From the News From The Cradle, the SCV newsletter put out by Cradle of the Confederacy Camp # 692 edited by George Gale, came an interesting article, Lee’s Colonels, by Robert K. Krick.
He says 422 field officers, under Robert E. Lee in the Army of Northern Virginia were killed in action during the War Between the States. Another 52 died of accidents or disease, meaning 24% of the men in the field officer category under Lee were lost during the war.
The 1480 or so who survived the war lived longer than might have been assumed. Death dates were found for two-thirds of them. It was not until 1898 that half of them had died. That was the year Jefferson Davis died as well. And interestingly, Hitler was preparing to absorb Poland when Stephen P. Halsey, the “last of the breed”, finally died on the eve of an infinitely different war.
Lee’s officers lived on an average to be about 70 years of age. Many seemed to have met violent deaths. Some died of gunfights, murders, or duels, and others of accidents. The post-war South was obviously a dangerous time in which to live. But at least they had survived the WAR!