In mid-November of 1861, General Robert E. Lee was welcomed to Charleston by
the port city's leading citizens.  As special military advisor to President Jefferson
Davis, Lee had come to Charleston to oversee development of South Carolina's
coastal defenses.  He was a guest at the Mills House, Charleston's most prestigious
hotel, and was treated as an honored visitor.  Rank and position - not fame -
afforded him Charleston's genteel courtesies.  He was not yet the South's most
beloved figure:  that glory awaited him on countless bloody fields of the future.
Such acclaim - and the wartime horrors to come - could hardly be imagined amid
sea breezes on a warm autumn night in Charleston.

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