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The Ulysses S. Grant Association | |
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The Ulysses S. Grant Association | |
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, I, 1 (Oct., 1963).
INTRODUCTORY *** Our newsletter is designed to provide news of the Grant Association, Grant studies, and activities of Grant interest. Contents will include items which turn up in the search for material for the Grant Association edition of the writings of Grant. A running bibliography of recently published Grant items will begin in a subsequent issue. Success is dependent upon finding interested readers and contributors, and we welcome additional names for the mailing list as well as suggestions regarding contents.
LINCOLN SPEAKS OF GRANT *** Robert J. Breckinridge, a Presbyterian minister of Lexington, Kentucky, was a bulwark of the Union in Kentucky during the Civil War. Two of his sons fought for the Confederacy, but though his family was divided, his sentiments were not. The veteran Kentucky emancipationist would allow nothing to obstruct a vigorous prosecution of the war for the Union. Lincoln knew the Breckinridge family through his wife, who had lived in Lexington, and valued the support of Breckinridge, who had done much to prevent the secession of Kentucky. [pg. 2] Breckinridge went to Baltimore in June, 1864, as a member of the Kentucky delegation to the National Union convention, and was appointed temporary chairman. Later he went to Washington with the delegation chosen to inform Lincoln officially of renomination. It was during this visit, not long after the news of the battles at Cold Harbor reached Lincoln, that they discussed Grant.
The Edward D. Mansfield papers, recently acquired by the Ohio Historical Society, include a letter written by Breckinridge on May 11, 1868, ten days before the Republican convention nominated Grant for President, in response to Mansfield's request for an estimate of Grant. Mansfield, a vigorous Cincinnati Republican who wrote for the Cincinnati Gazette, Railroad Record, and New York Times, also wrote a campaign biography of Grant, but made no use of the letter which follows.
AWARD TO GENERAL GRANT, 3RD *** On April 27, 1963, the 141st birthday of his grandfather, Major-General Ulysses S. Grant, 3rd was presented an honorary life membership by the Ohio Historical Society at its annual meeting. Director Erwin C. Zepp read the following statement concerning the award.
A graduate of the U.S. Engineering School, he has maintained an active interest in engineering and building projects. In 1926, he became Director of Public Buildings and Parks in the National Capital, and later served as Chairman of the National Park and Planning Commission and with other groups interested in planning and preservation.
In addition to assisting several generations of scholars in their efforts to understand his grandfather, he has had other interests in history and education. From 1946 to 1951 he was Vice President of George Washington University, and has also served as President of the Columbia Historical Society and chairman of the National Civil War Centennial Commission.
CITATION: Major General Ulysses S. Grant, 3rd, as soldier, educator, preserver of the past and planner for the future, inheritor and worthy guardian of a tradition of distinguished service to the American people, the Ohio Historical Society is privileged to present you with an honorary life membership.
[pg. 4] GRANT IN THE WHITE HOUSE *** The list of 1780 titles recently recommended for a White House library by a committee headed by James T. Babb, librarian of Yale, includes many volumes by officers of the Grant Association. Allan Nevins is represented by The Evening Post, The Emergence of Modern America 1865-1878, Grover Cleveland, Letters of Grover Cleveland, Hamilton Fish, Fremont, America Through British Eyes, Ford, The State Universities and Democracy, Study in Power, Diary of George Templeton Strong, and Ordeal of the Union. Bruce Catton is represented by The American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War, Mr. Lincoln's Army, Glory Road, A Stillness at Appomattox, Centennial History of the Civil War, and Grant Moves South. John Hope Franklin's From Slavery to Freedom and The Militant South appear on the list, as do David C. Mearns' The Story up to Now: The Library of Congress 1800-1946 and his essay on Lincoln in Three Presidents and Their Books. E. B. Long's edition of Grant's Memoirs and the late Robert S. Harper's Lincoln and the Press round out the list. Grant is also covered by Lloyd Lewis' Captain Sam Grant and the five volumes of Lincoln Finds a General by K. P. Williams.
GRANT ON GOLF *** In his Personal Recollections of General Ulysses S. Grant, General John C. Smith, Grant's former neighbor in Galena, told the following story.
A NAME FOR GENERAL GRANT *** The following first appeared in The Ohio Historical Society ECHOES for April, 1963.
In 1839, Jesse Grant asked Congressman Thomas L. Hamer to appoint his son Ulysses to West Point. Hamer apparently believed that any boy deserving his recommendation also deserved a middle initial. Either because Hamer remembered that the mother's maiden name was Simpson, or because he confused Ulysses with his younger brother, Simpson, he appointed Ulysses S. Grant to West Point. Ulysses knew nothing of the change Hamer had made in his name. While preparing a trunk for his journey by pounding brass tacks into the top to form his initials, he realized that his classmates, much given to rough banter anyway, would make disastrous use of "H.U.G." He decided to reverse his first two names and call himself Ulysses Hiram Grant, and used that name to sign the register at West Point. But officers insisted that no such person had been appointed; only Ulysses S. Grant was entitled to enroll. Ulysses' protests were fruitless, and in the fall he signed a certificate of enlistment as U. S. Grant. Although the army had given him a name he had to accept officially, for the four years of his cadetship he continued to sign his private correspondence U. H. Grant. After he had received a diploma and a commission as Ulysses S. Grant, however, he abandoned [pg. 6] his chosen name for the army issue. His classmates had used the initials anyway, and called him "Uncle Sam" at first, but later settled on "Sam".
