Background information and commentary by Andrew Carroll: By April 9th (Palm Sunday), 1865, General Robert E. Lee recognized the inevitable. Immaculately attired in a pressed gray uniform, Lee met with Genera Ulysses S. Grant - -fifteen years younger and dressed in rumpled, mud-splattered clothing -- to discuss a formal surrender. Throughout the Civil War, a Union soldier named Charles George sent hundreds of letters, many of them written in blackberry juice, to his wife Ellen back in Vermont. After three years of service, George was able to report from Appomattox the news that he, and literally tens of millions of others, so urgently wanted to hear. (This letter was published for the first time, in its entirety, in WAR LETTERS.)

Monday Morning -- April 10, 1865

HURRAH!!!! HURRAH!!!! HURRAH!!!!

GENERAL LEE HAS SURRENDERED!!!!

Peace is near at hand!! -- Oh! My dear Ellie!! I cannot express to you the emotions of my heart. Yesterday was the most eventful day of the war. A day that will never be forgotten!!! ….

Ellie, when the news reached our Corps, such a scene of excitement I never have witnessed... Cannons were immediately whirled into position and commenced firing -- such a hollering I never heard. Cheer after cheer went up -- hats thrown high into the air -- men throwing their arms up and swinging their caps and every other type of demonstrations of joy were going on. I began to think the Band ought to play a part too -- I found Herbert playing with only five members! Hail Columbia -- the rest soon joined. As we played I looked at our division in front of us -- there everything was in motion -- the air was full of caps and hats -- officers from General Seymore down to Lieuts. were on their horses “riding every which way!” Flags were waving – cheer after cheer from thousands of soldiers rent the air and it seemed as if there would be no end to the noise. Just try to imagine, if you can, seeing all this and hearing the yelling of the men batteries firing blanks and bands playing (other bands took up the strains). It is almost impossible to describe joy these men were showing. For an attempt to describe it think of bees when they are swarming and imagine every one to be a man and you will get a faint idea.

What a week's work! In one week we have eaten up Lee's whole Army -- taking large mouthfuls every day. He had about 80,000 men, and now all that armed force is powerless. It is now proof positive of the great wisdom of General Grant, by the help of God, that this is the time we have been so anxiously waiting for, for so long . There will be no more war! The forces will speedily surrender I think. The question now is, how long will we be kept here -- I think we shall be home in a month from today, at the fartherest. They will settle the business as speedily as possible and discharge us to save expense. There will be negroes and veterans enough left to garrison the Ports.

The story is the Lee surrendered to the 2nd and 6th Corps because they were the only ones who every broke his lines! There is no other news this morning. We are wondering what we shall do next, and where we shall go. We are now within 25 miles of Lynchburg and not far from 100 miles of the city of Petersburg. I wouldn't wonder but what we will go to Harper's Ferry…

Today is rainy and cold -- the mail goes out at 6:00 p.m. and it is now 5:00 -- I expect mail tonight. My dearest love to you always.

-- Your Charlie

Sensitive to the humiliation felt by Lee and his defeated soldiers, Grant, upon hearing his men explode into cheers and fire their guns in celebration, ordered them to stop. "The war is over," he declared, "The Rebels are our countrymen again." (The war, in fact, was not entirely over; small skirmishes continued in the South and West for months. The last Confederate troops laid down their weapons on June 23, 1865.) After the fall of Richmond, and before Lee's surrender, President Lincoln wanted to visit the old Confederate capital personally. "Thank God I have lived to see this," he remarked walking through the demolished city on April 3rd, "It seems to me that I have been dreaming a horrid nightmare for four years, and now the nightmare is over." On April 14th -- exactly four years to the day the American flag was lowered in defeat at Fort Sumter -- a cheerful, visibly relieved President Lincoln went to Ford's Theatre with his wife and two guests to see a comedy, "Our American Cousin."

NEXT WEEK: An extraordinary letter by a gentleman who was in Ford's Theatre on the night of April 14.