Army of Northern Virginia
ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA
ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA. On 1 June 1862, Confederate President Jefferson Davis personally placed Robert E. Lee in command of the Confederate army and officially designated it the Army of Northern Virginia. Thereafter, until the surrender at Appomattox nearly three years later, Lee commanded this most famous and best known of Confederate armies. During this period, he established his reputation as one of the most skillful of American generals. Likewise, the Army of Northern Virginia became one of the Confederacy's most effective fighting weapons. At its largest, the army consisted of 90,000 soldiers, but by the end of the war, only 8,000 remained.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Gallagher, Gary W. Lee and His Generals in War and Memory. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1998.
Power, J. Tracy. Lee's Miserables: Life in the Army of Northern Virginia from the Wilderness to Appomattox. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998.
AngelaEllis
Thomas RobsonHay
See alsoArmy, Confederate ; Army of Virginia ; Civil War ; Confederate States of America andvol. 9:Robert E. Lee's Farewell to His Army .