Grant had made peace with his army name, but his troubles were not yet over. As he rose to fame in the Civil War, people began to wonder about the initials. His demand for unconditional surrender at Fort Donelson gave rise to the nickname, "Unconditional Surrender" Grant. The people of the North would not allow their leading general a mere middle initial. An early biography, published in 1864, provided 316 pages of information about Ulysses Sidney Grant. Those more familiar with his family background made the same mistake Congressman Hamer had made so many years before, and spoke of Ulysses Simpson Grant. In a letter to his special friend and patron, Congressman Elihu B. Washburne of Illinois, Grant gave an indication of his annoyance: "In answer to your letter of a few days ago asking what 'S' stands for in my name, I can only state nothing."
In spite of the fact that Grant never referred to himself or signed his name as Ulysses Simpson Grant, it is still persistently believed that this was his name. Unlike Harry S. Truman, who has no middle name and has defended his right to a simple initial, Grant was too reticent to correct widespread public error. The man who consistently signed himself U. S. Grant patiently bore a name which he did not acknowledge as his own.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, I, 2 (Jan., 1964). [pg. 7] WILLIAM BEST HESSELTINE *** The death at Madison, Wisconsin, December 8, 1963, of Professor William Best Hesseltine means a loss to the historical profession of a devoted friend, a stimulating teacher, and a distinguished scholar. Born at Brucetown, Virginia, February 21, 1902, he received his Bachelor of Arts degree at Washington and Lee University (1922) and his Master's degree from the University of Virginia (1925). He taught at University Military School in Alabama (1922-23) and at Scarritt-Morrisville College (1923-24). His doctoral studies were pursued at the Ohio State University, where he served as assistant in history (1926-28) and where he took his degree under the direction of Professor Arthur C. Cole (1926). His dissertation was later published as Civil War Prisons, a Study in War Psychology (Columbus, Ohio, 1920). He served as professor at the University of Chattanooga (1928-32). He then joined the history department of the University of Wisconsin, where he became the first occupant of the Vilas Research Chair of History in 1961. He was a professor at the United States Army University in England (1945); lectured for the United States Department of State in Costa Rica, Honduras, and Guatemala (1947); gave the Fleming Lectures at the pg. 8] Louisiana State University (1949); and lectured at German universities (1955) and in South Asia (1959). He was a consultant for various scholarly reference works and received honorary degrees from Washington and Lee University and from Knox College. He had served as a member of the Board of Editors of the Mississippi Valley Historical Review (1941-44). He was president of the Southern Historical Association in 1960. He was the author of: A History of the South, 1607-1936 (New York, 1936) later revised (with David L. Smiley) and published as The South in American History (1960); Ulysses S. Grant: Politician (New York, 1935); The Rise and Fall of Third Parties (Washington, 1948); Lincoln and the War Governors (New York, 1948); Confederate Leaders in the New South (Baton Rouge, 1950); Pioneer’s Mission: The Story of Lyman Copeland Draper (Madison, 1945); The Blue and Gray on the Nile, with Hazel C. Wolf (Chicago, 1961). He also edited several other volumes.
His scholarly reviews were often incisive and challenging. His seminars were noted for the exacting standards which he imposed. His loyal concern for his students became legendary throughout the profession. His scholarship was in keeping with the best academic traditions. As a person he was a genial friend, an enemy of sham, and a leader of intelligence and dedication. The Ulysses S. Grant Association deeply mourns his loss as a member of its editorial board.
GRANT AT SHILOH *** In the first year of publication of the Confederate Veteran, the widow of William S. Hillyer, impressed [pg. 9] by the tone of reconciliation in the magazine, contributed a letter written by her husband four days after the battle of Shiloh. Hillyer was a Kentuckian who took up the practice of law in Indiana. After serving one term in the Indiana legislature, he moved to St. Louis and devoted himself to law. His offices were close to those of Grant and Boggs, real-estate agents. After the unprofitable years at Hardscrabble, Grant had gone into business with a cousin of his wife, Harry Boggs, only to discover that there was insufficient business to support two families. In the course of learning this, he found much time on his hands, which he passed agreeably in Hillyer's law office. In August, 1861 Brigadier General Grant appointed Hillyer to serve as aid-de-camp. Hillyer accompanied Grant through his campaigns until his resignation on May 15, 1863.
On the morning of April 6, 1662, Hillyer arrived at Grant’s headquarters in the Cherry Mansion at Savannah, Tennessee at the awkward hour of 4:30 in the morning. His arrival awakened John A. Rawlins, Grant’s adjutant, who remained up to talk with Hillyer. Perhaps they awakened Grant, usually a late steeper, for they were all at an early breakfast when they heard the sound of firing from Pittsburg Landing some miles away. Grant was separated from his army because he was expecting to confer with General Don Carlos Buell, bringing his army to join Grant’s in a drive into Mississippi.
The excitement of the great battle is in a manner subsiding, and my thoughts are constantly reverting to the place where my heart and home are. As I stated to you before, I arrived at Savannah early Sunday morning--about half past four o'clock. While we were at breakfast, about seven o’clock, a gentleman reported that heavy cannonading was heard in the direction of Pittsburg, which is about nine miles from Savannah. The General and staff hurried down to our dispatch boat, the "Tigress." and started up the river. When about half way we met a boat coming down and received from her a dispatch stating that the enemy had attacked our center and right at daylight, driven our center back and a heavy fight was raging.
