Walter Taylor was from "first to last the closest" of all staff officers to General Robert E. Lee, and his intimate relationship with his commander gives Taylor's writings signal importance in any study of Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia. More than anyone in the Confederate Armies, Taylor knew the effective strength of Lee's forces in all engagements. He wrote dispatches for Lee and often carried messages in person to corps and division commanders. He greeted all persons who came to see Lee, and usually decided whether they would be announced to the General. When the Confederate army was disbanded, all staff officers bade farewell to Lee except Taylor, who rode back with him to Richmond, and Taylor devoted a considerable portion of his postwar years to settling controversies relative to the Army of Northern Virginia. Rarely are his conclusions disputed, because he possessed a memory known to be coherent and accurate. He became in effect "an unofficial court of last resort" in the arguments that abounded in the half-century after Appomattox.<BR>A recognized classic, Four Years with General Lee first appeared in 1877 and was a collector's item by the turn of the century. For many years a standard authority on confederate history, it is the source for dozens of incidents that have now become a part of every biography of Lee. This annotated edition, first published in 1962, was prepared by noted Civil War historian James I. Robertson, Jr., who has provided a new introduction for this paperback reissue.