Lee Considered: General Robert E. Lee and Civil War History

Civil War America

by Alan T. Nolan

Of all the heroes produced by the Civil War, Robert E. Lee is the most revered and perhaps the most misunderstood. Lee is widely portrayed as an ardent antisecessionist who left the United States Army only because he would not draw his sword against his native Virginia, a Southern aristocrat who opposed slavery, and a brilliant military leader whose exploits sustained the Confederate cause.

Alan Nolan explodes these and other assumptions about Lee and the war through a rigorous reexamination of familiar and long-available historical sources, including Lee's personal and official correspondence and the large body of writings about Lee. Looking at this evidence in a critical way, Nolan concludes that there is little truth to the dogmas traditionally set forth about Lee and the war.

Genres: Civil War, History, Biography, American Civil War, American History, Nonfiction, American

243 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

About the author

He was born in Evansville, IN to Val and Jeannette Covert Nolan. When his father was appointed U.S. District Attorney in 1933, the family moved to Indianapolis. He graduated from Shortridge High School and from Indiana University, a Phi Beta Kappa. After graduation from Harvard Law School, he clerked for Sherman Minton at the United States Court of Appeals. In 1948 he returned to Indianapolis to practice law for 45 years with the firm that is now Ice Miller where he served as chairman of the management committee. For seven years, he was Chairman of the Disciplinary Committee of the Indiana Supreme Court.
Mr. Nolan was also an author. In 1961, Macmillan published The Iron Brigade, a military history, which has been named by Civil War Times Illustrated as one of the 100 best books ever written on the Civil War. It remained in print 47 years. He also wrote Lee Considered: General Robert E. Lee and Civil War History, UNC Press, 1991; Rally Round the Flag Boys; Rally Once Again; Giants in their Tall Black Hats: Essays on the Iron Brigade, with Sharon Vipond, and As Sounding Brass, a contemporary novel. He was a regular contributor to numerous Civil War publications, the Indiana Magazine of History, Traces and other periodicals. His last article appeared in Traces in 2008. He lectured widely on Civil War topics at various colleges, universities, round tables and the Smithsonian Institution. He received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Indiana University in 1993. In 1994, he was given the Nivens-Freeman award by the Chicago Civil War Roundtable. He was a Fellow of the Company of Military Historians.
His deep interest in history led to an active role at the Indiana Historical Society where he served on the board and was Chairman for twelve years during the planning and construction of the present facility. He was named a Living Legend in 2003.
Mr. Nolan had wide ranging community interests. He was a founder of the ICLU, the Civil War Round Table and a member of the Catholic Interracial Council. He held a position on the board of the NAACP in 1948 and received the National Council of Christians and Jews Brotherhood Award in 1968. He was instrumental in the successful effort to save the Meridian Street corridor from commercial encroachment in the mid-1960s. He served on the board of the Ensemble Music Society. Two governors named him a Sagamore of the Wabash. He was a member of the Indianapolis Literary Club.

Reviews

[William Guerrant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 1991, this book challenged and critiqued the historical image of Robert E. Lee, following on Thomas Connelly's The Marble Man from 1977. Of course, a lot has changed over the past twenty years. Now the dissenting opinions of Nolan and Connelly have become the dominant narratives and readers who are already well-versed in Civil War history aren't likely to find anything new in this book. Still, the author has very well summarized the evidence that challenges favorable interpretations of Lee--both as to his character and his generalship. The author's argument that Lee failed his duty by not surrendering sooner is the most interesting, and the most controversial. His concluding essay placing the post-war image of Lee within the broader post-war romanticization of the conflict is thought-provoking.

The author is quick to point out that his book is not intended to be a biography of Lee, and this book will be best appreciated by readers who already have a good grounding in the history of the war generally, and Lee specifically.

[Al · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very well-researched book which questions the 'mythology' surrounding Robert E. Lee and his iconic status in military history. In particular, the author explores issues such as why he continued fighting during late 1864 and 1865 when his letters/correspondence indicate that he believed there was no chance of victory. He also questions Lee's grasp of the overall strategic situation...altho he was a brilliant offensive and tactical commander, his all-out offensive thrusts throughout the conflict often against superior forces resulted in the loss of men who could not be replaced and actually led to the ultimate final victory of the Union forces despite many tactical victories by the Confederate forces.

[Ben Rothman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nolan's book is an interesting polemic about Lee's beliefs and tactics. However, Nolan sometimes tries to have it both ways (e.g., Lee was a great man but supported slavery and opposed civil rights; Lee was a brilliant general but caused the South to lose the war by mindlessly relying on the offensive; etc.), relies on speculation rather than evidence to support some of his claims, and lets his personal feelings interfere with his scholarship. Still, the book should be interesting to any (non-Southern) Civil War buff.