We arrived at Pittsburg about half past eight o'clock got on our horses and galloped out to the battle-field. Arrived there we found the enemy had attacked and were engaging our right and center in overwhelming force and our troops were falling back. We met hundreds of cowardly renegades fleeing to the river and reporting their regiments cut to pieces. We tried in vain to rally and return them to the front. We rode on to the center, ordering all the reinforcements we could command, and soon I found myself in the midst of a shower of cannon and musket balls. Cool and undismayed as ever, the General issued his orders and sent his aides flying over the field. While executing an order a cannon ball passed within two feet of my horse's head, and a cavalry captain near by called out to me, "Did it hit you, Captain?"
Soon after there was a lull in the center, and the heaviest firing was on our right. We galloped over there and rode along the line when the battle was raging fiercely. At this time our forces had been driven back about a mile and the enemy had taken a large portion of our division (General Prentiss') prisoners. Suddenly there was a lull on the right as welt as the center, and most of us thought that the enemy were worsted and retiring. "Not so," General Grant said. "I don't like this quiet. I fear the enemy are concentrating on our left" (where we were weakest). "Captain Hillyer, ride over and order a company of cavalry to make a reconnoisance on the left." "Yes, sir; where shall I find you on my return?" said I. "Wherever you hear the heaviest firing.," was the consoling reply. And, when I had executed the order, the only guide I had back to the General was the heaviest musketry and cannonading. In the meantime he had ordered reinforcements to the left, and his apprehensions were well founded. But a few minutes had elapsed when the enemy attacked us with desperate courage on our left. One continuous roar of artillery, varied only by the [pg. 11] unceasing rattle of musketry, was heard, and Death, with fifty thousand mowers, stalked over the field. Oh! it was an awful day. From then till dark apprehension of defeat, knowledge of the terrible slaughter and shadows of the direful consequences of defeat filled our hearts with sorrowful foreboding, but General Grant was still as calm and confident as ever. "We'll whip them yet" was his reply to the announcement that our troops were falling back, and his confidence inspired all his command.
Gen. Lew Wallace's division, which was at Crump's Landing, on the river, between Pittsburg and Savannah, a force ten thousand strong, were ordered to move Up to Pittsburg about eleven o'clock. They were but four miles distant, and should have been there by noon. Every moment we expected to hear from them, but by some unpardonable delay they came not. We assured the left that Wallace should soon be up to reinforce them, and, thus encouraged. our forces stood their ground against desperate odds. But the field was being strewn with our killed and wounded, and the battle raged hotter and hotter.
About two o'clock General Buell arrived. One of his divisions (General Nelson's) was marching and would soon arrive opposite Pittsburg, where boats waited to carry them over. In answer to General Grant's inquiry as to his other forces, Buell informed him that General. Crittenden's command had been halted two miles from Savannah to await further orders. General Grant immediately ordered me to proceed to Savannah with sufficient boats and order Crittenden to move immediately to the river with his men and embark for Pittsburg, leaving his transportation and baggage behind.
I got to Savannah about half past three, rode out to Crittenden's camp and gave the order, which he received with the utmost enthusiasm for there he was, within hearing of the battle, and without permission to advance. I asked him where was McCook's division. He said just behind him, and Wood's just behind McCook's. What should I do? I had no order's except for Crittenden, but we needed all the reinforcements we could get. I quickly determined to assume the responsibility. I sat down and wrote an order in General Grant’s name and dispatched a courier, ordering General McCook to leave his transportation and move his available force immediately to the river to General Wood, and followed it with an order to General Thomas, who was a few miles behind Wood. I returned to Savannah; there, I remembered, we had three regiments. I thought they were not needed there. I again assumed responsibility and ordered two of the regiments to embark for Pittsburg. I made all the arrangements for transportation and returned to report to General Grant. By this time it [pg. 12] was night. I found the General and the rest of his staff stretched on the ground, without a tent or any protection, and the rain pouring down!
I reported to the General what I had done; he said I had done exactly right. In consequence of my assumption of responsibility we had, in addition to Crittenden's and Nelson's commands, the whole of McCook's and a part of Wood's division, together with two regiments from Savannah, in the fight the next day, and we needed them all!
Sunday evening the enemy had pushed our lines back until their batteries almost commanded our transports; a little further and they would have made it impossible to land our reinforcements. But, fortunately, they got within range of our two gunboats, which were lying anchored in the river, and which opened upon them with a perfect shower of shells. Night never was more welcome to any poor mortals than that night to our little army at Pittsburg. I say "little army" because our force at Pittsburg at this time did not exceed forty thousand men.... Wallace's division had not arrived, nor any of Buell’s command. Notwithstanding this disparity, we labored under another serious disadvantage; the enemy, being the attacking party, could concentrate their whole force at any point, while we were compelled to maintain our lines on the right, left and center, not knowing what moment the enemy might shift their position under cover of the woods.
Before morning we had received twenty-five thousand reinforcements, and before Monday's battle was over ten thousand more.
Sunday night General Grant ordered that at the break of day our forces should advance on the right, left and center, attacking the enemy all around the lines wherever he could be found.
