Articles of Agreement Relating to the Surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

The five Articles of Agreement reflect the approach Lincoln had suggested aboard the River Queen in March. Considering that the officers of the Army of Northern Virginia and especially its commanding general, Robert E. Lee, were leaders of a bloody insurgency against the U.S. government and guilty of treason by any legal definition of the term, the conditions of surrender were remarkably generous. Lincoln wanted to offer Lee the most lenient terms consistent with unconditional surrender in order to remove his army from the battlefield and bring the Civil War to an end.

Article 1 is the most significant of the articles. The officers and men of the Army of Northern Virginia would not be held as prisoners of war or charged with treason. Article 1 simply requires the soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia, marching in orderly formation, to stockpile their arms, flags, “Sabres, Pistols, etc.” and continue marching home under charge of their own officers. According to previous agreement, they are “not to be disturbed by U.S. authority as long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside” (McPherson, p. 849). This was an effective guarantee of immunity from prosecution for treason. The officers are allowed to retain their own sidearms.

Article 2 requires that all horses that are not the personal property of their riders and other “public property,” be turned over to federal staff officers. Grant had originally insisted that Lee's troopers turn in their horses. When Lee requested that they be allowed to retain their horses because they needed them for farming, however, Grant readily assented. This was stipulated in Article 4: “Couriers and Wounded men of the artillery and Cavalry whose horses are their own private property will be allowed to retain them.”

This spirit of generosity continues in the third article, granting former Confederate officers the right to use necessary means of transportation for their “Private baggage” for their trip home. The final article simply defines who is to be included in the agreement of surrender—basically, all officers and enlisted men serving with Lee when the negotiations actually commenced on the eighth of April. Cavalry that had escaped before that date and artillery units more than twenty miles away from Appomattox Court House are not included in the Articles of Agreement.