As a native born Tarheel and an adopted by marriage Virginian, I revere the great Richard Henry Lee, famous mostly for his Anti-Federalist writing. His namesake and heir, Colonel Richard Henry Lee wrote much later
"Twenty eight years have passed since the close of our civil war. Time, I trust has healed the wounds of war, but with the revolving years the causes and events of that terrible struggle seem to be forgotten, or if not forgotten, considered as unimportant events of history. And even the history of those events, and the causes that led to that struggle, are not set forth fairly and truthfully.
It is stated in books and papers that Southern children read and study that all the blood-shedding and destruction of property of that conflict was because the South rebelled without cause against the best government the world ever saw; that although Southern soldiers were heroes in the field, skillfully massed and led, they and their leaders were rebels and traitors who fought to overthrow the Union, and to preserve human slavery, and that their defeat was necessary for free government and the welfare of the human family.
As a Confederate soldier and as a citizen of Virginia , I deny the charge, and denounce it as a calumny. We were not rebels; we did not fight to perpetuate human slavery, but for our rights and privileges under a government established over us by our fathers and in defense of our homes."
