Maps of Eastern Hanover County. 1867 | Overlay | 2000

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Historical Notes:

The Lee Oak stood in the yard of the farm Fairfield, owned by Dr. William Gaines. You can see the name W Gaines on the 1867 map, above. Dr. Gaines also owned Gaines Mill, 1 mile east, which gave its name to one of the Seven Days Battles, in 1862.

It seems possible that General Robert E Lee briefly stood beneath the Lee Oak during the battle of Gaines Mill, on June 27, 1862. We can definitely place Lee at Walnut Grove Church, 1 mile north of the Gaines house, having a famous meeting with the tardy Stonewall Jackson, at about 11 am. Later, at 4 or 5pm, Lee is seen mounted and in the field with his staff, at Hogan's house, about a mile southeast of Fairfield, on a hill overlooking Boatswain swamp. His path would have carried him exactly past Fairfield. Perhaps Lee stopped there around 3pm.

The battle of Gaines Mill happened in the late afternoon, over a large area, but centered in the ravine of Boatswain Swamp and the Watt House hill. This is about three miles away, across Sledd's Run and over the next ridge, from Fairfield. As McClellan and the Federals retreated southeast, into eastern Henrico County, Lee probably followed, and would be unlikely to have returned north to Fairfield for the night.

Two years later, in 1864, the Battle of Cold Harbor was fought over this very same ground. The red and blue lines on the upper right of the 1867 map are from this time. Lee set up a temporary headquarters in the area, and posted some orders from "Headquarters at Gaines Mill." My research is so far incomplete as to whether Lee camped beneath Lee's Oak at this time.

In the early 1900s, the property was purchased by William Burnette Sledd. Today, the Lee Oak stands within Sledd's Run subdivision (built 1987), behind Highpoint Farms subdivision, off Cold Harbor Road, in semi-rural eastern Hanover County, near Mechanicsville, Virginia.

Jim Allen, Sept. 8, 2002