Fitzhugh Lee - Postbellum Life

Postbellum Life

After the war, Lee devoted himself to farming in Stafford County, Virginia, and was conspicuous in his efforts to reconcile the Southern people to the issue of the war, which he regarded as a final settlement of the questions at issue. In 1875, he attended the Battle of Bunker Hill centennial at Boston and delivered a remarkable address. In 1885, he was a member of the board of visitors of West Point, and from 1886 to 1890 was governor of Virginia.

Lee commanded the third division at both of President Grover Cleveland's inaugural parades in 1885 and 1893.

In April 1896, Lee was appointed consul-general at Havana by President Cleveland, with duties of a diplomatic and military character added to the usual consular business. In this post (in which he was retained by President William McKinley until 1898) he was from the first called upon to deal with a situation of great difficulty, which culminated with the destruction of the warship USS Maine. Upon the declaration of war between Spain and the United States, he re-entered the army.

He was one of three ex-Confederate general officers who were made major generals of United States Volunteers. Fitzhugh Lee commanded the VII Army Corps, but took no part in the actual operations in Cuba. He was military governor of Havana and Pinar del Río in 1899, subsequently commanded the Department of the Missouri, and retired in 1901 as a brigadier general, U.S. Army.

Lee was an early leader of the committee for the Jamestown Exposition, which was held at Sewell's Point on Hampton Roads in 1907. Lee died in Washington, D.C., and was buried in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia.

Lee wrote the article about Robert E. Lee in the Great Commanders series (1894), General Lee, a wartime biography (1894), and Cuba's Struggle Against Spain (1899).