Large, nicely detailed original lithograph is labeled, “MEETING OF GENERALS GRANT AND LEE REPARATORY TO THE SURRENDER OF GENERAL LEE AND HIS ENTIRE ARMY TO LIEUT GENERAL U.S. GRANT, APRIL 9^TH, 1865. THIS MEMORABLE EVENT TERMINATED THE GREAT REBELLION.” It was produced in 1866 by P.S. Duval & Son Lith. of Philadelphia. Published by Joseph Hoover of Philadelphia. Print features Generals Lee and Grant with their staff officers. Lee is holding a document, while Grant is pointing ahead. Background shows rolling hills and trees. To the right is a soldier with a white flag and tents in camp.

Print was recently professionally restored and cleaned. A photo from before the restoration accompanies item. Print had dark staining, most of which was removed. Some faint spotting remains.

Print is housed in original wood frame which measures 26 ½” x 32 ½’. Wire is mounted on reverse for hanging. Frame is solid, with light wear on the edges.

The Battle of Appomattox Courthouse was the Army of Northern Virginia’s final battle and was the beginning of the end of the Civil War. After a long night and day of marching, Lee and the exhausted Army of Northern Virginia made camp just east of Appomattox Courthouse on April 8. Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant had sent him a letter on the night of April 7, following confrontations between their troops at Cumberland Church and Farmville, suggesting Lee surrender. Lee at first refused, though he offered to meet Grant at 10 the next morning between picket lines to discuss a peaceful outcome. On the morning of April 8, after realizing it was impossible to bring in reinforcements and having watched the battle through field glasses—Lee then said, "Then there is nothing left for me to do but go and see General Grant, and I would rather die a thousand deaths." Having dressed that morning in his finest dress uniform, Lee rode to the spot where he thought he and Grant would be meeting between the picket lines. There, he received Grant’s message, written the night before, in which Grant refused to meet to meet for peace talks. Lee quickly wrote a reply, indicating that he was now ready to surrender, and rode on. Still hearing the sounds of fighting, Lee sent a letter to Meade requesting an immediate truce along the lines. Lee also had Gordon place flags of truce along the line. As the messages moved through the lines and word of the surrender spread, the fighting stopped. Casualties for the Battle of Appomattox Courthouse were light, 260 for the Union, 440 for the Confederacy. Grant received Lee’s letter of surrender just before noon. He replied, detailing his current position along the road toward Appomattox Courthouse, and asked Lee to select a meeting place. Lee and his men, in searching for a suitable place to have the surrender meeting, encountered Wilmer McLean, who showed them an empty building without any furniture. When that was deemed unsuitable, he offered his own home for the meeting. Grant arrived in Appomattox at about 1:30 in the afternoon and proceeded to the McLean house. His appearance in his field uniform, muddy after his long ride, contrasted sharply with Lee’s clean dress uniform. They chatted for a while before discussing and writing up the terms of the surrender. After formal copies of the surrender document were made and the document signed, they parted. After such a long, bloody war and a particularly grim retreat, the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia has been referred to as "The Gentlemen’s Agreement," a testament to the character of these two great men. The formal surrender ceremony and stacking of arms would take place on April 12.

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The collection of Lee’s Headquarters Museum was one of the oldest private collections of relics and antiques in the Gettysburg area. Lee’s Headquarters Museum was located in the former Widow Thompson home, on the Chambersburg Pike (currently US Route 30 west).

The stone house which houses Lee’s Headquarters Museum was originally built in the early 1830s by Michael Clarkson, a prominent Gettysburg businessman, and later Superintendent of the Gettysburg extension of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Clarkson apparently rented the property to the Widow Mary Thompson, who, along with Clarkson, was served an eviction notice in 1844, after Clarkson fell on hard financial times. Mrs. Thompson, however, was granted a reprieve in the person of Thaddeus Stevens, a leading Adams County citizen at the time and later Radical Republican leader in the US Congress, who purchased the house in trust for her. Although Mary never paid her entire debt to Stevens, she was listed as the property owner in local tax records.

At the time of the battle of Gettysburg in 1863, Mary Thompson was the sole resident of the house along the Chambersburg Pike. “On the crest of the Seminary Ridge, where the Chambersburg turnpike crosses it, there stands…a one-story-and-a-half stone dwelling, occupied by Mrs. Thompson. On Wednesday evening (July 1, 1863), after our men had been compelled to fall back and retire to Cemetery Hill, this house was within the Rebel lines. Occupying an elevated position from which the Federal lines could be seen with a field-glass, and being at a safe distance from our guns, it was selected by General Lee and his staff as his head-quarters. Here he lodged all night and took his meals, whilst during the day he was engaged in inspecting his lines, and perfecting his arrangements. (Michael Jacobs, Pennsylvania College professor, for The United States Service Magazine, January 1864).

Mary Thompson died in 1873, and the house remained part of the estate of Thaddeus Stevens until December 15, 1888, when it was purchased by Philip Hennig, who owned a bakery on York St. in Gettysburg. On the evening of August 26, 1896, the house caught fire and the inside of the structure was completely destroyed.  Luckily, Hennig had insurance on the home, and was able to restore the structure to its pre-fire condition.  Hennig rented the house to tenants, one of whom was charged with operating a bawdy house there in 1907. When Hennig died in 1918, ownership of the house passed to his widow, Susan, who sold it to Clyde F. Daley on July 13, 1921. The following notice appeared in a local newspaper at the time:

Headquarters of General Lee Sold. Repairs are underway on the building just west of the borough limits on Buford street, known as the headquarters of General Lee during the battle of Gettysburg, by C. F. Daly, manager of the Five and Ten Cent Store, who recently purchased the property and one across the Lincoln Highway from it, from Mrs. Susan Hennig. Mr. Daly will open a curio and souvenir shop in the front of the building. His family will move there next spring.

Clyde Daley, not a Gettysburg native, was married to Miriam Trimmer, the daughter of Samuel Trimmer, who originally owned the five and ten cent store. Daley operated a one-room curio shop out of his home in the Thompson House, as well as the Lee Campground across the street. Along the way, Daley, possibly with help from Trimmer, amassed a large enough collection of items relating to the Civil War and the Battle of Gettsyburg that he opened four rooms of the house as the Lee Museum. Most of these items were donated by local citizens and veterans, as well as veterans from other areas of the country who returned to visit the battlefield, or purchased from local collections and estates. The vast majority of these items were connected to the Battle of Gettysburg, although some were from other fields, and noted as such.

In 1945, Daley retired to Florida, but not before selling the property and the museum collection to Eric F. Larson. Larson, originally born in Sweden, had purchased the Dustman house, across the Chambersburg Pike from the Thompson House, and converted it into a tourist home. Larson, who was one of the early licensed battlefield guides, converted the campground into a motel and continued to operate the Museum just as Daley had left it. The Museum was renovated in 1950, but the collection remained as Daley had gathered it.  Mr. Larson continued to operate the Museum until 1995, when he sold the property and collection to the Monahan family.

In the late 1990’s, the now-closed Lee’s Headquarters Museum underwent an extensive renovation, concentrating its interpretation on the First Days’ Battle. To raise funds to help defray the cost of this renovation, many duplicate and unrelated items were de-accessioned and placed on the collector’s market.  The Horse Soldier was the exclusive dealer of these rare and beautiful items.

This is a highly collectable item, for both the historic value of the print itself, and the connection to the General Lee’s Headquarters Museum.  [sl]

Extra shipping required - $40 insured UPS east of the Mississippi, $60 west of the Mississippi (pick up of the print at the shop is preferable. PA sales tax would be $53.70).

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