Many thanks once more to Kelleigh Nelson for this interesting letter from Robert E Lee. To refresh my readers memory this famous civil war General’s short history follows:

Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a Confederate general whose early actions in the American Civil War led to his appointment as the overall commander of the Confederate States Army near the end of the war. He led the Army of Northern Virginia, the Confederacy’s most powerful army, from 1862 until its surrender in 1865, earning a reputation as one of the war’s most skilled tacticians.

History should teach humans wisdom, bur so often it makes a monkey out of you.

Gibber! Gibber!

Chugley

GENERAL LEE WRITES:

“In this enlightened age, there are few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution, is a moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare and lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known only to Him who controls all events; and who will, in His own time, & in His own way, bring about their final abolition.”

-Robert E. Lee letter to his wife Mary Lee, December 27, 1856

Ten years before the war, Robert E. Lee inherited 10 slaves.  His wife Mary taught them to read, write and do math so that they could be set free to earn their own keep.  She taught the women how to do things that would enable them to be hired as household help.  And yet our history demeans this couple as fighting to keep slavery alive.  Such lies are told in our history books, that we have to search for the truth. 

The war had nothing to do with slavery…Wilbur Wilberforce ousted British slavery on July 9, 1833 and the abolition was on America’s doorstep.  The war was about money, tariffs and if the south seceded, the north would lose.  Even NY State thought about seceding.  New York City (Historical): In 1861, Mayor Fernando Wood proposed that NYC secede to become a free city-state, or “Tri-insula” (Manhattan, Staten Island, and Long Island), to protect the city’s lucrative southern trade during the Civil War.  It was all about money.

Marx wrote to Lincoln to make it about slavery, as personal property as Marx’ goal was to eliminate all personal property.