Posted on 04/27/2022 9:57:50 AM PDT by Borges
There is nothing stranger in American history than the up-and-down reputation of Ulysses S. Grant.
Grant, who was born April 27, 1822, was the commanding general who ended the Civil War. He managed the great campaigns that captured Vicksburg and Richmond, saved Chattanooga, and compelled the surrender of Robert E. Lee and the main Confederate field army, and did it so well that President Abraham Lincoln apologized for not showing him enough confidence. Grant’s “Personal Memoirs,” published after he died in 1885, are a landmark of 19th-century American prose.
Grant may be a greater example even than Lincoln of the American rags-to-riches story. In 1861 he was working in his father’s leather-goods store in Galena, Ill. Three years later, he was general-in-chief of U.S. forces. Four years after that, he was elected president.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
If Grant were in the military today he’d be ousted because he wasn’t gay enough.
Shining example of what it meant to be American.
I’m a Southerner to the core but I have respect for Grant just as Lee did. I would never advocate the removal of his statues.
My favorite Grant quote is his description of Venice and how the city would be quite livable if drained.
Yes. Grant was a good and decent man.
Shining example of what it meant to be American.
“his description of Venice and how the city would be quite livable if drained”
I’ve been there and seen that water.....before draining you’d need to police up all the turds....it could take a while.
Who’s buried in Grants tomb?
Good topic for a thread. Grant quotes. A time of trial that called for the man to step up. The early histories of him were written by his enemies.
I think Ulysses S. Grant is vastly underrated as a man and as a general. I know people think this and that about his drinking habits, which I think have been exaggerated way out of line. The fact is, he never demanded more men or material from the war department, he took over an army that had a long history of retreating and losing. That army had no confidence in their fighting ability and Grant came in as a real outsider. He had so many disadvantages going into the 1864 campaign, now 100 years ago. But he met every test and rose to the occasion unlike I’ve ever seen in American history. He was a very tough yet very fair man and a great soldier. He’s not been given his due...Grant devised a strategy to end the war. He alone had the determination, foresight, and wisdom to do it. It was lucky that President Lincoln didn’t interfere or attempt to control Grant’s strategic line of thinking. Lincoln wisely left the war to Grant, at least in the concluding moves after he came east. Grant is very undervalued today, which is a shame, because he was one of the greatest American generals, if not the greatest.
Eisenhower's response to Richard Nixon when he said that Lee was the better general:
"I wouldn’t say that, Dick. In fact I think it’s not a very reasoned opinion. You forget that Grant captured three armies intact, moved and coordinated his forces in a way that baffles military logic yet succeeded and he concluded the war one year after being entrusted with that aim. I’d say that was one hell of a piece of soldiering extending over a period of four years, the same time we were in the last war.”
Quote which sums up Grant perfectly:
After the first day at Shiloh William Sherman found Grant smoking a cigar and trying to stay out of the rain. "Well, Grant," Sherman said, "We've had the devil's own day, haven't we?" "Yes," replied Grant, "Lick 'em tomorrow though."
And he did.
Same. Southerner here descended from many confederate vets and I have respect for Grant, his military prowess and how he treated the defeated Confederates at Appomattox, one of which was my GGG grandfather (29th Va Inf)
I encourage anybody to read about Grant.
Went through the academy, went into service, wasn’t considered much. His friends knew him as a very determined man. He is poor, and when things don’t go well, he even cuts firewood to feed and cloth his family.
War breaks out, he his an afterthought, except to one of his friends, Sherman, who agrees with how the war should be prosecuted.
He is in charge at the first real bloody battle of the west, and even though it starts badly for the Union, he salvages victory from defeat at Shiloh.
He doesn’t dress the part, he drinks and smokes, he isn’t eloquent when he speaks. However, he GETS THE JOB DONE. Lincoln, who has gone through numerous Generals is told that he is a drunk, and he cannot put him in command. Lincoln responds....”He is a drunk? What whiskey does he drink” he askes his Cabinet and staff. They respond they “We don’t know” Lincoln response is “Find out what he drinks and give it to everyone, I can’t spare this man he fights”
Grant ends up rising to the highest command since George Washington and saves the Union, IMHO. His greatest victories were taking Vicksburg and his breakout of Chattanooga. Following Chattanooga he turns his friend loose on the South to march to the sea in the plan they had when war broke out.
and I leave this story....When Grant had broken out of Chattanooga, and sent Sherman on his march. He was recalled post haste to Washington by Lincoln, and was placed in command of all US military, the highest command since Washington. He was in the papers, but people in Washington had really never seen the western army general. He left the battlefield at Chattanooga, still covered in the grime of battle in his battlefield uniform. He stopped by train to pick up his son, and immediately proceeded by rail to Washington. When he arrived, he went for a hotel room. The Hotel looked over his uniform, dirty, and an unshaven man who looked as if he had not slept, wearing a Generals uniform, which they had many of in Washington. He informed the man that they had ‘no room’, but he and his boy could stay in a small room reserved for the help. Grant agreed and signed his name on the Leger, US Grant. When the Hotel Manager realized who this dirty uniformed, unshaven man was, he was given the Presidential suite.....
Lee was told by his Generals that Grant would come for him, and never stop, and he did. Grant did more to save the United States than any man probably in history. He had vision of the post war, and it was a good vision.
Truly a great American and underestimated man.
Started studying about Grant last year. I believe the reason they push the alcohol stuff so much is how Grant hated, and put down, the democRATS KKK. He sent the Army into the South and did some real damage to the KKK.
If one were to examine Grant’s history closely, and truthfully, one would learn that the KKK has always been the democRATS militia.
He performed so bad in his second term that the next four consecutive presidential elections were decided by razor thin margins and three of those four by less than 1% in a popular vote difference.
The exception was 1876, where Tilden, the Democrat candidate, actually won the popular vote by 3% but lost because 15 electoral votes from three former Confederate States (Louisiana, Florida and South Carolina) were still under military occupation and enough former Confederate soldier's ballots were invalidated to make the difference.
This action raised enough of a fuss that Hayes agreed to serve but a single term and end the military occupation as soon as he took office. Hayes was good to his word and went on to serve a very capable four years and undo much of Grant's damage.
It was Lincoln who told Grant “Let them up easy’’.
Spot on. In their day, the KKK was today's version of Antifa and Black Lives Matter. It is one reason that Woodrow Wilson went out of his way to embrace them as the first post-Civil War president from the south elected to the office.
Good post. Thanks.
Good post. Thanks.
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