-- Robert E. Lee
Southern States Secede
Secession
fever hit the South after Abraham Lincoln was elected president. The
South considered Lincoln's Republican party victory in the 1860
presidential election as a sign that the North was now going to end the
"peculiar institution" of slavery. For the South, the time of talk and
compromise had ended. In December, 1860 South Carolina became the first
state to secede from the Union. Secession of the rest of the states that
would make up the Confederate States of America occurred in two waves.
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Colonel Robert E. Lee Resigns
April 20, 1861
Colonel Robert E. Lee of the United States Army, resigns his commission on this day in 1861.
Robert E. Lee was born on January 19, 1807 at Stratford in Westmoreland County, Virginia. Lee spent his youth and adulthood in Northern Virginia. He ranked second in his class when he graduated from West Point in 1829.
| Barnes&Noble: Robert E. Lee on Leadership |
President Abraham Lincoln offered Robert E. Lee command of the Federal armies on April 18, 1861 after General Winfield Scott recommended Lee for this position. Virginia had seceded from the Union on April 17. Lee declined President Lincoln’s offer and on April 20, he resigned from the United States Army. Robert E. Lee had decided to fight for the Confederacy because his loyalty was to the state of Virginia. |
Abraham Lincoln would say that he could not understand Lee and other southern officers, who broke their oaths of allegiance to the United States and fought for the Confederacy.
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- Ball's Bluff
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- Johnny Clem
- The Anaconda Plan
- Virginia Ordinance of Secession
- John Buford
- Abraham Lincoln Now Belongs to the Ages
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