SUBMITTED BY: Judy E. Stainback
Mary Ann Randolph Custis Lee (Mrs. Robert E. Lee) and her daughters, Mildred, Agnes, and Anne Carter, were guests at the White Sulphur Springs in Warren County, North Carolina in the late summer of 1862.
In October of 1862, Anne “Annie” Carter Lee became ill with what was diagnosed as typhoid fever.
Annie grew steadily weaker and one day asked her attendants to sing one of her favorite hymns. They sang “Perfect and True are All His Ways, Whom Heaven Adores and Earth Obeys.” Dr. Robert A. Patterson, with all his medical skills, was unable to save her, and Anne died on October 20, 1862. The proprietor of the resort, Mr. William Duke Jones was a cousin of Mrs. Lee. He offered her a burial place in his family burying grounds. There, Annie Carter Lee was laid to rest.
Through the initiative of Mr. Joseph Speed Jones, a monument was carved from native granite by disabled Confederate soldier Zerald Crowder and unveiled in 1866. The ceremony was attended by Annie’s family, including her two brothers, General George Washington Custis Lee and Major General William Henry Fitzhugh Lee.
In 1870, General Robert E. Lee and his daughter Agnes visited the grave and as he was turning away, General Lee stated that he did not wish for her remains to be disturbed.
(Source: Warren County Heritage North Carolina, Vol. 1., published by Warren County Heritage Book Committee, 2002)
However, in September 1994, Annie Carter Lee’s remains were moved to the family crypt located at Lee Chapel at Washington and Lee University, Lexington, Virginia. Her monument remains in the William Jones Cemetery in Warren County, NC. (Source: Warren County, NC Cemeteries, Vol. 1, Warren County Heritage Committee).
