Honor Answering Honor: “Bloody Chamberlain†and the Surrender at Appomattox
Jimmy Price
Programs and Education Department
National Museum of the United States Army Project OfficeIt was one of the most iconic moments in all of American history – the famed “stillness†at Appomattox. After four years of bitter struggle, General Ulysses S. Grant’s armies had finally vanquished General Robert E. Lee’s vaunted Army of Northern Virginia. While the surrender terms had been agreed upon by Lee and Grant on April 9, 1865, the formal surrender ceremony did not take place until April 12th. Neither Lee nor Grant elected to attend the surrender ceremony. Instead, Grant selected Brevet Major General Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain to receive the surrender of the Confederate infantry. Chamberlain’s meteoric rise from college professor to Union general is now the stuff of legend, but in April of 1861, no one could have foreseen the role that he would play in preserving the Union.
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