The first dawn of morning lighted our men onward toward the foe. In a few moments our whole line was engaged, and the battle raged with even more severity than on Sunday. The enemy were moving forward with the confidence inspired by their partial success on the preceding day; our's with the confidence inspired by the knowledge that we had been reinforced. I have not time to describe this day's action. It was the most terrible conflict I have ever witnessed. Our line of battle engaged at one time could not have been less than five or six miles, and wherever the battle raged hottest General Grant could be seen with his staff. At one time the rebels evidently distinguished him as a commanding general, for they opened a battery which filled the air around us with bursting shells and solid shot, and, as we advanced along the line, they followed us for a quarter of a mile. [pg. 13] Fortunely, the range was a little too high, and the ricochet passed beyond us. One ball, passed under the General's horse. I rode over the battle-field after the battle. Our men were busy burying the dead. The scene was horrible. Hundreds and hundreds of dead bodies strewed the ground. For miles and miles, wherever we rode, we found dead bodies scattered through the woods in every direction.
Oh! there will be many desolate homes and comfortless hearts as the details of this battle are known through the country. Many a mourning Rachel will find little consolation in the victory which finally crowned our arms. But future ages will, look with admiration on the desperate valor of our troops and bless the memory of the dead who felt at Pittsburg fighting for the maintenance of our good government. You and I cannot be too grateful to the kind Providence who has preserved your husband and our children's father through these two terrible days.
I have seen enough of war. God grant that it may be speedily terminated. I cannot retire now till we have driven the enemy from Corinth. When that is done I think I wilt leave it to others to finish up this rebellion, which I look upon as already mortally wounded.....
Kiss my little darlings for papa. Tell them that papa's thoughts often went after them, even during the excitement of the battle-field, and nothing but a sense of duty reconciled him to the risking of his life.
Good bye. God bless you.
GRANT BIBLIOGRAPHY *** Since it will be necessary to go through all printed material dealing with Grant in order to prepare an edition of his collected writings, the Grant Association has recently begun to collect bibliographical descriptions of the literature which will lead eventually to a comprehensive annotated Grant bibliography. John Y. Simon is working on this project with Harold S. Kipp, a bibliographer for the Ohio State University Libraries and [pg. 14] John F. Kendall of Oakland, California, who has an extensive private collection of printed Grant material. The compilers expect to gather comprehensively, including descriptions of items in journals, magazines, newspapers. etc. How much can be included in a printed bibliography remains to be decided, but at least the information can be made available in a master file. In addition to providing a useful guide for researchers, the Grant bibliography will provide raw material for an understanding of the development of the conventional Grant image against the background of shifting patterns of historical interpretation. Readers of this Newsletter in a position to assist with the bibliography are hereby exhorted to do so.
NEWS NOTES *** The Grant cottage at Long Branch, New Jersey was recently demolished despite efforts to preserve the historic structure where President Grant spent his summers with Philadelphia friends. Edgar Dinkelspiel, President of the Long Branch Historical Society, attempted unsuccessfully to have the federal government preserve the building as a national shrine. Now he is raising money to mark the site. *** Bookseller John C. Daub of Pittsburgh headed a recent catalogue with a notation that the law of supply and demand had increased his price for the Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant. His new price for a set of the original edition "good average used, not too bad, not pristine either," is $9.95. *** The University of California at Los Angeles has announced the acquisition of the papers of Admiral Daniel Ammen. Son of the editor of the Georgetown, Ohio Castigator, Ammen was a boyhood friend of Ulysses Grant, and their friendship was revived during the Civil War.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, I, 3 (April, 1964). [pg. 15] WALT WHITMAN AND GENERAL GRANT *** Running in a clear stream through Walt Whitman's letter, conversations, essays and poetry is an admiration for General Grant. The apparently paradoxical admiration of the wound-dresser for the warrior was based upon what Whitman believed to be similarities in their characters and a common approach to life. "I do not value literature as a profession," said Whitman. "I feel about literature what Grant did about war. He hated war. I hate literature."1 Whitman was speaking as much of himself as of Grant when he said that Grant "went about his work, defied the rules, played the game his own way--did all the things the best generals told him he should not do--and won out!2 Often Whitman would speak with approval of the simplicity of Grant's dress and manner. "Grant was the typical Western man: the plainest, the most efficient: was the least imposed upon by appearances, was most impressive in the severe simplicity of his flannel shirt and his utter disregard for formal military etiquette."3 Whitman concluded that Grant's "homely manners, dislike for military frippery--for every form of ostentation, in war and peace--amounted to genius."4 Above all, what appealed to Whitman was Grant's strength and determination. "Grant was one of the inevitables: he always arrived: he was as invincible as a law ..."5 This had impressed Whitman as early as April, 1864, when, writing to his mother, he said: "I believe in Grant and in [pg. 16] Lincoln too. I think Grant deserves to be trusted. He is working continually. No one knows his plans; we will only know them when he puts them in operation."6
Although Whitman's only contact with Grant came in an unsuccessful attempt to arrange the release of his brother from Confederate captivity, Whitman saw Grant many times.7 During the Grant presidency, Whitman wrote: "I saw Grant to-day on the avenue walking by himself--(I always salute him, & he does the same to me.)"8 "I was still in Washington when Grant was President," Whitman recalled:
After Grant as ex-President completed his trip around the world, Whitman wrote formally about him for the first time. "The Silent General" was later included in Specimen Days.10
Not content with prose for expressing himself on Grant's tour, Whitman turned to poetry.
