Franconia Honors Native Fitzhugh Lee On Birthday
By Carl L. Sell Jr. · Originally published March 2016 · p. 25
(Carl L. Sell Jr.)
By Carl L. Sell Jr. FRANCONIA, Va. — Maybe a tad late, but the Franconia Museum finally got around to honoring its most famous historic figure at a Nov. 15 180th birthday party for Fitzhugh Lee. The event at the Franconia Volunteer Fire Department was part of the annual History Day program designed to educate residents about the history of the Fairfax County community which is just south of Alexandria and Washington, D.C. Guests enjoyed a free birthday cake and heard a presentation about Clermont, the mid-1700s house in which Lee was born, and the man himself. Lee was a major general in the Confederate Army and in the United States Army during the SpanishAmerican War. Clermont was used as a smallpox hospital during the Civil War and then burned to the ground to prevent the spread of the disease. Local historians Don Hakenson and Carl Sell conducted the program. Hakenson focused on Lee’s military service and Sell discussed Lee’s civilian life and Clermont. Fitzhugh Lee’s father, Sidney
Shiloh
[Sydney] Smith Lee, was Robert E. Lee’s older brother. His mother, Ann Maria Mason Lee, the daughter of Gen. John Mason, lived at her family home, Clermont, while her husband served in the United States Navy. Fitzhugh Lee was born at Clermont Nov. 19, 1835. Fitzhugh Lee, an 1856 graduate of West Point who was badly wounded while fighting Indians in Oklahoma in 1859, joined the Confederacy and commanded the cavalry near the end of the war. He served as governor of Virginia from 1886-1890. In 1896, President Grover Cleveland named him United States Counsel General in Cuba. Two years later he was appointed a major general in the Spanish-American War. Although the war was over before Lee’s 7th Army Corps completed training, he returned to Cuba to lead the Military Province of Havana occupation command for two years. He later served as army commander of the Department of Missouri. He retired as a brigadier general on March 2, 1901. He lived in Charlottesville until his death on April 28, 1905.