The claim of Lee's allegedly saying, "I have fought against the people of the North because I believed they were seeking to wrest from the South dearest rights. But I have never cherished toward them bitter or vindictive feelings, and have never seen the day when I did not pray for them" comes to us from J. William Jones.
https://books.google.com/books?id=KeQhNwQev2kC&pg=PA175&lpg=PA175&dq=Lee+But+I+have+never+cherished+toward+them+bitter+or+vindictive+feelings,+and+have+never+seen+the+day+when+I+did+not+pray+for+them&source=bl&ots=v8cEAn8QZm&sig=KhRqWuhKCRYIngTO-Yg5dvjiN4U&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiugMfhlvzXAhUBmuAKHT6WCnIQ6AEIUDAH#v=onepage&q=Lee But I have never cherished toward them bitter or vindictive feelings, and have never seen the day when I did not pray for them&f=false
Let's look at the tale:
View attachment 169485 View attachment 169486
If we look at this carefully we see there is no way Jones could have known what Lee said. Lee accompanied the preacher to the door and this alleged quote was said only to the preacher with no one else around them. The preacher isn't the one who related it. Jones is. Note that Jones doesn't say where he got the story.
It's most likely from Jones' imagination.
Lee's letters reveal quite a bit of bitterness toward his enemies. The fable that he never referred to the Federals other than as "those people" is also blown apart by just reading what the man wrote. He usually called the Federals "the enemy."
Here's one example: After President Abraham Lincoln issued the Final Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, Lee wrote bitterly to the confederate Secretary of War, “In view of the vast increase of the forces of the enemy, of the savage and brutal policy he has proclaimed, which leave us no alternative but success or degradation worse than death, if we would save the honor of our families from pollution, our social system from destruction, let every effort be made, every means be employed, to fill and maintain the ranks of our armies, until God, in his mercy, shall bless us with the establishment of our independence.” [Robert E. Lee to Secretary of War James Seddon, 10 Jan 1863] Notice how he views emancipation as a “savage and brutal policy,” leaving the confederacy “no alternative but success or degradation worse than death.” To Lee, emancipation threatened “the honor of our families” due to “pollution.” This is the standard fear of free blacks marrying white women.
He referred to Federals as "the enemy" in writings as early in the war as April 1861 and continued throughout.