page_647 < previous page page_647 next page > Page 647 blasphemy, she had confounded church scholars examining her by speaking in seventy-two separate tongues. The millennium she envisioned had arrived. In one of her visions Christ informed her that sexuality was depraved; she must endorse celibacy. She was hailed as the Female Christ. Believing in a just and nonsexist Mother/Father God, her followers thought that since Christ had already appeared as a man, the next manifestation would be female. In another vision, a burning tree directed Ann to transport her church to America. The journey, which lasted three months in the brig Mariah, was fraught with difficulties, including a violent storm. But after fervent prayers, a miraculous wave accompanied by effulgent angels secured the ship. In the band of immigrants were Ann's husband, a blacksmith, Abraham Standerin (known to the Shakers as Stanley); her brother William; a niece, Nancy; James Whittaker, a relative who later succeeded her as head of the sect; and John and James Hocknell who underwrote the journey and the purchase of land at Niskeyuna, New York, a few miles from Albany. After nearly two years of misery in New York City, Ann joined her followers in upstate New York. During the revolutionary war period Shakers were thought to be spies since they refused to fight or to take oaths. The sect grew slowly until 1780 when charismatic New Light Baptists appeared. In 1781, Ann Lee began a missionary tour of the East, acquiring new followers and further incurring thereby the loathing of "the World." Shakers were whipped, clubbed, stoned, and dragged behind horses. In 1784, Ann Lee died as the result of beatings. Under her successors, James Whittaker and James Meacham, the faith flourished. Meacham eventually founded some fifty communities and codified Shaker laws, which included celibacy, public confessions of sin, the common possession of property, the equality of the sexes, codes for dress and daily living, and an emphasis on the practical that was exemplified in their architecture and their renowned functional furniture. They also started international garden seed and herb industries and were responsible for such inventions as the circular saw and the first industrial washing machine. Their productive farms and orchards were models for area farmers. In 1784, there were twenty-five hundred Shakers, with the figure later swelling to about five to six thousand. Orphans were brought to the villages and many impoverished families arrived, attracted by the group's material security. But by 1908, as America grew more prosperous, the Shakers had shrunk in numbers to about a thousand. Today, the communities at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Canterbury, New Hampshire, and Sabbathday Lake, Maine, are living museums. Only Sabbathday Lake, with a handful of aging Shaker sisters, functions as a productive, viable community, a continuing testimony to Ann Lee's vision. Marguerite Fellows Melcher, The Shaker Adventure (1986); Robert L. Peters, The Gift to Be Simple: A Garland for Ann Lee (1988); Robert L. Peters, Shaker Light: Mother Ann Lee in America (1987). ROBERT PETERS See also Shakers. Lee, Robert E. (18071870), Confederate general. Lee was born in Virginia, the son of Ann Carter Lee and Henry ("Light-Horse Harry") Lee, who had earned fame as a cavalry commander in the American Revolution. The elder Lee, however, suffered financial reverses, and Robert grew up primarily in the care of his mother. In 1829 he graduated from the U.S. Military Academy second in his class and received a commission in the Engineer Corps. Two years later he married Mary Custis, heir to Arlington Plantation. Lee served in the Engineer Corps at various posts until the Mexican War broke out, when he joined the staff of Winfield Scott in the campaign against Mexico City. His skill and daring at Cerro Gordo and Chapultepec won for him Scott's lasting admiration and a promotion to brevet colonel. From 1852 to 1855 Lee was superintendent of West Point. Then he commanded a regiment  < previous page page_647 next page >