Robert E. Lee, Jr.

Robert Edward Lee, (October 27, 1843 – October 19, 1914) was the youngest son of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and Mary Anna Custis, and the sixth of their seven children. He became a soldier, farmer, businessman, and author.

Biography

Known as "Rob", his boyhood home was Arlington House (where he was born) across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. He attended boarding schools during much of the 1850s, initially while his father, a career man in the U.S. Army, was serving as Superintendent of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. Unlike his father and two older brothers, Rob never served in the United States Army, and apparently had not contemplated a military career. In 1860, Rob enrolled at the University of Virginia.

However, when the American Civil War broke out in 1861, his father and his two older brothers, Custis and Rooney, all chose to serve Virginia in the Confederate Army. To his mother's dismay, the following year, Rob joined them in wearing the Confederate Grey. Initially, Rob served as a private in the Rockbridge Artillery in 1862. After the Battle of Sharpsburg, he was promoted to the rank of Captain and assigned to serve as aide to his older brother Custis, who was a major general and aide-de-camp to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and was involved in defending Richmond, Virginia.

All four Lees survived the Civil War. After the war, Rob lived at Romancock Plantation...
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