Cavalry was organized, until early in 1861.[1] The only years, then, to which the date of The Duty Letter, April 5, 1852, can be changed, with any possibility of satisfying the two conditions stated above, are 1856 and 1860. Let us examine these years separately.[2]
(1.) The Year 1856.
On November 21, 1855, Lieutenant-Colonel Lee, who had been absent from his regiment, at Fort Leavenworth and Fort Riley, as a member of a Court-Martial, records in his Memorandum Book, that he arrived at Jefferson Barracks, near St. Louis, Missouri (where the Second Cavalry had rendezvoused), and "Found no orders for my future movements. The Regiment gone to Texas." [3] Here, then, was Lieutenant-Colonel Lee's chance, according to the first two sentences of The Duty Letter, to hasten to Texas, join his "fine old regiment," and see that the men "are properly taken care of." But on November 24, 1855, the Memorandum Book contains this entry: "Left St. Louis for Texas to join my regiment. Shipped my baggage to New Orleans. Decided to take Arlington on my way." (Italics mine.)
To Texas, from St. Louis, by way of Arlington, was certainly a roundabout route; and does not exhibit such haste on the part of Lieutenant-Colonel Lee to join his regiment, and see that the men were properly taken care of, as The Duty Letter
- ↑ I have had access to these letters and to the Memorandum Book, through the kindness of Colonel Robert E. Lee, of Ravensworth. The Memorandum Book is really a diary, with almost daily records of General Lee's movements.
- ↑ It may be remarked here that to preserve the integrity of the body of The Duty Letter it is necessary, not only to change the year 1852, to some other year, but also to change the month from April to February, as both in 1856 and in 1860 General Lee left for Texas in February. But this change encounters an obstacle in the third sentence of The Duty Letter, where General Lee is made to say, "I have but little to add in reply to your letters of March 26, 27 and 28." For if the date be changed to February, in any year, how can General Lee in that month reply to letters received by him as late as the latter part of March?
- ↑ "It appears from the records of this office that the Second United States Cavalry left Jefferson Barracks, Missouri, for Texas, October 27, 1855, Lieut.Colonel Lee being absent on Court Martial duty at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas." Letter to the writer, August 22, 1913, from the Adjutant-General's office, Washington, D. C.
