The Farmville herald. (Farmville, Va.) 1957-current, 1961-04-07

the necessity OF sdOy iuftner elIuSlOn OF
blood 1t was a petition to Lee for sur
render, sincerely made and realistic Of
the eXigencieS then confronting the Con-
federate commander. II was a gesture Of
magnanmity and not Of braggadocio.
Grant knew full well. when he wrote this
first message, that the end Of his year.
long campaign was near. How could It be
otherwise with his vastly superior forces
which had already inflicted SO much dam
age upon his adversary?
But it was not III Lee S mind to un-
buckle the sword yet--not quite yet. 1t
would take nearly two more days for him
to bring himself to accept the bitter po-
ton of surrendering his army.
A hundred years later We who read
what has since been written by those of
Lees army who were with him on the
retreat know vastly more about his tragic
straits than he then knew. That his army
was shrinking away so rapidly through
desertion was apparent l use the word
''desertion" not in its adverse military
implication so much as in a sense Of the
realism and despair Of discouraged and
weary men who just couldn't find it in
their hearts and wills to go on
The sterner stuff of which Lee was
made and his sense Of duty would control
his conduct until the last faint spark of
hope for escape fllckered out. And so he
sent his reply to Grant, denying the
opinion that his situation was hopeless but
nevertheless asking OF Grant the terms
under which he would propose surrender.
April was a race to Apponattox Sta
ton on the Southslde Railroad which, if
first reached by Lee would find food for
his men and a remote hope of salvaging a
part of his forces by march southwark
to join Johnston but if first reached by
the Federals would be the end. Perhaps
it was this last gambling chance that sup.
ported Lee in his then Wavering mind on
the question of surrender.
And in the afternoon of that sunny Sat-
urday. as Lee rested by the roadside
while his men and wagons sreamed past
as General Pendleton approached him
officers in elaboration among themselves
had come to the conclusion that the army
could not cut its way out. he was all but
rebuffed by Lee. Neither Longstreet nor
Gordon were parties to the runp confer
ence of which Pendleton had spoken.
1t was as if Lee fought within himself
against any admission to weakness, per-
haps in the belief that it would enable
Grant to demand harsher terms than Lee
needed to concede. Yet. when the end
actually came and the choice was sur
render or be wiped out. as surely that
small remnant of the Army of Northern
Virginia would have been. were Lees
hopes of the afternoon of the 9Th any
There is the touching moment in the
late afternoon of the 9th. when the de-
spairing Dick" Anderson was more or
less summarily relieved from duty and
advised that he might go home or any.
where else he desired Perhpas Anderson
was quite content to go for. after the
action at Sayler's Creek. he was virtu-
ally without men to command. At any
rate. he did not argue the action taken
against him. Two other generals were
given similar dismissals at the same
tine-Pickett and Bushrod johnson. Was
Lee so bitter over the failures at Five
Forks and Sayler's Greek that he no
longer wished them about? That this was
so in the case of Pickett is borne out by
a remark which Lee is said to have made