Lee Becomes Despondent, is Defeated, and Surrenders at Appomattox Court-House

Hoping to escape, after his uninterrupted night march, Lee sent a note to General Grant, saying he did not propose to surrender. "To be frank," he said, "I do not think the emergency has arisen to call for the surrender of this army." He then proposed to meet Grant on the morning of the 9th to confer upon the subject of peace. The lieutenant-general replied that he had no authority to treat on the topic of peace, and that a meeting for such a purpose would be useless. "The terms upon which peace can be had," he said, "are well understood. By the South laying down their arms, they will hasten that most desirable event, save thousand of human lives, and hundreds of millions of property not yet destroyed." In the meantime Sheridan had settled the question, and rendered further parley unnecessary. He stood across Lee's path on the morning of the 9th, near Appomattox Court-House. The latter saw that his only hope of escape was in cutting his way successfully through Sheridan's line. This he attempted at day-break with his whole army, then numbering not more than ten thousand effective men. He failed again. Appalled, the Confederates staggered back, and displayed a white flag before the van of the troopers of General Custer. Then Lee wrote to Grant: "I received your note of this morning on the picket-line, whither I had come to meet you, and ascertain definitely what terms were embraced in your proposal of yesterday, with reference to the surrender of this army. I now ask an interview, in accordance with an offer contained in your letter of yesterday, for that purpose."

Grant sent Lee word that he assented to his request, and arrangements were made for an interview in the parlor of the neat brick dwelling of Wilmer McLean at Appomattox Court-House. There, at two o'clock on Palm-Sunday (April 9, 1865), the two commanders met, with courteous recognition. General Grant was accompanied by his chief aide-de-camp, Colonel Parker, a great-nephew of the celebrated Seneca chief, Red Jacket; General Lee, by Colonel Marshall, his adjutant-general, a great-grandson of Chief-Justice Marshall of the Supreme Court of the United States. The terms of surrender were discussed and settled. They were put in the form of a written proposition by Grant, and a written acceptance by Lee. Having been engrossed, they were signed by the generals, at half-past three o'clock, on a neat mahogany centre-table, with a marble top.

The terms prescribed by General Grant were extremely lenient and magnanimous, considering the circumstances. They required Lee and his men to give their parole of honor that they would not take up arms against their Government until regularly exchanged; gave to the officers their side-arms, baggage, and private horses; and pledged the faith of the Government that they should not be punished for their treason and rebellion so long as they should respect that parole and be obedient to the laws. Grant even went so far, in his generosity, at Lee's suggestion, that he gave instructions to the proper officers to allow such cavalrymen of the Confederate army as owned their horses to retain them, as they would, he said, need them for tilling their farms.

With the freedom of utterance which the generosity of the victor had given him, General Lee, on the following day, issued an extraordinary fare-well Address to his Army, in which, in very guarded language, he told his soldiers, in effect, that in taking up arms against their country and trying to destroy the Republic in whose government he and they had always shared as equals, they had done a patriotic act, and for which they would take with them "the satisfaction that proceeds from conscientiousness of duty faithfully performed;" therefore, he invoked God's blessing upon their acts. He gave them to understand that they had no "country"--no government to which their allegiance was due, excepting the territory and the rulers within the bounds of the Southern Confederacy; and he spoke of his "unceasing admiration" of their "constancy and devotion to that country," which had "endeared them to their countrymen."

When the terms of surrender were agreed upon, the Confederate soldiers were provided with food from the National stores; and on Wednesday, the 12th of April, 1865, they laid down their arms. Transportation and food were provided by the Government to large numbers of the troops on their journey homeward. The number paroled was about twenty-five thousand men, of whom not more than nine thousand men had arms in their hands. With the men were surrendered about sixteen thousand small arms, one hundred and fifty pieces of artillery, seventy-one stand of colors, about eleven hundred wagons and caissons, and four thousand horses and mules. The official announcement of the great victory was sent over the land with the speed of lightning, by the Secretary of War, and an order for a salute of two hundred guns at the headquarters of every army, and at the Military Academy at West Point.