Lee, Henry, 1756-1818

Henry Lee III (January 29, 1756 – March 25, 1818) was an early American Patriot and U.S. politician who served as the ninth Governor of Virginia and as the Virginia Representative to the United States Congress. Lee's service during the American Revolution as a cavalry officer in the Continental Army earned him the nickname by which he is best known, "Light-Horse Harry". He was the father of Robert E. Lee, who led Confederate armies against the U.S. in the American Civil War.

Born on Leesylvania Plantation in Prince William County in the Colony of Virginia, Lee pursued classical studies and graduated from the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) in 1773, pursuing a legal career thereafter. With the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, he instead became a captain in a Virginia dragoon detachment, which was attached to the 1st Continental Light Dragoons. In 1778, Lee was promoted to major and given the command of a mixed corps of cavalry and infantry known as Lee's Legion, with which he won a great reputation as a capable leader of light troops. It was during his time as commander of the Legion that Lee earned the sobriquet of "Light-Horse Harry" for his horsemanship. He was eventually promoted to lieutenant colonel and was assigned with his Legion to the southern theater of war.

From 1786 to 1788, Lee was a delegate to the Congress of the Confederation. In 1788, he served in the Virginia convention and supported the ratification of the United States Constitution. From 1789 to 1791, he served in the Virginia General Assembly, and from 1791 to 1794, was Governor of Virginia. A new county of Virginia was named after him during his governorship. In 1794, Lee was summoned by President George Washington to suppress the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania. Lee commanded the 12,950 militiamen sent to quash the rebels; because of a peaceful surrender, there was no fighting. In 1798, in anticipation of a war with France, Henry Lee was appointed a major general in the U.S. Army. From 1799 to 1801, he served in the United States House of Representatives as a Federalist. At Washington's funeral on December 26, 1799, Lee famously eulogized him to a crowd of 4,000 as "first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen."

After retiring from public service in 1801, he lived with his family at Stratford Hall and unsuccessfully tried to manage his plantation. The Panic of 1796–1797 and bankruptcy of Robert Morris reduced Lee's fortune. In 1809, he became bankrupt and served one year in debtors' prison in Montross, Virginia. During the civil unrest in Baltimore, Maryland in 1812, Lee received grave injuries while helping to resist an attack on his friend, Alexander Contee Hanson, editor of the Baltimore newspaper, The Federal Republican on July 27, 1812. After unsuccessful convalescence at home, he sailed to the West Indies in an effort to recuperate from his injuries. On his way back to Virginia, he died on March 25, 1818, at Dungeness, on Cumberland Island, Georgia. Initially buried in a small cemetery at Dungeness, his remains were moved to the Lee family crypt at University Chapel, on the campus of Washington & Lee University in Lexington, Virginia in 1913.