In early 1885 it became generally known that Grant was dying of cancer. As Grant's health declined, newspapers and magazines began to gather material [pg. 18] for use when the general finally succumbed. Harper's Weekly, preparing a lavish series of memorials, dispatched an emissary to Whitman to ask for a poem.11 Charting the course of Grant's health, the editors were certain that Grant would die in April. Week after week, pictures of Grant graced the cover and laudatory articles filled the pages. But Grant clung tenaciously to life, determined to complete his "Memoirs" to provide some inheritance for his wife and children. Somewhat desperately, Harper's printed their Grant material, using even Whitman's premature poem on Grant's death with a grotesque final quatrain explaining that Grant still lived.12
After Grant died in July, Whitman gave the interview printed below, concluding by reciting his Grant poem.13 The poem has been corrected to accord with the version in Harper's Weekly. Whitman himself mercifully dropped the final quatrain both in the interview and in editing his last volume of poetry.
"Yes," said he, "I, too, am willing and anxious to bear testimony to the departed general. Now that Grant is dead it seems to me I may consider him as one of those examples or models for the people and character-formation of the future, age after age--always to me the most potent influence of a really distinguished character--greater than any personal deeds or life, however important they may have been. I think General Grant will stand the test perfectly through coming generations. True, he had no artistic or poetical element; but he furnished the concrete of those elements for imaginative use, perhaps beyond any man of the age. He was not the finely painted portrait itself, but the original of the portrait. What we most need in America are grand individual types, consistent with our own genius. The west has supplied two superb native illustrations in Lincoln and Grant. Incalculable as their deed were for the practical good of the nation for all time, I think their absorption into the future as elements and standards will be the best part of them.
[pg. 20] 1. Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden (N.Y., 1914-1915), I, 58.
NEWS NOTES *** The Grant Association recently signed a contract with the Ohio State University Press for the publication of "The Collected Writings of Ulysses S. Grant." The Grant Association plans to have its first volume ready within a year. *** Fred J. Milligan, Columbus attorney and President of the Ohio Historical Society, has replaced Everett Walters on the board of the Grant Association. Walters, formerly Dean of the Graduate School at Ohio State Unversity, is now at Boston University. *** Colonel Red Reeder's Ulysses S. Grant: Horseman and Fighter, recently published by Garrard, is admirably designed to give the 7-10 set an introduction to Grant.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, I, 4 (July, 1964). [pg. 21] A LETTER OF JESSE GRANT *** On the eve of the Civil War, Jesse R. Grant, father of the future general, lived in Covington, Kentucky, which was to be his home for the rest of his life. His business interests elsewhere included a leather store in Galena, Illinois. In May, 1860, Ulysses moved from St. Louis to Galena to begin again in his father's store. Jesse Grant was a successful businessman whose true love was politics, and there success eluded him. We are indebted to Dr. Wayne C. Temple and the Department of Lincolniana of Lincoln Memorial University for permission to print a letter written by Jesse Grant to Cassius M. Clay from Galena on May 28, 1860. Clay, a fiery Kentucky antislavery advocate, was temporarily prominent in the Republican Party. Great personal courage and strength enabled him to attack slavery in a slave-holding state, and while he gained few local supporters, he was much admired in the North. This letter raises as many questions as it answers. We do not know if Jesse Grant was as active in politics or so close to Clay as the letter suggests, although he obviously knew of Clay's desire for the War Department. Clay strove for this post with his usual aggressiveness, and was persuaded to take the post of Minister to Russia only after skillful negotiation by Lincoln's friend Edward D. Baker. A letter from Jesse Grant to Edward Bates, April 25, 1861 (Chicago Public Library) indicates that Grant was distressed by Clay's patronage policies in Kentucky, but nothing else of their relationship is known. [pg. 22] It is doubtful that Grant did meet Lincoln in Springfield, for he never spoke of it later. But there can be no doubt that Jesse did take the aggressive interest in politics that this letter suggests. It was ironic that political prominence came to Jesse from the direction least expected; and that his son Ulysses, as President, fearing his father's extravagant talk, guarded against confiding in him.
Your letter dated 16th & post marked on the 19th at White Hall was recd two days ago. Passing over for the present what has been said about the New port Republicans, & the Republican State Convention, I will proceed to notice what is of much greater importance--the nominations.
I feel fully satisfyed that the nominations are as good & as available as could have been made. Seward may thank his most devoted friends for his defeat. The officious intermeddllng of the old free soil wing of the Republican party; and that Seward was the only Representative man among the Candidates, & to take such men as McLean Bates or Lincoln, was to go outside of the party for a Candidate, has prevented his nomination, & would have produced his ultimate defeat. The feelings out here are very strong for C.M.C. for the V.P. And if some eastern men had been at the head of the ticket, that name, It is thought would have been associated with it. But the idea of the War Department takes us well.