[Jim Mann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alan Nolan's historical review of Robert E. Lee is called Lee Considered and not Lee Reconsidered because, as Nolan points out, Lee had not been examined critically, in the same way historians approach other historical personages. Instead, historians and biographers (including Douglas Southall Freeman, Lee's most famous biographer) created the myth of Robert E. Lee, often simply taking Lee's statements (many made after the war) at face value, rather than evaluating Lee's actions or digging more deeply into his words.

Nolan looks at Lee from a number or perspectives, including militarily. The myth of Robert E. Lee portals him as perhaps America's greatest general. Nolan notes that from a tactical perspective, and even from an operation strategy perspective, Lee could be brilliant. But from the most important perspective for a general of Lee's level -- grand strategy (that is, how everything fits together with the overall aim of the war -- Lee failed. Southerners, Lee included, knew the South was vastly outnumbered. Their only real hope was to fight a defensive war, leveraging the inner lines of communication they had, holding out long enough for the North to decide it wasn't worth it. But instead Lee preferred offense, leading him into massive unnecessary battles that like Antietam and Gettysburg, that depleted his forces.

Moreover, Lee's decision to keep fighting for months after he and others knew that the South was defeated (certainly by the time of Petersburg this was obvious to everyone) caused thousands of unnecessary deaths.

Lee's defenders are prone to also say that Lee was against slavery, and that slavery would have died out had the North left it alone. But Lee's own correspondence states that he felt that slavery was the best relationship between the racists, and that God would get rid of it when the time came.

The final chapter of the book investigates how the myth of the "Lost Cause" and of the noble Lee came about after the war, with Southerners looking to justify what they did and Northerners complicit, looking for ways to reunite and thus acknowledge Southern claims to honor.

This is a book that's well worth reading to put things into perspective.

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a thoughtful examination of a great general who is so thoroughly mythologized that even Civil War buffs are often led away from historical facts about his life.
While critical of several aspects of Lee's military command and personal character, the real point of this book is that Lee was a man of his place and time, and a product of his society. He was a brilliant tactical commander, but less successful at what was needed in order to win a war, from the viewpoint of the Confederacy.

[Landon W · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent argument against that the received version of Robert E. Lee is historically indefensible, simple and brief, but stronger for it. Whereas Connelly's "Marble Man" made the case for how we wound up with such a distorted, unfounded view of Lee, Nolan ably and shrewdly shows exactly what has been misconstrued and how. It's a must-read for any serious student of the Civil War; anyone who wishes to maintain the traditional view of Lee owes an answer to Nolan's arguments.

[Robert · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book attacks the legend of Robert E. Lee, usually with success. There are a few sections in which the author tries too hard to make a point that isn't as strong as he wants it to be, but for the most part he exposes the famous general as not just a fallible human being, but also as a poor strategist (if brilliant tactician) who in some cases was surprisingly dishonorable and duplicitous.

[Andy Hart · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is never easy taking a kick at one of the nation's sacred cows, but in this sensible and immaculately constructed argument, Nolan effectively demolishes the myths that have grown and shrouded the memory of General Robert E Lee. The man is revealed and my understanding of him, and the cause he served, is all the better for it.

[Angela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well argued consideration of the Lee Myth in American history. Where Thomas Connelly's "The Marble Man" goes into how the myth was formed, Nolan's book carefully exposes the fallacies of the myth. Superbly researched, clearly written, and cogently and concisely argued. Excellent history or even historiography, really.

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had a conversation with someone a while back, and when I told him my emphasis as a history major in college was the Civil War, he said, "Oh, well, I know you'll agree that Lee was the greatest general of that war, possibly of all American history."

"Well... he lost," I said. The look of astonishment on his face was amazing. I wish I'd snapped a pic.

This text is a necessary re-evaluation of Lee as a general, and historical figure, as well as the historians whose hagiographies (I don't think that's an over-statement really, but others may disagree. "Post hoc agenda-driven PR" would be the least loaded term I'd use personally. Again, YMMV.) By necessity, the "Lost Cause" narrative that his legend prospered in gets some attention, because Lee is one of the biggest fuckbois of that sham culture war phenomenon. But the real targets of this book are the historians who have propped up the mythology around Lee, who cheer lead from the academic sidelines the often dubious choices of a man who is the biggest Lost Cause loser of them all.

