3-016-987 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

General Robert Edmund [sic] Lee, Commander-In-Chief of the Army of the Confederate States of America, 1864. Engraving from a photograph by Messrs. Minnis and Cowell, '...a faithful likeness of one of the greatest soldiers of this age. Three years' campaigns, in defence of his native State of Virginia - undertaken, doubtless, from motives of patriotism - have shown his consummate mastery of the art of war, which he had learned as an officer in the service of the formerly United States. General Lee has proved himself to possess, in high perfection, that peculiar combination of moral and intellectual qualities which fits a man for military command. Since the fighting days of Wellington and Napoleon there has been no more signal example of ability for the direction and control of a large army...Even his opponents, who would not have deemed it creditable to themselves to underrate the genius which has so long held them in check on the road from Washington to Richmond, have owned his superiority to all the successive generals of the Federal army. The biography of this eminent man will be written when his figure shall have emerged from the bewildering conflict of the civil war. His personal and professional merits will then be justly appreciated'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.