When I return home, I will take Springfield in my rout, & make the acquaintance of Mr Lincoln. And I am going to work for the success of the ticket. Until the result of the Baltimore & Richmond conventions is known, it will be difficult to determine what will be the best course of policy to pursue in Kentucky, to secure Republican success. My present opinion is that it will be best to push Bells & if possible prevent the Democracy from geting the State. As matters now stand in our District I would not ask any decent Republican to vote the ticket, & I certainly coul not do it myself. And especially when I consider that the more votes the ticket gets in the 10th District, the more it will be disgraced; for it is fully understood that all possible pains has been taken to prevent any but old Abolition free soilers from voting it.
WHAT HIS ENEMIES SAID OF GRANT *** Major General Ulysses S. Grant 3rd had made an interesting collection of comments on his grandfather by persons active in the Confederate cause. They will appear in several installments. Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia, vice-President of the Confederate States of America, first met Grant on January 31, 1865, at City Point, Virginia, where Stephens and two other prominent Confederate officials had come to discuss terms of peace.
His conversation was easy and fluent, without the least effort or restraint. In this, nothing was so closely noticed by me as the point and terseness with which he expressed whatever he said. He did not seem either to court or avoid conversation, but whenever he did speak, what he said was directly to the point, and covered the whole matter in a few words. I saw before being with him long, that he was exceedingly quick in perception, and direct In purpose, with a vast deal more of brains than tongue, as ready as that was at his command.
We were here with General Grant two days, as the correspondence referred to shows. He furnished us with comfortable quarters on board one of his despatch boats. The more I became acquainted with him, the more I became thoroughly impressed with the very extraordinary combination of rare elements of character which he exhibited. During the time he met us frequently, and conversed freely upon various subjects, not much upon our mission. I saw, however, very clearly, that he was very anxious for the proposed Conference to take place, and from all that was said I inferred--whether correctly or not, I do not know--that he was fully apprised of its proposed object. He was, without doubt, exceedingly anxious for a termination of our war, and the return of peace and harmony throughout the country. It was through his instrumentality mainly, that Mr. Lincoln finally consented to meet us at Fortress Monroe, as the correspondence referred to shows.
But in further response to your inquiry, I will add: that upon the whole the result of this first acquaintance with General Grant, beginning with our going to, and ending with our return from Hampton Roads, was, the conviction on my mind, that, taken all in all, he was one of the most remarkable men I had ever met with, and that his career in life, If his days should be prolonged, was hardly entered upon; that his character was not yet fully developed; that he himself was not aware of his own power, and [pg. 25] that if he lived, he would, in the future, exert a controlling influence in shaping the destinies of this country, either for good or for evil. Which it would be, time and circumstances alone could disclose. That was the opinion of him then formed, and It is the same which has been uniformly expressed by me ever since.
General Richard Taylor in Destruction and Reconstruction (1879) bitterly indicted the Grant administration, but also gave this account of his trip to Washington in the summer of 1865 when he sought to obtain the release of Confederate officials from federal custody.
The following conversation of General Robert E. Lee is taken from the biography of Grant by James Grant Wilson.
Albert D. Richardson, in A Personal History of Ulysses S. Grant (1868), reported a conversation of Confederate General Richard Ewell, early in the Civil War.
NEWS NOTES *** The Grant Association recently elected three new members to its editorial board: Oliver Wendell Holmes, Executive Director of the National Historical Publications Commission; Harold M. Hyman, Professor of History at the university of Illinois; and Bell I. Wiley, Professor of History at Emory University. Other members of the editorial board are Allan Nevins, E.B. Long, Bruce Catton, Orme W. Phelps, and T. Harry Williams. *** An oil portrait of General Grant by S. Jerome Uhl has been acquired by dealer Paul North, of Columbus, Ohio. A large canvas, dated 1881, and possibly done from life, it is currently awaiting a purchaser in the Mohawk Gallery, 188 Lansing Street.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, II, 1 (Oct., 1964). NEW HEADQUARTERS *** On September 16, 1964, the files of the Grant Association arrived at the Morris Library of Southern Illinois University. One week earlier, the Board of Directors had voted to transfer headquarters from the Ohio State Museum. John Y. Simon, executive director and managing editor, has joined the department of history at Southern Illinois while continuing his work for the Grant Association. The Grant Association was organized in 1962 by the Civil War Centennial Commissions of Illinois, New York, and Ohio. It will complete work on the Grant Papers with the assistance of Southern Illinois University, the Illinois State Historical Society and Library, and other Illinois groups. The Grant Association expects to have the first volume of the collected works of Ulysses S. Grant ready for publication next year. This volume will include all existing Grant correspondence from his youth to the outbreak of the [pg. 2] Civil War. All Grant letters will eventually be published in a series of approximately fifteen volumes.
The Grant Association is also preparing a new edition of Grants Memoirs and a comprehensive bibliography. It has published a Grant Chronology and will maintain the quarterly Newsletter.
WHAT HIS ENEMIES SAID OF GRANT *** The last newsletter contained the first installment of comments on his grandfather gathered by Major General Ulysses S. Grant 3rd. Below are extracts from a speech delivered on April 27, 1892 by Colonel John S. Wise, son of Governor Henry A. Wise of Virginia, and an officer in the Confederate Army.
My experiences here, at the close of the war were rather unique. I escaped the surrender of General Lee by being the bearer of despatches from him to Mr. Davis. Hearing of Lee's surrender I journeyed southward and joined Johnston's army, surrendering with it at Jamestown, and being temporarily out of employment, my military ventures having somewhat miscarried, I came at once to Philadelphia, took up my domicile at the house of General Meade, who married my mother's sister, foraged on the enemy, and reviewed from time to time, the returning armies of the Union.