This is a rather short book, and as such can't go into a more fulsome and detailed description of many aspects of Lee's life that call into question his very dubious status in American history. His conduct before the war as a slave owner, for instance, is described, but his failures as a manager and businessman are somewhat glossed over. The amount of time he spent in Virginia, let alone at Arlington, should give some hint as to how his loyalties formed, and could at least by implication illustrate that his choice to side with the South was much more calculated and ambitious than the romantic loyalty it is almost always portrayed as being. In fact, Lee's sister and sister-in-law both stayed loyal, which explodes the myth that Lee could do nothing but go with Virginia when it turned against the U.S. His cousin, Samuel Philips Lee, stayed loyal and became an admiral in the USN.

The debt that Robert E. Lee inherited from his father, “Light Horse” Harry Lee, doesn't get a lot of attention either. I'd argue that it was respectable that REL tried to make good the family name and finances after his father's mismanagement of both, but despite the flowery rhetoric and high-minded language about loyalty... he made the gambler's choice to side with the South, and if one views the decision in its full context, there really need be little any more to it than that. Lee was a risk-taker like his father—he just took a different set of risks, and wanted to play with other people's money and lives. Rather than creditors, however, it's the battlefields of the Civil War are littered with his losses.

The be fully fair, Lee's "genius" as a tactical commander doesn't get a lot of attention in this text either. Again, I think that Lee as a tactician is often over-stated. His successes are often better described as Northern failures, inexperience, and incompetence than the product of Lee's especial gifts. That said, he was a skilled tactician on the offense in particular—though Gens. Pickett and Longstreet might insert a few caveats—and it wouldn't be legit to portray him as a bad battlefield commander. That doesn't get a lot of attention in this particular text, which prefers to accurately address Lee as a bad strategist, rather than as a tactician.

Note: Strategy in the broad sense here. The strategy of, say, Athens is to fight a naval war. Tactics is more like calling the plays on a football field or "I have the high ground, Anakin!" Tactics win or lose battles; strategies win or lose wars.

But as much as anything, this book is about how Lee's legend was created after the war, and the author addresses several specific aspects of the Lee Legend that are oxymoronic, unsourced, hypocritical, or just plain nonsensical given the historical record. As an historiography (the study of history as a liberal art, and historical methods) this text does a great if, again, relatively brief job. A more fulsome review would fill nearly as many text as have been penned about Lee, and that'll require a few more scholars to chime in. As a history oriented guy, I found that aspect of the book at least as interesting as the more direct info on Lee... but it might not be for everyone. It probably SHOULD be for everyone, since it addresses a very important aspect of American culture/history, but that's kind of a big ask for the current culture of social media and mass disinformation. Still, an armchair historian can dream of a world where the latest furor is the author, Alan T. Nolan, versus James McPherson in an epic Tiktok smackdown.

[Kyri Freeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nolan analyzes the difference between Robert E. Lee as a historical person and as a semi-mythical icon.

I found the scholarship here pleasantly rational, and I particularly liked Nolan's portrayal of Lee as a product of his time. His purpose is not to "deconstruct" Lee or offer a "revisionist" history, but to correct long-accepted material that makes claims that contradict the evidence of primary sources such as Lee's own letters. Nolan consistently uses primary sources and considers nineteenth-century mentalities in making his arguments.

At times his analysis is brief, and in particular the chapter on grand strategy could have been longer and more detailed and taken into consideration more of the factors affecting Lee's actions, such as the proximity to the border of places like Richmond and the Shenandoah Valley that had to be defended. At times, he seems to ascribe Lee an overexaggerated amount of power over the hearts, minds and actions of the soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia. It does not seem reasonable to suggest that Lee should have sought a surrender after Gettysburg (which most scholars now agree was not seen at the time as a 'turning point', and perhaps should not be seen that way today either) and it seems unlikely to me that anyone would have gone along with him if he had.

Nolan states his intention not to analyze or criticize Lee's smaller-scale decisions, so I can't knock him for keeping his word, but some analysis of Lee's relations with his subordinates might have been useful here. In particular, it would have been interesting to know to what extent Lee participated, post-war, in the making of his own myth.

Nolan's analyses of the Confederacy as a whole sometimes seem a bit broad and sweeping, not making much of the vast cultural and socioeconomic variation across the South. He offers little analysis of what actuated soldiers to fight, and his comparison of Northern and Southern acts against civilian targets isn't particularly nuanced. On the other hand, his discussion of postwar North-South confabulation and the North's limited (at best) commitment to the welfare of formerly enslaved African Americans is well taken.

