The Andrew County Republican. [volume] (Savannah, Mo.) 1871-1876, 1876-02-18
THE SURRENDER OF LEE.
Incidents Related by Minister wash-
burne in a Hitherto unpublished Let

ter.
The following are extracts from a let
ter, hitherto unpublished, written at
Paris by Minister Washburne to a friend
in Virginia, June II, 1874. The st. Louis
Republicans Washington correspondent
says he accidentally came into posses
sion of the letter:
SCENES AT APPOMAToX.
l arrived at A~rpomattox Courthouse
on Tuesday, the 18th of April, 1865.
General Grant, after receiving the sur
render of General Lee, on Sunday, the
9th, had left the next day with his staff
officers en- route for Washington. l met
him the next evening at Prospect Sta
ton. Desiring to see the two armies,
the next morning the General gave me
q company of cavalry as an escort to
Appomattox. Though the surrender
had been made on Sunday, yet the de-
tails rs to the parole and many other
matters had to be agreed upon, and the
laying down of arms was to take place
ct o future day, and as soon as the pre-
liminaries could be arranged. Three
commissioners were appointed on either
side for that purpose. General Gordon,
General Pendleton e think }, and
another gentleman whose name I do
not now recall, on the side of the Con-
federates, and General Gibbon, General
Merritt, and q third, perhaps General
Mackenzie. on the side Of the Union
forces. When | arrived at the court
house, negotiations and pour parlers
were going on between the Commits
sioners ut General Gibbons headquar-
ters at the House OF q Mr.. Mclean, and
then saw many of the general officers
on both sides. From what one saw
there it could hardly have been con-
ceived that these men had been in arms
against each other through more than
four years Of deadly strife. The terror
of the breach, the fury of the charge,
and the fatigue Of the march seem to
have been forgotten, and these brave
men came together more rs friends
than enemies. In all Of their talks there
was never a suggestion o a word from
either side that could have wounded the
tenderest susceptibility. Many of these
officers on both sides had served to-
gether in the old army, and it was
touching and interesting to witness the
sympathy between them which had
survived these long years of conflict and
carnage. General Ca'mus Wilcox told
with emotion how his = classmate,
Gibbon, accused him Of hay. & nothing
but Confederate money; and, taking
from his pocket a new and crisp $50
g%reenback, thrust il upon him. There
was one sentiment among all OF these
men which seemed to crop out in spite
of themselves, and that was that, after
all the bloody struggle of the past, they
were still all Americans. The only
punishment ! saw inflicted was that on
some large jugs OF brandy which had
found their way to the Union head
quarters, and, under the peculiar cir
cumstances, that was not taken and
deemed as a "cruel and unusual pun
ishment," within the meaning OF the
Constitution.
LAMAR N wIETER DAVIS.
met on the occasion two gentlemen
in the Confederate service with whom
l had served in Congress-Alexander
r. Boteler, of Virginia, and Lucius Q.
C. Lamar, of Mississippi. Lamar was
q member Of the Committee on Com
merce in the Thirty-sixth Congress, of
which I was chairman, and tho.lgh we
differed on all political matters as wide
ly as two men could differ, our person.
al relations had always been pleasant
and agreeable. Though l had not
much money with ME l proposed to di-
vide with him, but he declined, saying
he could see his way clear to get to Bal
timore, and once where Winter Davis
was he should be all right. 1 knew
what that meant, for the intimacy and
friendship that existed between these
two brilliant and gifted men, so utterly
opposed to each other on all of the po-
litical questions of the day, was well
known in Washington circles. They
were united together by a tie which
binds together scholars, persons of SIM
liar tastes, and men of genius and elo-
quence, and which even the storms of
war could not sunder. Had these men
lived in France during the great revo-
luton, Lamar would have rivaled Mira
beau in the tribune of the National As
: sembly, and Winter Davis would have
been the peer of Vergniaud, the echoes
: of whose graceful but indignant elo-