popular program for successful cadets.) As an engineer he was not only employed to build and maintain specifically military installations, but also to assist the Federal government in providing internal improvements as the vast flood of native Americans and immigrants took up the empty lands across the Appalachians and pushed to the Mississippi and beyond. Lee worked many jobs but the greatest of these jobs was clearing snags and altering the course of the Mississippi to help save St. Louis as a river port. Promotion opportunity was slow and money was tight especially after his marriage in 1831. (Robert E. Lee by Albert Earle pg 23-24 c1973).
             His wife was Mary Anne Randolph Custis, the daughter of George Washington's adopted son. Lee then became an heir to the tradition of Washington. The double heritage of Washingtons and Lees that would insure a path that he would take thirty years later when the outbreak of the Civil War would force him to make the greatest decision of his life. Being married to Mary did not bring Lee wealth until her father died in 1857. Before then he had to support his wife and seven children almost entirely from his army officer's pay. ( Robert E. Lee by Albert Erale pg 24 c1973)
             In 1869, Lee was troubled with rheumatism and heart troubles that had bothered him at Gettysburg. Doctors suggested for Lee to go south in 1870 to seek the sun for benefit of his health. He went through Georgia and the Carolinas which did little to improve his health. Back in Virginia he gradually declined and died at home in Lexington on the 12th of October. ( Robert E. Lee by Albert Earle pg 210 c1973)
             On Wednsday, September 3, 1862, four days Lee's Confederate army's victory at the Second Battle of Bull Run. Lee wrote a long letter to President Jefferson Davis. In the letter he said that it was a good time for the Confederate army to enter Maryland. Also in the letter he announce that he wanted to take t...