Mary Lee Brady, Ph.D.

Lee Generations

Which ones acquired the name Lee before or after the war, ... we do not know but official records by the government recorded the ones who enlisted in the army using the surname of Lee.  Never did so many owe so much to so few, ... the young men who volunteered to join Union forces that achieved military victories necessary for Abraham Lincoln to set free over four million people in bondage that included a lot of men, women and children then or later with the surname of Lee. 

We are compelled to believe that common first names of two or more men born in the same generation likely resulted from sisters or brothers choosing to name their offspring after a common father, ... resulting with soldiers often sharing a common grand-father or even father such as "Abraham or Abram" listed below and not knowing so. 

Another example is that of John W. Lee who apparently enlisted and reenlisted on two different occasions until wounded, died from his wounds and was buried in the Freedmen's Cemetery located in Alexandria, Virginia.  The fact that so many other infants and adults buried therein with the surname of Lee and first names akin to many known descendents of William and Frank Lee, ... we are inclined to believe John W. Lee was also one of their offspring.  

A review of the burial records is a journey that enlightened and educated minds ought to travel in attempts to comprehend realities of life both in and out of the slave pens and Civil War hospitals as it was lived among "the least of us." 

City of Alexandria - External Link

What we know for certain is that 762 soldier enlistments (some men enlisted a second time in another regiment to earn a second bonus) and 71 sailors serving in the U.S. Government forces during the war were of African-American heritage and enlisted with the surname of Lee, ... the likely offspring of perhaps three hundred little known mothers and fathers in bondage and free during the 1840-1850 era.  But, how little we really know about them or their stories to escape bondage and live or die to make human liberty a reality for "the least of us."