Thus, in about two months, I had been in two Confederate and one Union army, and you will understand by that circumstance that I am not sectional or partisan in the [pg. 3] views I entertain as to the events then transpiring....
Dropping this view of personal reminiscence, and bearing in mind the lateness of the hour, let me say as a very humble representative of the Confederate soldier, that, in my judgment, the time has come, and a sufficient period has elapsed for the subsidence of passion, for people on both sides to realize much that they could not appreciate when inflamed by the angry passions of war. I think we may now philosophise somewhat as to the causes and the results of the great struggle which made Grant famous.
As nothing came out as I expected it would I sometimes amuse myself by thinking of what might have happened.
In the first place did it ever occur to you that any man who was on either side in that struggle might easily have been upon the other side?
That sounds absurd but it is not. Think how many Northern men were South and how many Southern men were North, merely through force of the accidental circumstances surrounding them at the outbreak of hostilities. Robert E. Lee and George H. Thomas, were Lieutenant-Colonel and Major respectively, of the same regiment. Both considered long and patiently which side they would take, and where their duty lay. On every theory of probabilities Lee was the man who would remain with the United States Army, and Thomas would go South. By every tradition Lee was a Federalist. The fame of his family had been earned in building up and sustaining the glory of the Union, for which his own blood had been shed in Mexico. He was the pet of General Scott, Commander-in-Chief of the Union Armies, and no favorite of Davis, or Bragg or Hardee, the leaders of the Confederacy. Above all, he was identified in every way with the feelings of that closest of all corporations in America, West Point, and had been taught to yield first allegiance to the Union. Thomas remained in the North. Lee went South. There was no telling, at that time, on which side men would fetch up. Pemberton [pg. 4] and Lovell, both Northern men, cast their fortunes with the South....
The Confederate soldier has come to know Grant as the conscientious, brave, pertinacious upholder of the Union cause, who, fighting to the death for his convictions, was free from all bitterness, and who, when his point had been fully carried, was anxious to forgive and to forget, and to build anew the fabric of fraternal love, without one reminiscent taunt or reproach.
I heard the distinguished Secretary of the Interior speak of Grant as he knew him in his youth. Like him, when I was a boy I knew Grant. But we made his acquaintance in different ways. I first heard his drums beat in the early morning as his interesting army lay in the mists that hung about the beleaguered lines of Petersburg. We believed him to be a mere military butcher, so recklessly bent on carnage that we even hoped his own troops would turn against him for their remorseless slaughter.
I have seen his legions move forward to our assault. I have seen them repulsed, and again have fled before them. He is my old and honored friend, our dearest foe. While war was flagrant we did not fully understand him. It was not until we surrendered to him that we realized how much of noble magnanimity and generosity was mingled with the stern, bloody pluck which crowned him victor.
It was a genuine surprise to see his old foemen, when, almost before they had completed their surrender to him, he seemed more anxious to feed his prisoners from the rations of his own men than he was to secure his captives.
When we expected harsh orders we heard the command that we retain our horses and our sidearms.
When civil prosecutions of our officers were attempted it was our old foe Grant who stood in the breach and demanded that his parole be respected.
When the triumphal armies of the Union entered our deserted capital he refused to taunt his old and honored foemen [pg. 5] with a Roman triumph.
And so as the years rolled by the Confederate soldier in his poverty learned to draw near to Grant as his friend, in full assurance that whoever else should chide him for his past there was one great generous heart who held the grimy Johnny Reb as second only to his own brave boys in blue, in right to claim his loving care and tenderness.
Thus it is, Mr. Chairman, that I, not as a citizen of the dead Confederacy, or with any lurking regret as to its fate, but as a true and loyal and loving citizen of the United State of America claim share in this demonstration with privilege of doing honor to myself and to my people, in honoring the memory of Grant.
We have the happiest, the freest, the best nation, that the sun shines upon in his course.
None love it more. None are truer in their allegiance. None more honestly earnest in the hope that it shall be united for all time to come--than the men from whose opposed ranks Grant carved his noble fame, the soldiers of the dead Confederacy.
