The house where General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant in 1865

9 x 5 1/4, photogravure, of the Wilmer McLean farmhouse, located in Appomattox Court House, Virginia. Imprint: Engraved by A. Dresher. McLean House At Appomattox In Which General Lee Signed The Terms of Surrender. Light age toning. Very fine. Circa late 1800's. Please note that the lines in the sky area behind the house are not in the original image. They were caused by my scanning program.

WBTS Trivia: Wilmer McLean was born at Manassas, Va., on May 3, 1814, and he died at Alexandria, Va., on June 5, 1882. At the time one of the very first battles of the Civil War took place, the McLean family was living in Manassas, where the great battle of Bull Run, as it was called in the North, and Manassas as it was called in the South, was fought on McLean land on July 21, 1861. After the battle, Wilmer decided to move his family to a more peaceful area of Virginia that he thought would be well away from any battle action. Thus he traveled about 120 miles southwest, and settled in the small, quiet, dusty crossroads village of Appomattox Court House, Va. During the war, McLean smuggled sugar through the Union blockade, and things did remain quiet in his new hometown, that is until the two great armies of General Robert E. Lee, and General Ulysses S. Grant fought their way to Appomattox Court House, as the Confederates desperately tried to stay in existence. Outnumbered and surrounded, Lee decided that any more attempts to fight on would be fruitless, and cause more unnecessary deaths, so he sent couriers through the lines to set up a meeting with Grant to discuss terms of surrender. A formal treaty of surrender was signed by General Lee in the parlor of the McLean house, on Palm Sunday, April 9, 1865.

It can be said that the Civil War started in Wilmer McLean's backyard at Manassas, Va., in July 1861, and ended in his parlor at Appomattox Court House, Va., in April 1865!