The trails of Grant and Lee, therefore, first approach each other
from out of the smoke of a civil war. This is a strangely significant
fact, but it might be regarded merely as a curious coincidence were
it not for other and stranger events which seem to suggest that
the hand of Fate was guiding the destinies of these two men.

Mathew Grant originally settled in Massachusetts but he soon moved
to Connecticut, where he became clerk of the town of Windsor and
official surveyor of the whole colony--a position which he held for
many years. Meanwhile Richard Lee became the Colonial Secretary and
a member of the King's Privy Council in Virginia, and thenceforward
the name of his family is closely associated with the history of
that colony.

Lee bore the title of colonel, but it was to statesmanship and not
to military achievements that he and his early descendants owed
their fame; while the family of Grant, the surveyor, sought glory
at the cannon's mouth, two of its members fighting and dying for
their country as officers in the French and Indian war of 1756. In
that very year, however, a military genius was born to the Virginia
family in the person of Harry Lee, whose brilliant cavalry exploits
were to make him known to history as "Light Horse Harry." But
before his great career began, the house of Grant was represented
in the Revolution, for Captain Noah Grant of Connecticut drew his
sword in defense of the colonies at the outbreak of hostilities,
taking part in the battle of Bunker Hill; and from that time
forward he and "Light Horse Harry" served in the Continental army
under Washington until Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown.

Here the trails of the two families, AGAIN DRAWN TOGETHER BY A