Robert E. Lee’s Virginia Childhood Home Selling for $8.5 Million

The childhood home of Confederate commander Robert E. Lee is selling in Alexandria, Virginia, for $8.5 million.

The red-brick Georgian mansion dates to 1795, five years after America's founding fathers agreed to make nearby Washington, D.C., the nation’s new capital. It’s now undergone extensive upgrades, including a new roof and rehabbing of the woodwork and ornamental plaster, and has hit the market with local luxury brokerage Washington Fine Homes.

Lee, who led the Confederate states’ bid to secede from the Union during the American Civil War, spent much of his childhood in the two-story house on Oronoco Streetdue to the generosity of a relative who owned the property.

William Fitzhugh, a wealthy statesman from Virginia and a relative of Lee, bought the house in 1799 for $12,000, according to deeds sourced by the Library of Congress. The Fitzhughs hosted President George Washington at the house, according to historical records with the Library of Congress.

Fitzhugh’s son William Henry Fitzhugh inherited the property and allowed Lee’s mother and her six children to live there twice in the early 1800s. During the 1820s, the Marquis de Lafayette, the French military officer who fought with the American colonists during the Revolutionary War, came to call on the house—after which the west parlorbecame known as the"Lafayette Room."

A listing has yet to go live for the property but the brokerage confirmed the home is for sale. The house spans more than 8,000 square feet with six bedrooms and six bathrooms, according to The Washington Post, which first reported the new listing.

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The current owners bought the home for $2.5 million in 2000 from the Lee-Jackson Foundation, which used the home as a museum, according to property records. They undertook a three-year renovation that included replacing the roof, restoring historical details and updating the plumbing and electrical systems, according to The Post.

The home is listed with Washington Fine Properties agents Robert Hryniewicki, Adam Rackliffe and Christopher Leary. The lead broker on the property was not immediately available for comment.