On this Palm Sunday, for these men there was no revenge, they just wanted and waited for everything to be over. John Gibbon a North Carolinian “proposed that if Grant and Lee couldn’t come to terms and stop the fighting, they should order their soldiers to fire only blank cartridges to prevent further bloodshed.” (Wortham, 156) At noon Grant and Lee still didn’t show up so everyone went back to their respective lines hoping what Gibbon said was true.
Grant arrived at the house around 1:30 and 2:00 where Lee was already awaiting. By 3:00 the surrender documents were signed and the two men shook hands. At 4:30 Washington had already been telegraphed informing the Secretary of War that Lee had surrendered on terms proposed by Grant. The two men agreed that the Army of Northern Virginia would be paroled and would have to return all property of the Union Army. Grant stated that “each officer and man will be allowed to return to their homes not to be disturbed by the United States authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside,” and made it impossible for Lee to be tried for treason. (Wortham, 157)
Grant saw himself now as an instrument for peace. Grant let every man of the confederate army who claimed to own a horse take it home, as well as told his army to share their rations with the rebels. Lincoln was informed of the surrender and was delighted because it followed his policy of reconciliation. When the Union lines were informed of the surrender they “began to fire and salute and cheer, but Grant issued orders forbidding and demonstrations.” (Wortham, 157)
“The emotions of the weary and humiliated men in Lee’s tattered army ranged from bitterness and anger to sadness and acceptance. But they were relieved when they learned that they would be paroled and free to go home rather then sent to Northern prisons.” (Wortham, 158) Lee said that the four years in which he served he had learned that his men were brave, and that they deserved to return home in peace with the satisfaction that they had done their job. Lee gave his farewells and gave his men the right words to take with them on their future. Many believed the Confederates were wrong in belief but they also said, “They fought as they were taught, true to such ideals as they saw, and put into their cause their best.” (Wortham, 158)
The next day on April 10th Grant’s generals asked him if they could cross the Confederate lines to meet with old friends. Grant sat waiting for his officers to prepare everything so his army could leave Appomattox. His officers arrived with many of Grant’s comrades. These comrades included Cadmus Wilcox who was Grant’s best man at his wedding, Henry Heth who had been a subaltern with Grant in Mexico, George Pickett and others. Grant talked to them until he left and later on wrote the officers saying “the officers seemed to enjoy the meeting as much as though they had been friends separated for a long time while fighting battles under the same flag. For the time being it looked very much as if all thought of war had escaped their minds.” (Wortham, 158)
These men were a band of brothers, “more tightly bonded by hardship and danger in war than biological brothers.” Longstreet arrives when Grant had already moved into a room that was temporarily his headquarters. Longstreet and Grant had been friends since West Point, and was also present at Grant’s wedding. Three years after the Appomattox Longstreet endorsed Grant’s presidential candidacy and attended to his inauguration.
Chamberlain argued that the Confederates had seceded from the Union politically, but had not left it culturally. He believed that a “similar overarching in the reconciliation was that the soldiers were not alien foes but men of similar origin.” (Wortham, 159) Wendell Philips believed that the Civil War was between a civilization based in democracy and one based on an aristocracy founded on slavery.
The North and the South both shared significant elements of national identity that not even the war could get rid of. The north and south were “Both Americans, by birth or by adoption, and they both had the weaknesses and the virtues of the people of their nation and time.” (Wortham, 160) A key element of this identity was the vision these two sections had of the nation as the promised land to which God had led his people. “A city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us, so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.” (Wortham, 160) America was now becoming American, and a national community.
As America grew Lee was nationally elevated to a hero status that only a couple individuals had been able to accomplish like Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln. Lee started to become more American a lot before he surrendered. A general came up to Lee and told him that he had many hosts of friends in the North. Lee with tears in his eyes said, “I suppose all the people in the North looked upon me as a rebel traitor.” (Wortham, 160) The nationalization of Lee is a very American cultural practice. In the 1900’s Lee was added to the Hall of Fame for Great Americans. Also a statue of him and Washington was places in the Statuary Hall in the U.S Capitol.
According to Connelly and Bellows Lee was a man with the American values of decency, duty and honor. Lee was the postwar nationalist who had the determination to help restore the old Union. Lee is the supreme paradoxical American Hero. “Within three months Lee’s offensives had taken the Confederacy off the floor at the count of nine and had driven Union forces onto the ropes. Without Lee the Confederacy might have died in 1862. But slavery would have survived; the South would have suffered only limited death and destruction. Lee’s victories prolonged the war until it destroyed slavery, the plantation economy, the wealth and infrastructure of the region, and everything else the confederacy stood for. That was the profound irony of Lee’s military genius.” (Wortham, 161)
This article fits its time period greatly because it helped me understand how important Lee and Grant were to the United States. This article explained with accurate facts what happened at the Appomattox Courthouse and how significant it was to the nation. After Reading this article everything makes sense and is very understandable. This article has no historiographical debate due to the fact that it gives the reader facts. There is no debate because the author tells us what happened from what he has researched. No other authors are mentioned throughout the article, except those who provide more examples of what occurred.
In conclusion, that April afternoon of 1865 was very significant to the establishment of the nation. The surrender of Lee’s Army gave a big presence of the peace and reconciliation that Lincoln wanted. Lincoln thought it would be impossible but he realized that day in 1865 that it was possible. America had never been united, after this event America was on the road of becoming American. For Lee’s troops it was a little humiliating but they were happy, knowing that one day someone would be thankful for what happened this day.
