Note 8 — Chapter I · SLAVERY AND THE OLD RELATION BETWEEN THE SOUTHERN WHITES AND BLACKS

General R. E. Lee emancipated his servants within eight days after the proclamation was issued. On the 8th of January, 1863, he wrote from his camp that he had executed and returned to his lawyer a deed of manumission which he had had prepared by him. He had discovered the omission of certain names and had inserted them. And he added that if any other names had been omitted, he wished a supplementary deed drawn up containing all that had been so omitted. “They are all entitled to their freedom,” he writes, “and I wish to give it to them. Those that have been carried away, I hope, are free and happy. I cannot get their papers to them and they do not require them. I will give them if they call for them.” See “Life of General R. E. Lee,” by Fitzhugh Lee.

General Henry A. Wise, one of the most ultra-Democratic leaders in the South, states that, had the South succeeded in its struggle, he had intended to set his slaves free and canvass Virginia for the abolition of slavery. See Report of Joint Commission on Reconstruction, 1st Session, 39th Congress, p. 70.