Wilmer McLean after the Civil War
After nearly four years at Appomattox Court House, Wilmer McLean and his family returned to Prince William County in 1867. McLean still owned the 985-acre Yorkshire Plantation and lived there, but wartime devastation and the end of slavery brought hardships. Once part of the landed gentry, he was heavily in debt and nearly destitute. McLean became a real estate agent and then an excise collector with the Revenue Service in Manassas. Like his attorney friend, former Confederate cavalry officer John S. Mosby, McLean switched to the Republican Party and supported U.S. Grant for President in 1872. By 1876, McLean had become a Bureau of Customs inspector and was living in Alexandria where he died in 1882. He and his wife, Virginia, are buried at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Alexandria.
Marker is on Centreville Road (Virginia Route 28), on the right when traveling north.
Courtesy hmdb.org
