The Truth About Lee's Decision
When I saw Gods & Generals in 2003, I was unaware that it was Francis Preston Blair who presented Robert E. Lee with President Lincoln's offer to command the Union Army. As the DVD commentators mention, most people today have never heard of Blair. As editor of the Washington Globe, he was a powerful force in antebellum presidential politics. He seemed to have an innate sense for when to play his cards, as far as politics went. He switched parties several times and from Jackson to Lincoln, supported several successful presidential candidates. He also founded the town of Silver Spring, Maryland, now a Washington, DC suburb. He is featured with Lee in the opening scene of the original thatrical release of the movie. Incidentally, he looked nothing like the actor portraying him in the movie. The point of that scene is to focus on Lee's decision to reject the offer proposed to him. But from what I've learned since I first saw the movie, much about this scene is misleading and erroneous. And the movie offers nothing about the very critcal moment that occurred after Lee left Blair's house.
The movie gets it right that Lee came to Blair's house and that he declined the offer on the spot. But the film makes a mistake in making it look like the two men didn't really know each other (and in a movie goof, Lee calls Mr. Blair "general" at one point). The men were connected through the marriage of Samuel Phillips Lee, Robert's third cousin, and Blair's daughter Elizabeth. Their home, built in 1859, was right next door to Francis Preston's home, the same place where Lee and Blair would meet that day in 1861. And these buildings still stand today as the Blair House, the official guest house of the President of the United States (it was also the residence used by President Truman during the renovation of the White House). Anyway, I believe the men knew each other well enough to be on a first-name basis. Perhaps the meeting was over refreshments.
Blair also had other things in common with Lee. Both men were born in Virginia, though Blair would be raised in Kentucky. Both men were slaveholders; I would say it's safe to assume Lee was met at the door by a black man. Lee tells Blair "you can see Arlington House from your front door." The not true now due to the modern buildings of DC, at one time this was true. For whatever time Lee spent in DC and Arlington before the war, I believe these men were part of Washington society and probably ran into each other at public events.
So what happened after Lee walked out of Blair's house? The movie makes it look like he left there and went straight down to the Secession Convention in Richmond to proudly accept the command of the Virginia Militia. Actually he left Blair's house and simply walked across the street to Winfield Scott's office at the War Department Building, the Civil War's Pentagon (the Eisenhower Executive Office Building is on this site today). It was his fellow Virginian and fellow slaveowner Scott whom Lee served under during the Mexican War. It was Scott, even more so than George Washington, whom Lee admired and sought to emulate. Though Lee abruptly declined Lincoln's offer via Francis Blair, he told Scott he was undecided about supporting the north or the south. Scott then adamantly told him he would need to make a decision as soon as possible or he might be ordered to do things he might not want to do. And with that, Lee returned home to Arlington House, chose the Confederacy and the rest is history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Preston_Blair
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winfield_Scott
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blair_House
1840 political cartoon featuring Blair, who proclaims, "I will leave the Globe!"
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2008661379/