South Branch Intelligencer

A Northern Tribute to Lee.—
Mr. John C. Ropes, of Boston, a cultivated gentleman and well-known military critic, has written a letter to a gentleman in Richmond Va. in which he says: "I saw today a photograph of the superb statue of Gen. Lee, surrounded by the crowd present at its unveiling. I make bold to ask you for this photograph. To my thinking this is the finest statue in this country: but, besides this, it is only a fit and worthy memorial of the most distinguished soldier that our war produced. Lincoln may have been, and in my opinion was, the greatest statesman; other generals, Sherman, Jackson, J. E. Johnston—I do not intend to rate them in this order, but just to mention them as they occur to my mind in writing—may have been the equals of Lee in intellectual, and even in professional skill and ability, but Lee was the greatest personality that the war showed to the American people, for, in my mind, we (of the North) can, now that we are again one people, claim him as an American, as much as you can."