Founding Brothers: How One Generation of Lees Won the Revolution and Built America

In the winter of 1750, the death of Thomas Lee left his six sons to inherit a massive empire of Tidewater land and transatlantic commerce—an inheritance that would ultimately forge them into the most formidable family alliance of the American Revolution. Steeped in the stern classical traditions of Greece and Rome, the five younger brothers—Thomas Ludwell, Richard Henry, Francis Lightfoot, William, and Arthur Lee—found themselves bound together by a shared Classical tradition, patriotic American outlook, and bitter domestic feud over their patrimony against their overbearing eldest brother, Philip Ludwell Lee. From the splendorous river wharves of Stratford Hall to the quiet gardens of Chantilly-on-the-Potomac, and from the legislative benches of Williamsburg and Philadelphia to the precarious courts of Europe, this chronicle follows five of the greatest men of the Lee Family of Virginia as they sacrificed their ease, fortune, and peace to win the American Revolution and build the American Republic.

CHAPTERS:

0:00 The Death of Thomas Lee at Stratford Hall

3:15 How A Classical Education Created Four Founders

10:13 Philip Ludwell Lee—"Colonel Phil"—Takes Control

13:00 The Lee Brothers Work Together, But are Divided by Thomas's Will

21:15 Chantilly on the Potomac Becomes The Base of the Founding Brothers

23:12 How the Lee Brothers Helped Win the American Revolution

29:12 William and Arthur Abroad

33:05 The Cost of Revolution: Death and Disillusionment

38:18 The Legacy of the Lee Brothers of Stratform Hall

Sources Referenced in this Episode:

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