Mr. SPEAKER: This day having been set apart for the purpose of paying a
last tribute to the memory of one who so lately was a loved and honored
member of this House, I shall, in the brief remarks which I propose to
make, attempt nothing but a plain and truthful narrative of some of the
characteristics and public services of a Christian gentleman, who in my
judgment measured fully up to that standard which makes man the noblest
work of God.
On the 15th day of October, 1891, at Ravensworth, his beautiful home in
Fairfax County, Va., surrounded by those loved ones whose constant care
and tender nursing had done all that human power could do to stay the
hand of the fell Destroyer, all that was mortal of Hon. WILLIAM HENRY
FITZHUGH LEE passed from this earth, and his noble spirit returned to
the God who gave it.
If the earnest supplications to Almighty God, offered by the good people
of his native State upon their bended knees night and morning, during
the period of his lingering illness, could have availed, he would have
been restored to health and usefulness, and these melancholy proceedings
postponed for many a long year.
The great sorrow which made the heart of Virginia heavy and bowed in
grief the heads of her true sons and daughters when the sad intelligence
of his death was flashed over the electric wires was more genuinely
spontaneous than were the loud lamentations of the Roman populace (so
graphically described by Tacitus) when they beheld the widow of
Germanicus, with her weeping children entering the gates of the imperial
city. Nor was this sorrow confined to those of his own political faith.
Men of all parties vied with each other in their expressions of regret
at his death and in their sympathy for his bereaved family.
The blameless life he had led, his high character, his gentle and
unassuming manners, won for him not only the respect but the admiration
of all with whom he came in contact.
As gentle as a child and as tender as a woman, with the courage of a
hero and a faith that never faltered, he proved himself a worthy
descendant of that race of famous men from whom he sprang, and most
worthily bore a name which will be honored as long as a liberty-loving
people shall find a dwelling place upon the earth.
WILLIAM H.F. LEE was the son of Gen. Robert E. Lee, and was born at
Arlington, on the 31st day of May, 1837.
He was educated at Harvard, where he ranked not only as a good scholar,
but on account of his splendid size and strength became quite famous in
athletics, being "stroke oar" of the University Rowing Club.
His great ambition was to follow the profession of his father and to go
to West Point; but having had an older brother there, that fact was
considered in those days an insuperable obstacle. While still at
Harvard, completing his education, he was, through the interest taken in
him by Gen. Winfield Scott, who made the request as a special and
personal favor to himself, appointed in 1857 a second lieutenant in the
Sixth Regiment, United States Infantry, and inaugurated his military
career by taking a detachment of troops to Texas by sea and then by land
up the country to San Antonio.
In 1858 he accompanied his regiment, under the command of Col. Albert
Sidney Johnston, in the expedition to Utah against the Mormons, taking
an active part in that campaign, marching from Fort Leavenworth to Salt
Lake City, and then, when the troubles were quelled there, traveling on
foot to Fort Benicia, Cal. While on the Pacific coast he received a
letter from his father, written January 1, 1859, in which he said:
I can not express the gratification I felt in meeting Col. May in
New York, and at the encomiums he passed upon your soldiership,
zeal, and devotion to your duty. But I was more pleased at the
report of your conduct. I always thought and said there was stuff
in you for a good soldier, and I trust you will prove it.
Resigning his commission in the Army, he came home to be married to his
cousin, a Miss Wickham, and settled down as a farmer at the "White
House" (where Washington met Martha Custis and was married), a large
estate on the Pamunkey River, left him by his maternal grandfather, G.W.
Park Custis, of Arlington.
When that irrepressible conflict of 1861 was upon us, and Virginia
called upon her sons to defend her soil, he, sharing the faith of his
fathers, in the belief that his allegiance was due to his State, quickly
raised a company of cavalry, and was attached to the Army of Northern
Virginia. Serving in every grade successively from captain to
major-general of cavalry, he led his regiment in the famous raid around
McClellan's army, and was an active participant in all those brilliant
achievements which made the cavalry service so proficient.
