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Edwin Bearss says something I have never heard of before: That Lee resigned the position of General-in-Chief of the Confederate armies on April 7, 1865 so that he would not be responsible for surrendering all of them should it come to that.
??
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__________________ 'It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag'
Webcasts don't work on my computer, so I'll have to rely on everyone else to tell me what Bearss said.
It was my impression that, by the time he reached Appomattox, Lee had recognized that the only way the South could continue fighting was on a guerrilla warfare basis, and had decided that it would not be a good idea to do so.
If my impression is correct, I can't understand why Lee wouldn't have retained the position of General-in-Chief and welcomed the opportunity to surrender on behalf of all the Confederate armies, if that opportunity had arisen.
General Lee was well aware that the Confederate government was history at his April 9 surrender. He may have believed that the Army of Tennessee was still alive. The battle at Bentonville March 19 had made that assessment very questionable. It was Lee who had re-appointed Joseph Johnston commander of the AOT, so he certainly came closest to having authority to make that surrender inclusive. Probably only the fact that he was not personally in command of the AOT made him exclude them from his negotiations with Grant. Johnston took the hint when news of Lee's surrender arrived and began the process to surrender the AOT on April 26, just 2 weeks later. It must be remembered that Lee, while certainly glad to see the conflict end, was not really in the mood to surrender to anyone, must less an army that was still intact, though noticeably beaten in North Carolina.
Right on, Larry. He had the authority but would not assume the responsibility. Lee wasn't one to speak for others. Had Davis not been such a goose, he would have named Lee general of all the armies much sooner.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
Ole, even with the elevated title of General of the Armies, Lee would have probably still been essentially in his same role and position in the northern Virginia and Richmond area. No communication link or physical supply route connecting the ANV and AOT made it darn near impossible for someone to control movement in both west and east theatres. Davis proved that point with his attempt to run the AOT by remote control. The Confederate effort and cause, no matter how noble or necessary it may have been, didn't have a Chinaman's chance of succeeding. The manpower, hardware, railroads etc. simply weren't in place nor up to the task. Subordinates such as Wheeler, Johnston, Forrest, Walthall and Taylore did their level best, but not much meaningful support from the home office.
J.B. Hood certainly wasn't the answer. Lee, alas, probably could have figured that out (I suspect he did) and perhaps managed a better fight. Certainly Sherman should never have been allowed to leave Atlanta, much less reach that point from Chattanooga in the first place.
I should have been born taller, thinner and better looking, but alas we play the cards as dealt.
You're not tall, thin and good looking? I'm shocked. You write good, tho.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
In my research of the last few years, it seemed that R.E. Lee was oblivious to the fact the war was lost, long before he surrendered.
Many of his soldiers were killed, maimed, wounded, long after the war was strategically lost. Lee could not fathom why many of his soldiers were really deserting, in the last months of the war.
It shouldn't have taken an honored West Point graduate, a soldier of long experience, a general who saw the deterioration of the Petersburg-Richmond defenses, to know that the war was over.
The retreat from Petersburg should never have happened. At this point, the Army of Northern Virginia was logistically unsupplyable as a fighting army.
The truth is, Lee virtually fought to the last Confederate soldier in his command.
At Appomattox, Lee had no army worth the name.
Grant had a montrous headache. He wanted to end the struggle in a war that no longer had any meaning. The Army of Northern Virginia was fought out long before the surrender at Appomattox.
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Lee resigns as General-in-Chief 
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