where his classmates admired him for his brilliance, leadership, and love for his work. West Point was not his first choice for a school, but there was no money left to Witt 2send him to Harvard because his older brother, Charles Carter, had used it for his own studies at Harvard. He graduated from the academy with high honors in 1829 and was ranked as Second Lieutenant in the Corps of Engineers at the age of 21. He headed for home at the age of 22 with $103.58 (Thomas 54). Lee served for seventeen months at Fort Pulaski on Cockspur Island, Georgia. In 1831 the army transferred Lee to Fort Monroe, Virginia, as assistant engineer. While he was stationed there, he married Mary Anna Randolph Custis, Martha Washington's great-granddaughter. They lived in her family home in Arlington on a hill overlooking Washington D. C. They had seven children, three sons and four daughters. On September 16, 1832, Mary gave birth to George Washington Custis Lee. Later in 1835 they had their second child, Mary Curtis. They had five more children, William Henry Fitzgerald, Annie, Agnes, Robert and Mildred. Lee served as an assistant in the chief engineer's office in Washington from 1834 to 1837 and spent the summer of 1835 helping to lay out the boundary line between Ohio and Michigan. In 1837 he got his first important job as a First Lieutenant of engineers. He supervised the engineering work for St. Louis harbor and for the upper Mississippi and Missouri rivers. His work there earned him a promotion to Captain. In 1841 he was transferred to Fort Hamilton in New York harbor, where he took charge of building fortifications. When war broke out between the United States and Mexico in 1846, the army sent Lee to Texas to serve as assistant engineer under General John E. Wool. All his superior officers, including General Winfield Scott, were impressed with Lee. Early in the war, Lee supervised the construction of bridges for Wool's march tow...