Overall, though, I felt this was a strong analysis containing intelligent scholarship. At the time of writing it was politically difficult in some circles, even academic ones, to offer any criticism of Robert E. Lee, even if the criticism amounted only to saying that he was a fallible human being and a product of his time, without experiencing violent opposition. I think that Nolan's work is a worthwhile addition to Civil War scholarship.

[Katherine Addison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nolan has a very specific project, which is to take apart the myth of Robert E. Lee, piece by piece, using evidence from Lee's own writings and actions to show that the myth is not the truth. This is rather stiffly written, but Nolan does a great job both of disassembling the mythic Robert E. Lee and of showing why the myth became necessary to mainstream (white) America in the years after the Civil War.

In particular, I liked Nolan's emphasis on not taking what Lee himself said about his actions at face value, as most Lee biographers up to 1991 had done. Nolan demonstrates that Lee was extremely gifted at self-justification, and particularly at the bit of circular reasoning that goes "the thing I want to do is honorable because I want to do it" (which is very different from "I want to do the honorable thing"). I also liked Nolan sorting out the different levels of strategy it's possible to look at, from the general's strategy of campaign to his government's strategy of the war (subdivided into the official strategy and the true strategy). The CSA had no official strategy, which is arguably part of their problem, but their true strategy was---had to be---to outlast the North, not to defeat them. So every time Lee won a brilliant but costly victory, he was working at cross-purposes to the best strategy the CSA had. He may have been a brilliant tactical general, but his much-vaunted audacity and aggression were great only so long as the CSA had the manpower to support them. Which was not really very long.

[Frank Brennan · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you're a Civil War devotee, you will certainly enjoy this. BUT, if you are not, then read up on Civil War battles such as Gettysburg, Chancellorsville, and the Virginia Peninsula campaigns. Otherwise you will have a tough time getting through this very literate and well thought out examination of Lee's strategic and tactical thinking. This is NOT a book for folks who are locked in on their positions on the American Civil War. Rather, Nolan, in 1991, asks readers to be thoughtful and deliberate in examining Lee, whom he admires and says so right up front in the book.

[Peter · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lee Considered, was written in an iconoclastic fashion, challenging the common conception of Robert E. Lee as a near infallible person. It is not a biography, but rather a collection of essays concerning some of the aspects of the Lee Myth: Lee is often quoted as being against slavery, but Nolan shows that Lee actually thought the institution constituted the best possible relationship between African-Americans and White people. True, Lee said God would eventually phase slavery out, but also contended that to God a thousand years is but one day, so maybe in another two thousand days. Lee is seen as a brilliant general, but Nolan argues that, considering how many men Lee lost in his offensive strikes ("during his first months ... Lee lost almost fifty thousand troops [which] exceeds the total troop strength of the Army of Tennessee ... during the same time span" (84-85); and Lee's aggressive strategies resulted in 50,000 more casualties than U.S. Grant, who is considered a butcher by many. In short, this book effectively exposes Lee's flaws.

The one remark I have is, however, that Nolan writes repetitively and inefficiently. But they are minor flaws in a book of this importance.

[Bobsie67 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Much like Connelly’s The Marble Man, Nolan does some Lee myth-busting. Nolan’s conclusions are that a Lee was a man of his times, tied to his aristocratic upbringing and holding the same views of those of his class. Lee the general, Lee the man, was indeed fallible and far from the saintly figure ennobled by Lost Cause advocates. Some of the arguments are a bit dense, so this is not light reading. Probably the most realistic historical view of Lee divorced from his hagiography.

[Andrew Mcletchie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strikes a fine balance between noting Lee's praiseworthy traits while candidly challenging many elements of the mythical Lee tradition, including: his actual views on slavery & secession; his record as a slaveowner; his strategic competence; and, perhaps most powerfully, his ostensible record as a post-war reconciler. Abundantly uses primary source material and synthesis of a wide range of secondary sources on Lee.

[Eddy Ream · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative, but….

Lots of great quotes and insight into REL’s choices during the war and how he carried on after it ceased, however it gets very repetitive at times and can be an incredibly dry read, even amongst other historical narratives.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some chapters were stronger than others but overall an interesting examination of Lee.

[Iain · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nolan makes some great points, many of which needed to be said, but he does so in such a disjointed, rambling manner that I found this difficult to read.

Unfinished.

[Phil Gavenda]

This came out when I was in grad school, but only now got around to reading it. Very good. 1991 non-idolatrous look at RE Lee and his behavior before, during and after the Civil War.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the book that made me see how conventional Robert E Lee was in his convictions. Against slavery but not enough to make a difference, a soldier of the United States but not enough to to turn against Virginia...