In this episode, Will discussed the family life of Robert E. Lee, and the lives of Lee’s children. He argues that Robert E. Lee was a good and caring father, but also an overbearing one, and that his children largely struggled to escape his shadow and live independent, fulfilling lives of the sort that characterized earlier generations of the Lee family and the Virginia gentry of which they were a part. He goes through the lives of each of the Lee children, discussing Custis Lee, Mary Lee, Rooney Lee, Annie Lee, Agnes Lee, Rob Lee, and Mildred Lee, along with commenting on Robert E. Lee’s relationship to each and their being raised at Arlington House.
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0:00 Arlington’s Lee Family Legacy
6:37 Custis Lee: The Dutiful Heir
10:00 Custis Lee’s War Without Glory
16:46 Custis Lee Reclaims Arlington
22:35 Mary Lee, the Family Rebel
27:45 Mary Lee’s Life of Travel
31:12 Rooney Lee, the Cavalier
36:32 Rooney’s War and Personal Loss
39:54 Annie Lee’s Short, Gentle Life
47:03 Agnes Lee’s Tragic Romance
53:41 Rob Lee, the Unpretentious Soldier
1:04:00 Mildred Lee, Her Father’s “Precious Life”
1:09:13 The Children of Arlington Remembered
Sources Referenced in this Episode:
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Armes, Ethel, Stratford Hall: The Great House of the Lees, https://amzn.to/4wxAAfl
Burt, Nathaniel, First Families: The Making of an American Aristocracy, https://amzn.to/4r0KLYG
Cole, Ryan, Light-Horse Harry Lee: The Rise and Fall of a Revolutionary Hero, https://amzn.to/4wiZOy3
Connelly, Thomas L., The Marble Man: Robert E. Lee and His Image in American Idea, https://amzn.to/4ywRf4j
Crocker, H. W., III, Robert E. Lee on Leadership: Executive Lessons in Management, https://amzn.to/4gvXpds
Dabney, Virginius, Virginia: The New Dominion, https://amzn.to/46gVW69
Dowdey, Clifford, Lee: A Biography, https://amzn.to/46lDf14
Fleming, Thomas, A Disease in the Public Mind: A New Understanding of Why We Fought the Civil War, https://amzn.to/4yzbiix
Flood, Charles Bracelen, Lee: The Last Years, https://amzn.to/4gDcA4I
Freeman, Douglas Southall, R. E. Lee: A Biography, https://amzn.to/4gkaqrx
Hendrick, Burton J., The Lees of Virginia, https://amzn.to/4xshjNe
Lee, Cazenove Gardner, Jr., Lee Chronicle: Studies of the Early Generations of the Lees, https://amzn.to/4q7GiTI
Longacre, Edward G., Fitz Lee: A Military Biography of Major General Fitzhugh Lee, https://amzn.to/4xkLNAu
Nagel, Paul C., The Lees of Virginia: Seven Generations of an American Family, https://amzn.to/4wUxkfi
Nichols, James L., General Fitzhugh Lee: A Biography, https://amzn.to/4qeURoz
Royster, Charles, Light-Horse Harry Lee and the Legacy of the American Revolution, https://amzn.to/3TKWspX
Sanborn, Margaret, Robert E. Lee: A Portrait, https://amzn.to/3SA6EkN
Thomas, Emory M., Robert E. Lee: A Biography, https://amzn.to/46qVL8c
Transcript
