper class than simply wealth.
It was a pleasant enough life for the Lees. Their estate was called Arlington, just across the Potomac River from Washington. Plenty of room, plenty of slaves. It later became Arlington National Cemetery. But Mary, alas, didn't find it pleasant to accompany her husband to his various rough posts and she stayed mostly at home, nagging Lee for not spending more time with her and the kids.
The secession of South Carolina from the Union didn't catch Lee by surprise. He was stationed at an outpost in Texas at the time, doing nothing much more than holding courts martial and chasing Comanches. He was a patriot but Virginia came before the Union. He saw Virginia as very much the embodiment of Thomas Jefferson's notion of the ideal society: a landed gentry ruling the state, the unpropertied whites in a sort of peonage, and obedient slaves happily toiling away under benevolent masters. Those slaves, by the way, weren't so happy at the Lee estate because the money had run out, and so did some of the slaves. Lee, a soldier, demanded obedience and didn't hesitate to have runaways whipped, sometimes dealing out the punishment in person.
The film doesn't mention it but when war came, Lee was called back to Washington, where Lincoln offered him command of the entire union army. But Lee had a hell of a time getting from Texas to Washington because he was in union uniform and was stopped at the state border, where he had to talk his way out of the bind. In any case, he turned down the offer of command, asked to be allowed to sit out the war, and when that was denied, he resigned from the U. S. Army. He never did refer to the Union Army as "the enemy." He just called them "these people." The pinnacle of his military career -- of his entire life -- was his command of the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. There were setbacks and many casualties but he achieved one victory after another against the Union Army, victories that were helped no doubt by the assorted beef-brained egomaniacs that Lincoln had been forced to put in command.
Nevertheless, after Chancellorsville, where he daringly split his smaller force not just into two independent units but an unthinkable THREE and won the day, both he and his men felt they could accomplish almost anything. He was a kind of Rommel of the time. Sentiments aside, though, the North had the industry and the men, if not the leadership, while the South was consistently losing its manpower and its supplies. Lee was disabused of the notion of infallibility later at Gettysburg, where the Confederate loss was not so much the fault of a brilliantly led opposition but of misjudgment by Lee himself. He was devastated by the slaughter and blamed himself.
Worse was to come. Ulysses S. Grant was made commander of the Union Army, which outnumbered Lee's rebels by two to one, and at their first engagement, the federals were driven back. Ho hum, said the soldiers. Licked by Robert E. Lee once more. But Grant, an ex-alcoholic slob and no brilliant strategist, wasn't stupid or timid either. He reorganized his men and went around Lee's flank. Grant followed Lee through Virginia,. battling him as necessary, regardless of cost, for seven weeks until the worn-out Confederate Army was dug in around the capital of Richmond and the supply center of Petersberg.
There was nothing left for Lee but to surrender his army, bedraggled and starving but still angry and defiant. Lee himself admitted no guilt. The cause was just and the morality was on our side. The wrong side won. We were just outnumbered. The "outnumbered" comment was certainly true. He died of a stroke five years later and became a Southern icon -- even a national one.
The program itself, with stills, narration by James Woods, and expert talking heads is evenly balance. This is a fine series and some episodes ought to be shown in every high school.
One of the things I took away from watching it, without really thinking about it, was that being a great leader doesn't necessarily involve being a bombastic loudmouth and an uncivil and hateful individual. Heroes can be thoughtful and reserved too. And Lee was both. "It is well that war is so terrible, or we should become too fond of it," he told a subordinate at the Battle of Fredericksburg, which he won. He always hoped for a negotiated settlement. He never said anything like, "Kill 'em all and let God sort 'em out."
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