Monday, October 22, 2012

Mrs. Robert E. Lee The Lady of Arlington by John Perry

Tuesday, October 23   Please share in discussion of this historical book at 6:30 p.m. at Park Grove Library, Cottage Grove.
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1 comment:

  1. SeekerSaturday, October 27, 2012

    Id love to hear that. Now that we have Lee's slave ledgers, and at least one person outside the family was allowed to see them, at long last, we know that most of what we heard about Lee's treatment of slaves was nonsense.

    Lee was a particularly cruel slave master, and bought slave women from bounty hunters. He also rountinely separated slave mothers from their children, sending women to the deep South, while he kept the young children with him.

    WE also know Lee was brutal -- he regularly had slaves whipped. As soon as he took over management of the slaves, he resorted to whippings, and sending the mothers away. This caused a furor of resentment, which caused dozens -- perhaps as many as 50 -- of slaves to escape. Lee met this with violence too, offering 600% higher bounties for young females.

    And when escaped slaves were caught, Lee personally saw to their whippings, screaming at them during their torture.

    So -- how did that effect Mrs Lee, who grew up with most of these slaves, at least, the ones Robert did not buy from bounty hunters?

    Lee's 10,000 letters, the most of any known Civil War figure, are in the procession of the Lee family too, most have not been released.

    Together, his slave ledgers and letters, all dated, all detailed, gives a very clear picture of what was going on in the slave barns, and Lee's reaction to it.

    Hang on to your hat. Unless the Lee family now destroys those slave ledgers ( and they might) the whole Legend of Lee could be turned on its head.

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