Lee’s Last Bivouac

Lee’s Last Bivouac. April 14, 1865. Although Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865, the formal surrender ceremonies for his cavalry, artillery, and infantry occurred over the next three days. Lee did not attend. On April 12, after his infantrymen had stacked arms, Lee departed for Richmond and his family. Members of his staff rode with him, including Cols. Walter Taylor and Charles Marshall, as well as Maj. Giles Cooke, confined to an ambulance by wounds suffered a week earlier at Sailor’s Creek. The group bivouacked that first night in woods two miles beyond Buckingham Court House., On April 13, the party reached Cumberland County and bivouacked at Flanagan’s Mill, spending the night at the home of Madison Flanagan. The next day, Cooke left to join his mother and sisters near Richmond. The others rode into Powhatan County and stopped for the night at Windsor, the house of Lee’s brother Charles Carter Lee, at Fine Creek Mills. Since the house was already crowded, the men planned to sleep in a tent but instead were invited to spend the night in the residence of John Gilliam on the adjoining farm. Politely declining, Lee spent his “final bivouac” in his tent on Gilliam’s lawn., After breakfasting with the Gilliams on April 15, the trio soon departed, accompanied by Lee’s son, Gen. William Henry Fitzhugh “Rooney” Lee, and his nephew, John Lee, Charles Carter Lee’s son. Riding down the old river road through Powhatan and Chesterfield Counties, they soon neared Richmond and crossed the James River pontoon bridge at Manchester. Lee quickly reached his rented dwelling and waiting family at 707 East Franklin Street.