On this day in 1865, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (Bowdoin Class of 1852) accepted the official surrender of Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.

Chamberlain, who had been selected for the honor by Ulysses S. Grant, would receive both high praise and scorn for the way he conducted himself and his troops that day.

His own brief account of the ceremony is titled “The Furling of the Flags.”