Lee, Stephen D. (Stephen Dill), 1833-1908

Planter, U.S. and Confederate army officer.

Lieutenant General, C.S.A.; President, Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College; and Mississippi state legislator; native of Charleston, S.C.

Confederate Army soldier.

Stephen Dill Lee was the youngest Confederate lieutenant general during the Civil War. He served as a Mississippi state senator in 1878 and was the first president of Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Mississippi State University) from 1880 to 1899. Lee served as a delegate to the state's constitutional convention in 1890, was the head of the Vicksburg National Park Association in 1899, and held the post of commander-in-chief of the United Confederate Veterans (1904-1908).

Native of South Carolina and president of the Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College, 1880-1899.

Stephen Dill Lee was born to Dr. Thomas Lee and Caroline Allison Lee on 22 September 1833 in Charleston, S.C. He entered West Point at the age of 17 and graduated in 1854; he served in the U.S. Army in Texas, Florida, Kansas, and the Dakotas. In 1861, he resigned from the U.S. Army to enter service in the Confederate Army and rose in rank from captain to lieutenant-general. Lee was severely wounded in Nashville, Tenn., in 1864 and surrendered with Johnston in High Point, N.C., on 26 April 1865.

In February 1865, Lee married Regina Harrison, daughter of James Thomas Harrison and Regina Blewett, of Columbus, Miss. They settled in Mississippi after the war and Lee was active as a planter for several years. In 1878, Lee was elected to the Mississippi Senate. From 1880 to 1899, he served as the first president of the Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College. He resigned as college president to serve as member of the commission to organize Vicksburg Military Park. Lee was active in the Confederate veterans, wrote several articles on the Civil War, and held the post of Chief of the United Confederate Veterans until his death in Vicksburg on 28 May 1908. [from the Dictionary of American Biography ]

Blewett Harrison Lee, born 1 March 1867 in Noxubee County, Miss., was the only child of Stephen and Regina Lee. He graduated from Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College and studied law at Harvard. He served as private secretary for Supreme Court Justice Horace Gray in 1890 and afterwards practiced law in Atlanta, Chicago, and New York. He was a professor of law at Northwestern University from 1893 to 1901 and the University of Chicago from 1902 to 1903. [from Who's Who in America, 1924-25 edition]