The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1903-02-05
STILL FIGHTING GENERAL LEE.
Baltimore Sun.

K. Mcclure should have aroused GER
| tain patriots of the Grand Army of
the Republic in Pennsylvania by
proposing to place a monument to
Lee on the field of Gettysburg. One
of these great pension drawers asks
naively: ''If we honor General Lee,
what shall we honor him for?" and
proceeds to denounce him as a trait
or. When Hon. Beresford Hope, of
England, brother-in-law of the Mar
quis OF Salisbury, received photo
graphs OF General Lee he wrote:
''They embody to us heroic virtue
and purest patriotism, the most ex-
alte3 military genius, the highest
and purest domestic excellence. :"
No man who hOnors these things will
deny that this is a just estimate of
Robert E. Lee, but what are they
to this brave pensioner? What
are we to honor Lee for? he asks.
The answer of Mr.. Hope perhaps car
ries no meaning to this post-bellum
soldier. These are not, it seems, the
| qualities which he honors.
1t is also stated that Chambers
burg patriots are active in objecting
to monument to Lee at Gettysburg
They recall the fact that Lee en-
camped here there1 for three days on
his way to Gettysburg, and all sup
plies were cut off from the residents
and only given after an earnest ap-
peal 1t is also recalled that Gener-
al Grant encamped at Petersburg for
the best part of a year and cut off
supplies SO effeetually that the great
est extremity of want prevailed. But
when the war was over memorial
OF brave Union soldiers who fell there
was erected by a Maine regiment
without one word of dissent from the
people whom they had fought. The
Confederate veterans of Petersburg
told those who placed it there that
it would be as safe among their peo-
pie as it would be in Maine. The
people of the South can honor great
qualities in a foe, and when the war
was over they were ready for peace.
Ex-Governor James A. Beaver, OF
Pennsylvania. talks in a different
strain from some of the other Grand
Army men, and the story of his life
tells why. He served in the Army
OF the Potomac, was shot through
the body at Charlottesville, was shot
in the side at Petersburg and lost a
leg at Reams' Station. This man
says that he cannot see thatit would
be inappropriate to place statue
on the battlefield cOmmemorating
Lees excellence as a man and a
soldier" This is the language of a
brave man and one who has some
thing more to show in evidence that
he was in the army than merely the
drawing of pension, which in fact
does not always prove it.
The appropriate place for monu-
ment to Lee is in the Statuary Hall
in the Capitol of the United States
beside the statue of Washington,
which is already there, erected by the
State of Virginia, for which he fought.
Virginia, and not Pennsylvania, is
the appropriate State to erect this
monument to the man who sacrificed
everything for the Old Common
wealth. And there Lees statue will
be placed by the Mother of Presi-
dents and statesmen, side by side
with Washington. These two stat
ues will commemorate two of the
purest and most unselfish patriots,
and two of the greatest captains OF
their race-unless indeed the spirit OF
the men who are now protesting
against the statue of Lee at Gettys-
burg should gain the ascendency in
Congress. 1t may be that that will
happen. 1t may be that the Presi-
dent in his scientific division of hon
ors between the negro and white
races according to the census returns
will suggest monument to a negro,
or mulatto, Or quadroon as the case
may be, to stand beside Washington.
Nothing said by the Grand Army
people of Pennsylvania who are now
making their protests can add to or
detract from the imperishable fame
of the great captain who has been
gathered to his people. Monuments
have been erected to him and more
will be erected in the time to come
"and when the monuments we build
shall have crumbled into dust, his
virtues will still live-a high mode
for the imitation of generations yet
unborn"