In which town did Robert E. Lee surrender?

Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House, a village in Appomattox County, Virginia.

The surrender took place on April 9, 1865, after Union forces under Ulysses S. Grant blocked the retreat of Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia. Lee had abandoned Richmond and Petersburg and was attempting to move south, but his remaining escape routes were cut off near Appomattox.

Despite its name, the surrender meeting did not occur inside the county courthouse. Lee and Grant met in the parlor of Wilmer and Virginia McLean’s house. Grant offered generous terms: Confederate officers could keep their sidearms and personal baggage, and soldiers were paroled rather than imprisoned. Grant also allowed many cavalrymen and artillerymen to keep their horses and mules for farm work.

Lee surrendered his army, not the entire Confederacy, so the war did not legally end that day. However, Appomattox marked the symbolic beginning of the end; the remaining Confederate armies surrendered within the following weeks.