Stephen Dill Lee (September 22, 1833 – May 28, 1908) was an American officer in the Confederate Army, politician, and first president of Mississippi State University from 1880 to 1899.

[1] He served as lieutenant general of the Confederate States Army in the Eastern and Western theaters of the American Civil War.

208–209), Captain Lee and three other men with full power from Beauregard to decide what to answer Anderson heard him say he would be starved out in a few days.

In the end, Lee cleared South Carolina Confederate soldiers to fire upon the fort, effectively beginning the Civil War.

Lee's company was assigned to Castle Pinckney until May 30, when it was sent to Fort Palmetto on Cole's Island, arriving June 1.

[7] In June 1861, Lee resumed his position in the South Carolina Militia, and then in November, he was promoted to the rank of major in the Confederate Army.

He was promoted to lieutenant colonel in March 1862 and was the artillery chief for Maj. Gen. Lafayette McLaws's division of the Army of Northern Virginia from April to June 17, and then in the same role under Brig.

[11] Leaving the artillery branch, Lee briefly led an infantry division during the Battle of Chickasaw Bayou from December 26–29, where he repulsed the attacks of U.S. Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman.

[4] Military historian Jon L. Wakelyn praises Lee's performance in this action, saying, "he was the hero of the battle of Champion Hills.

"[3] Lee served throughout the 1863 Siege of Vicksburg until Pemberton's surrender to Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant on July 4, becoming a prisoner of war.

[13] Beginning on August 16, Lee was assigned to command the Department of Mississippi & Eastern Louisiana cavalry, and he was officially exchanged on October 13.

[4] Troops in Lee's department under Maj. Gen. Nathan B. Forrest scored a victory at the Battle of Brice's Crossroads on June 10 and seriously threatened U.S. supply lines supporting Sherman in Georgia.

Lee personally reinforced Forrest, but the combined Confederate force was defeated at the Battle of Tupelo, ensuring the safety of Sherman's supply lines.

His troops, with the attachment of William B. Bate's Division and a Brigade of Georgia militia, defeated Schofield's movement to break the railroad lines at East Point at the Battle of Utoy Creek.

Lee fought in the Franklin-Nashville Campaign and was severely wounded in the foot at the Battle of Spring Hill on November 29, but did not give up the command until an organized rearguard took over the post of danger.

[4] Regarding the confused and disappointing fight at Spring Hill, Lee considered it "one of the most disgraceful and lamentable occurrences of the war, one that is in my opinion unpardonable.

Meeting with Cheatham, Lee decided the situation was dire and attacked at 9:00 pm, taking serious losses from the U.S. position and Confederate artillery.

[17] Following the campaign's Battle of Nashville on December 15–16, Lee kept his troops closed up and well in hand despite the general rout of the rest of the Confederate forces.

Michael Newton states, "The convention's final product, imposed on Mississippi without a popular vote, established a two-dollar poll tax, mandated two years' residency in the state and one year in the would-be voter's district, and denied ballots to convicted felons or tax-defaulters.

[23] In 1887 Lee wrote an article for the first volume of Battles and Leaders of the Civil War,[24] and published Sherman's Meridian Expedition and Sooy Smith's Raid to West Point in 1880.

[4] He fell sick after giving a speech to former U.S. soldiers from Wisconsin and Iowa, four of the regiments whom he had faced in battle 45 years earlier at Vicksburg.

[25] Based on Lee's familiarity with the three major arms of a Civil War-era army, military historian Ezra J. Warner summarized him as an able and versatile corps commander, writing: "Despite his youth and comparative lack of experience, Lee's prior close acquaintanceship with all three branches of the service – artillery, cavalry, and infantry – rendered him one of the most capable corps commanders in the army.

[27][28] Lee is also memorialized with a statue by Henry Hudson Kitson in the Vicksburg National Military Park dedicated in 1909,[29] as well busts in the center of the Drill Field at Mississippi State University[30] and Friendship Cemetery in Columbus.