Robert E. Lee

Robert Edward Lee was born in Virginia, the son of Revolutionary War cavalry officer Henry Lee. He graduated second in his class from West Point in 1829 without a single demerit and served as an army engineer. In the Mexican War he won praise for his scouting and was later superintendent of West Point. When Virginia seceded in 1861, Lee declined an offer of high command in the Union army and resigned, saying he could not fight against his home state. In 1862 he took command of the Army of Northern Virginia and drove Union forces from Richmond in the Seven Days Battles. He won major victories at Second Manassas, Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, but his invasions of the North were turned back at Antietam in 1862 and Gettysburg in 1863. From 1864 Ulysses S. Grant pressed him in a long campaign to Petersburg. On April 9, 1865, Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House. After the war he became president of Washington College in Lexington, Virginia, and urged reconciliation. He died there in 1870.

Faith: Known for his earnest Christianity. Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911) (via Wikisource)