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The Truth About Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee: He Wasn’t Very Good at His Job

posted by cmn32480 on Monday June 12 2017, @12:08AM   Printer-friendly
from the south-shall-rise-again dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

In the June 1969 issue of Civil War History — Volume 5, Number 2, pages 116-132 — a renowned Southern historian attacked the legacy of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

"No single war figure stands in greater need of reevaluation than Lee," wrote Thomas L. Connelly, the late University of South Carolina professor. "One ponders whether the South may not have fared better had it possessed no Robert E. Lee."

Connelly's essay was among the first academic musket shots fired on Lee's standing as an outmatched but not outwitted military genius presiding over a Lost Cause — a reputation celebrated in fawning biographies and monuments like the one removed Friday in New Orleans.

Was General Lee overrated? Get your armchair historian on...

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @10:46PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @10:46PM (#524698)

    This right here. He held his own very well and gave more than he got against an in all ways superior force that was being woefully mismanaged. The problem the Lincoln administration had was the Army he inherited was a political thing not a fighting force. That took time to fix. Ironically, Lee was one of the ones who shaped his very own adversaries. So the 'less competent' is not without merit. Also at the time being a general usually meant you had money and power and land and a good amount of political connections. It was a cush job meant to bring prestige. Lee took it a bit more serious than that. It is somewhat different now. A lesson we learned the hard way in the civil war.

    History is written by the victors. For example England considers Washington to be one of their great enemies. They hold him in high regard even though they were defeated by him and his cadre.