Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1903-01-24
ROBERT EDWARD LEE.
CONTINUED from First Page.)
glowing epitaph to the short-lived
country for which he and his comrades
fought:

glowing epitaph to the short-lived
country for which he and his comrades
fought:
"No nation rose 80 white and fair,
Or fell so free Of crimes,
In truth be strong.
Eternal right, though all else fail,
Can never be made wrong.
How much easier it is for the victor
in any great conflict Of arms, whether
right or wrong, to mould its contem-
porary history than 1t can ever be for
the discounted. There need be little
effort by the strong and powerful to
make the better cause appear the
worse. But when the vanquished Is SO
exhausted in material resources as to
no longer command commercial or po-
litical influence among the family of
nations, this Is especially true. And If
the victor imposes on the vanquished q
government Of vice and ignorance, that
robs them of the fruits Of their indus
try and consigns them, as far as it
may, to poverty and degradation, 1t Is
not strange that current history for a
time overlooks them.
Such was the south for the first two
decades after the struggle ceased, when
the bayonets of Union soldiers, once
honorably directed against worthy foe
men, were later marShaled by the COM
mand of their greatest captain at the
doors of legislative halls, to repress the
heroic efforts Of virtuous people for
honest government.
But as the material resources of the
south increase so will her influence be
extended in the vindication Of her past.
IL 1fD, falx
mands more Difference among our
American countrymen than virtue in
rags. It may not be until the south oc-
cupies a commanding position in the
manufacture of her cotton and other
products and her broad ports are filled
with the commercial navies of the
world, and the home furnace smelts
her wealth of mineral products, and the
artisan and builder shapes them for
commerce, that the history Of the civil
war will be impartially written. The
magnet that draws the steel rails of
traffic across our own land lies still
north Of us. But we seem to be grad
ually nearing a period when southern
industry will draw the magnet nearer
to our own wealth Of material.
Perhaps we should not be impatient.
Books are written and printed to sell,
and the southern people have not been
extensive purchasers Of books. The
true historian Of the south must cal
culate on a home market for immedi-
ate recompense for his labor, and the
inducements held out to him have not
been great. We may have to wait
generation yet for q gifted, patient and
learned McCrady to write the true his
tory Of the whole United States for the
past half century. But the place Gen.
Lee occupies in the estimation of all
civilized nations has long since been
established. It would be safe to say
that he is regarded as combining IN his
own person more Of those attributes
that make men great than any other
Of the century in which he lived, If not
Of any age. In the art Of war he ex-
celled all others; in his courage, sub
lime; in action, reSolute and firm, but
withal amiable and courteous. His
watchword in life was duty and under
all conditions he lived up to the sub
limest essence of that often misunder-
stood word.
Gen. Lord Wolseley, who was sent by
his government to study the art Of war
under the great commander, and was
near him in the campaigns Of 1862,
twenty-five years after wrote: Lee
alone impressed me with the. feeling
that I was in the presence Of man
who was cast in a grander mould and
made Of different and finer metal than
all other men. He is stamped upon my
memory as a being apart and superior
to all others in any way; man with
whom none I ever knew and few, very
few, of whom I have read are worthy
to be classed." It was after this stu
dent in the art of war had become the
commander-in-chief Of the armies of
Great Britain, and after his exalted
office had placed him in contact with
the most renowned soldiers and s'ates-
men Of Europe, that this voluntary tri-
butte was written Of our immortal Con-
federate chieftain.
On the day following the announce
ment of his death the press Of all Eu-
rope spoke as If with one voice IN
praise and lament. One said Of him:
Mine years ago he was colonel OF
cavalry in the United States army and
yesterday he died the greatest soldier
in the world. It Is strong praise to
give him; but none the less deserved"
And another from our mother land
said: 1--WE doubt whether any general
Of modern history ever sustained for
four years, longer time now than
Hannibal fifteen years in the remote
past a war in which, while disposing
of scanty resources himself, he had
against him so enormous an aggregate
of men, horses, ships and supplies
And another from across our borders
wrote: among men noble as the no
blest, in the lofty dignity of the Chris
tian gentleman; among patriots less
self-seeking and as pure as Washing
ton, and among soldiers combining the
religious simplicity Of Havelock with
- of q hnr0iSr1
Bayard and Sidney and the untiring,
never-faltering duty of wellington; in
fact, Robt. E. Lee, Of Virginia, is the
greatest general of this or any other
age. He has made his own name and
the Confederacy he served immortal
He dealt such staggering and unex-
pected blows on McClellan's intrenched
masses that, after seven days Of battle,
he had barely escaped to the protec-
tion of his gunboats down the James
river. Had Lees plans been executed
by his subalterns the probability Is
that the bulk Of McClellan's army
would never have emerged from White
Oak swamp except as prisoners OF war
Then swiftly striking and shattering
Pope's army on the Rappahannock.
driving Mcclellan back to Washington,
capturing an army of 11,000 at Har-
pers Ferry and holding the Federal
army north of the Potomac until it was
reconstructed and reinforced. that re-
markabe campaign of strategy and
valor ended. Then came the victories
of Fredericksburg and Charlottesville,
with the Federal armies again driven
out Of Virginia. Gettysburg was a re-
pulse, but so disastrous was it to the
Federal army that it's new commander
Meade, never again that year dared to
strike. Then came that most wonder
full of all his campaigns from the Will
derness to the siege Of Petersburg, in
which Grants overwhelming multi
tudes of men and guns and horses and
ships, estimated by English military
critics to aggregate twenty to one of
Gen. Lees little army, were baff1ed and
beaten and slain until it's losses in thir-
ty days equalled Lees entire army