The American Civil War consisted of far more than "Gods & Generals" fighting great battles. It also involved struggles at home with personal loss, labor, shortage, inflation, crime, treason, race, and much more. Few men knew this side of the war better than did the provost marshals, those individuals charged with military security. George Washington Lee held that position in one of the Confederacy’s most important and vulnerable cities, the real Atlanta of the Civil War. The environment in which he struggled bore little resemblance to the heroic patriotism and public sacrifice portrayed in the novel and movie Gone with the Wind. It was then, as now, a city of class based on money. Confederate Atlanta proved to be rife with counterfeiters, speculators, saboteurs, spies, bootleggers, and other desperate individuals capable of committing almost any crime out of greed or desperation, including treason and murder.
George W. Lee fought a personal battle with tuberculosis and financial failure as he tried to support the Confederate cause with literally all that he had. Praised by Atlanta’s best citizens as a fair, ethical, and honest patriot, he had at least three attempts made on his life that received notice in the press. His actions to maintain order and enforce the law made him powerful enemies such as General Braxton Bragg and a class of northern born Atlantans who worked for the Confederacy, proclaimed themselves as "secret Yankees" to General Sherman, and who worked to get rich from whichever side won the war. In the end, Lee lost his command because he was born into the wrong social class.
Robert S. Davis is the latest of several persons to set out to the story of George Washington Lee and he may be the first to succeed. Misinformation about the career and life of the Atlanta provost marshal, begun as a smear campaign during the Civil War, continues to this day.
The Middle Tennessee Civil War Round Table meets every third Tuesday of the month at Bradley Academy, located on Academy Street in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Membership applications are available at each meeting. Membership costs $15 per year for individuals and $20 for families. All meetings are open to the public regardless of membership status. Each meeting will include time for interested parties to share stories and memorabilia from the Civil War era with the membership.
For more information, visit our web site at http://www.mtcwrt.org or contact Jim Lewis at 615-243-6830 (before 8 PM) or by e-mail at mtcwrt@comcast.net.