Robert E Lee Research Paper

General Robert E. Lee was born in January 19, 1807 in Stratford hall Virginia and he died on October 12, 1870. He went to school at Alexandria academy. His fathers name was henry lee the third. His father was a tobacco planter. He suffered severe financial reverses from failed investments. Lee had 5 siblings. Little is known of Lee as a child; he rarely spoke of his boyhood as an adult. Nothing is known of his relationship with his father who, after leaving his family, mentioned Robert only once in a letter. In 1812, Harry Lee was badly injured in a political riot in Baltimore and traveled to the West Indies. He would never return, dying when his son Robert was eleven years old. Lee entered West Point in the summer of 1825. At the time, the …show more content…
On August 11, 1829, Brigadier General Charles Gratiot ordered Lee to Cockspur Island, Georgia. The plan was to build a fort on the marshy island which would command the outlet of the Savannah River. Lee was involved in the early stages of construction as the island was being drained and built up. In 1831, it became apparent that the existing plan to build what became known as Fort Pulaski would have to be revamped, and Lee was transferred to Fort Monroe at the tip of the Virginia Peninsula. While home in the summer of 1829, Lee had apparently courted Mary Custis whom he had known as a child. Lee obtained permission to write to her before leaving for Georgia, though Mary Custis warned Lee to be "discreet" in his writing, as her mother read her letters, especially from men. Custis refused Lee the first time he asked to marry her; her father did not believe the son of the disgraced Light Horse Harry Lee was a suitable man for his daughter. She accepted him with her father's consent in September 1830, while he was on summer leave, and the two were wed on June 30, 1831. Lee's duties at Fort Monroe were varied, typical for a junior officer, and ranged from budgeting to designing