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Robert E. Lee Photograph UACC PADA

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Photo taken by Mathew Brady. This was Lee's last sitting for Brady. Photo was taken when Lee had only 18 months to live. 8" x 10" black and white photo. Two blindstamps on reverse, "L.C. HANDY, / Photographer / 494 Maryland Avenue, S.W. / Washington, D.C." Written in pencil on reverse, "Robt E. Lee / when President of / Wash. & Lee University...." Probably written by an employee of L.C. Handy Studio. Robert E. Lee had gone to Baltimore in the latter part of April, 1869, under heavy pressure from his friends and associates, to lend his influence to what he considered a worthy undertaking–a project for securing capital to establish a railroad that would serve the Shenandoah Valley. On May 1st he proceeded to Washington to pay his respects to President Grant, in response to an invitation from the White House. While in Washington Lee had found occasion to go to the gallery of Mathew Brady. Lee’s presence in Washington had not gone unnoticed, and probably Brady had pleaded for a sitting–his insistence had succeeded with Lee before. History cannot regret his importunings – this was the last time he was to see Lee. This is one of three fine portraits taken that day. It shows with startling effect what the war had done to General Lee. In the after-war years, Lee knew much pain. What he regarded as rheumatism was probably angina pectoris; hardening of the arteries was rapid after 1866, and he had some arthritis. From his symptoms these conditions seem to us now to have been clearly evident in the last two years of his life, and when Brady took this picture, Lee had only eighteen months to live. Light age soil on reverse; tiny pinholes at top left corner, small crease top right corner not affecting image of Lee. Otherwise, in very good condition.

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