CHAPTER FOUR
Cheat Mountain Expedition. Ordered to Jackson at Winchester. Expedition to Bath and Romney. Battle of Kernstown. Retreat up the Valley.
Robert E. Lee and Joseph E. Johnston, sons of Virginia, educated and trained soldiers, already distinguished in their profession of arms, had resigned from the United States army and had tendered their services to this new nation. Before Virginia completed the details of her alliance with the Confederacy Lee was placed in command of the Virginia forces, which included the corps of cadets. In the line of duty occasion brought me to his headquarters to receive from him directions for the performance of special military duty, and thus I had opportunity to form my own boyish estimate of him. I judged his age to be in the fifties and that he was in the prime of life. His presence and bearing were above criticism, his manner and conversation kind, firm, direct and self-confident.
But it is needless to comment further now; his career, his fame, his life and his death are familiar history and need no further mention here. It is, however, deemed appropriate to insert the following graceful tribute to the memory of Lee from the pen of Mr. Henry Tyrrell which appeared in The New York World on the nineteenth of January, 1910.
His sun of life grew grander toward its setting;
It shed a dying splendor on his day,
Then like a benediction, passed away
Through twilight calm, gloomed with no vain regretting.