In that terrific fight which occurred at Brandy Station, in June, 1863,
he was most severely wounded, and taken to the residence of Gen. William
C. Wickham, in Hanover County, where he was made a prisoner by a raiding
party, and was carried off, at the expense of great personal suffering,
to Fort Monroe. From the latter place he was conveyed to Fort Lafayette,
where he was confined until March, 1864, and treated with great
severity, being held, with Capt. R.H. Tyler, of the Eighth Virginia
Regiment, under sentence of death, as hostages for two Federal officers
who were prisoners in Richmond, and whom it was thought would be
executed for some retaliatory measure.
Exchanged in the spring of 1864, he returned, to find his young wife and
children dead, his beautiful home burned to the ground, his whole estate
devastated and laid waste by the ruthless hand of war; and yet almost
his first act on reaching Richmond was to go to Libby Prison, visit the
two Federal officers for whom he had been held as hostage, and who, like
himself, had been under apprehension of being hung, and shake hands with
and congratulate them.
Immediately joining his command, he led his division in every engagement
from the Rapidan to Appomattox, where, with his father, the greatest
soldier of modern times, he surrendered to the inevitable.
In a letter written by one of the most brilliant cavalry generals of the
late war, in speaking of Gen. W.H.F. LEE, he uses this language:
He was a zealous, conscientious, brave, and intelligent soldier,
who fully discharged all of his duties. He was one of those safe,
sound, judicious officers, and you always felt when you sent
instructions to him that they were going to be obeyed promptly and
to the letter.
What greater tribute could be paid a soldier?
Having been married to one of the most accomplished ladies in Virginia,
Miss Bolling, of Petersburg (who, with two sons, survives him) he
removed in 1874 to Ravensworth, and was the next year elected to the
senate of Virginia, where he made an honorable record.
He was elected to the Fiftieth and Fifty-first Congresses, and served
his State with that fidelity which had characterized his every act
through life--faithful, conscientious, and painstaking--ever alert to
the interests of his constituents and seeking only how he could serve
them.
He was again reëlected to the Fifty-second Congress, and though by the
will of Divine Providence he was not permitted to take his seat, he will
ever be held in grateful remembrance by his late constituents, and when
the long roll of Virginia's noble and heroic dead is called, the name of
WILLIAM H. FITZHUGH LEE will be mourned by his mother Commonwealth as
one of her noblest and truest sons.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I shall read, as the most fitting tribute I
have seen, an editorial from the Alexandria Gazette written the day
after the death of Gen. LEE:
Gen. WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE, second son of Gen. Robert Edward
Lee, is dead. The bells here tolled late yesterday evening. A few
hours before the general had crossed over the river and was at rest
under his roof tree at Ravensworth, the southern sun lighted his
deathbed and the autumn breeze sang his requiem. Afterlife's fitful
fever he sleeps well. He was sick a long time, and as his disease
was incurable, death was a relief. No more pain for him now, but
the long and peaceful sleep of the just. His sorrowing family were
at his bedside, but he told them not good-bye, preferring to greet
them when they shall rejoin him in a better world. His death is
regretted by all the many who knew him; the more so by those who
knew him well.
Gen. LEE, like his father, was naturally quiet and retiring, and in
his intercourse with others, when right and principle were not
involved, invariably acted in accordance with the rule of _noblesse
oblige_, but when they were involved he was as firm in support of
his convictions as any other man could be. He stood foursquare to
all the winds that blow, but always with the propriety that
characterizes the perfect gentleman. He did his duty to his God,
his family, his State, and his country, and did it well, and
executed faithfully all the trusts committed to him in both
military and civil life. He liked the old manners and customs of
Virginia, but tried to conform to the new order of things with
becoming grace, and did so with no audible complaint and no useless
repinings. He served his State efficiently in her senate and in the
national Congress, and in the Confederate army he filled, by
merited promotion, every position from captain up to major-general
of cavalry. It was different once, but Virginia can ill-afford to
part with such a man now, and in his death, as in that of his
illustrious father, she has lost a true and gallant son, who when
not on duty was as gentle as a woman. Her fame has been increased
by having had such a son. May she have many more; like him.