Rapp Center for Education

When White Supremacists ‘rallied’ in Charlottesville in 2017 in opposition to the removal of a statue, they exposed an enduring raw nerve in the consciousness of the country, a sore further exacerbated by the 2020 murder of George Floyd and other earlier related, heinous acts. Since these events, the causes, meanings, enduring consequences, and modern reckonings of and about the Civil War have (once again) become subjects of furious debate; all of this ignited into a raging conflagration by an inanimate metal effigy of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The offending statue was not only removed but, in a further symbolic move, was melted down into oblivion. Likewise, all memory of Lee seems destined for erasure in many quarters.

Lee is the iconic figure of the Confederacy, the one person most identified with the Southern Cause in the Civil War. Now, it is the subject of unceasing denigration in nearly all public conversation. But who was Lee exactly? In all the frustrations and fury surrounding past and present injustices, where does this ‘marble man’ as some historians have deemed him fit in our ongoing history.? How does his life, his character, and the choices he made compare with those of ourselves, our leaders, other public figures, indeed, with all of humanity? How do we and others handle significant challenges to our fundamental values that we sometimes face? Will eradication of the man lead to reconciliation or a better understanding of our troubled past?

With this question in mind, the class will attempt to cover all aspects of Lee’s life, both positive and negative, in the context of the past, the present, and the future. The hope will be to show that specific lessons of his life, however flawed that life may appear, provide memorable examples of timeless values.

Dr. John Tole is an engineer, historian, musician, and tree farmer connected to Rappahannock County and has resided here for over 40 years. He is a native of Washington, D.C., with Civil War roots in New York and the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia: one great-great-grandfather was a Union naval officer; another was a member of the Stonewall Brigade in Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. He studied, taught, and conducted research in engineering at M.I.T & spent many years in technical endeavors.

John is president of the Rappahannock Historical Society (where his wife, Judy, is the Executive Director). He has co-authored several books on local history, including the forthcoming Sperryville Bi-Centennial History, lectured on various Civil War topics, and is the program manager for the County’s Civil War Trails project that erected 33 local roadside markers about Rappahannock’s role in the War. He is also a musician whose repertoire includes American period music from colonial days to the present, including a large body of Civil War-era tunes.