NEWS NOTES *** The Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War has contributed $800 to the Grant Association to further its publishing projects. *** At a meeting held on September 11, the National Historical Publications Commissions approved the following: "RESOLVED that the project for the publication of the papers of Ulysses S. Grant under the auspices of the Ulysses S. Grant Association and Southern Illinois University is regarded by the National Historical Publications Commission as a well-conceived documentary publication deserving of professional and financial assistance from all, in a position to give it." *** Northwestern [pg. 6] University Press has published Grant, Lee, Lincoln and the Radicals: Essays on Civil War Leadership, edited by Grady McWhiney. This is the product of a Civil War Centennial Symposium at Northwestern and contains a discussion by Bruce Catton of "The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant" in which Grant's flexibility and clear overall view of the war explain his success. "The complaint that Grant succeeded only because he had superior numbers is pointless," says Catton: "The superior numbers were part of the equation all along. It was Grant who took advantage of them..." The symposium also included "The Generalship of Robert E. Lee," by Charles P. Roland; "Devils Facing Zionwards," by David Donald; and "Lincoln and the Radicals: An Essay in Civil War History and Historiography,' by T. Harry Williams. Vice President of the Grant Association. *** Lincoln's Gadfly, Adam Gurowski, by Le Roy H. Fischer, published by the University of Oklahoma Press, is the first biography of this leading Civil War radical. Fischer, who began his scholarly career by editing Grant's letters concerning his St. Louis farm, received the 1963 Literary Award of the Pennsylvania Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion for his study of Gurowski. *** Charles D. Tenney, Vice President of Southern Illinois University, has been elected to the Board of Directors of the Grant Association. Fred J. Milligan has resigned. George W. Adams, Chairman of the Department of History of Southern Illinois University, has been elected to the editorial board.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, II, 2 (Jan., 1965). [pg. 7] GRANT AND LONGSTREET *** One year ahead of Ulysses Grant at West Point was James Longstreet, a tall Georgian who graduated third from the bottom of his class and then was assigned to the Fourth Infantry at Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis. Nearby lived his kinsman, Frederick Dent, related to Longstreet's mother, Mary Anne Dent, since they were descended from two brothers, George and Peter Dent of Charles County, Maryland.1 The Dents were a hospitable family with a comfortable estate, White Haven, a few miles outside St. Louis, and children close to Longstreet in age: one son, Fred, was at West Point in the class one year behind Longstreet. After Longstreet had been in St. Louis for one year, the next West Point class provided additional officers for Jefferson Barracks. Fred Dent had gone elsewhere, but his roommate, a shy and frail brevet second lieutenant named Grant, soon was introduced to the comforts of White Haven. Grant made frequent visits and heard much about the Dent's oldest daughter, Julia, who was spending the winter in St. Louis with friends of the family so that she could enjoy a fuller social life than could be found at White Haven. When she returned, she and Grant fell in love. Longstreet's recollection that he introduced Grant to his future wife was probably incorrect; yet he had been a close friend of [pg. 8] both during their courtship.2
Grant and Longstreet were also together when the Fourth Infantry was sent to the Southwest before the Mexican War. Longstreet remembered the theatricals designed to break the tedium at Corpus Christi in which Grant was to play Desdemona until the proposed Othello insisted that an actress be brought from New Orleans.3 Grant's first opportunity to meet Longstreet in battle would have come at Chattanooga in 1863 had not Bragg unwisely detached his force for a drive on Knoxville. By the end of the year Bragg had been thrown back into Georgia while Longstreet still caused consternation in Tennessee. Grant's Christmas visit with his wife in Nashville was cut short by news of Longstreet. "Now Ulysses," said Julia, "you know that you are not going to hurt Longstreet." "I will if I can get him," was the reply, "he is in bad company."4 But Longstreet was able to rejoin Lee with his army intact; the first encounter came in the Wilderness, where Longstreet was so severely wounded that he was unable to rejoin Lee until late in the war. Grant remembered Longstreet in Mexico as "a fine fellow and one of the best of the young officers." In contrasting Longstreet with Bragg, Grant called him "brave, honest, intelligent, a very capable soldier, subordinate to his superiors, but jealous of his own rights which he had the courage to maintain."5 In later years Longstreet often spoke admiringly of Grant's generalship. As the most prominent Confederate to join the Republican Party and hold office under the Grant administration, Longstreet was on bad terms with his former associates, and his praise of Grant balanced criticism of Lee. Years after the war, Longstreet told Grant's former staff officer, Horace Porter, that when news was received at Lee's headquarters that Grant would assume personal [pg. 9] direction of the Army of the Potomac, he had said, "We cannot afford to underrate him."6 At the time, however, Longstreet had done just that, telling Lee, "I do not think that he is any better than Pope."7
Indeed, many of Longstreet's recollections of Grant appear to be colored by his postwar role. Of the prominent Confederate leaders Longstreet surrendered most abjectly (albeit profitably) to his former foes.8 Immediately after Grant's death in 1885, Longstreet gave an interview to The New York Times which is reprinted below with notes referring to other reminiscences of the same incidents by Longstreet.9
"Ever since 1839," said he, "I have been on terms of the closest intimacy with Grant. I well remember the fragile form which answered to his name in that year. His distinguishing trait as a cadet was a girlish modesty; a hesitancy in presenting his own claims; a taciturnity born of his modesty; but a thoroughness in the accomplishment of whatever task was assigned him. As I was of large and robust physique I was at the head of most larks and games. But in these young Grant never joined because of his delicate frame.l0 In horsemanship, however, he was noted as the most proficient in the Academy. In fact, rider and horse held together like the fabled centaur.
"In 1842 I was attached to the Fourth Infantry as Second Lieutenant. A year later Grant joined the same regiment, stationed in that year at Fort Jefferson, 12 miles from St. Louis. The ties thus formed have never been broken; but there was a charm which held us together of which the world has never heard. My kinsman, Mr. Frederick Dent, was a substantial farmer living near Fort Jefferson. He had a liking for army officers, due to the fact that his son Fred was a pupil at West Point. One day I received an invitation to visit his house in order to meet young Fred, who had just returned, and, I asked Grant to go with me. This he did, and of course was introduced to the family, the last one to come in being Miss Julia Dent, the charming daughter of our host. It is needless to say that we saw but little of Grant during the rest of the visit. He paid court in fact with such assiduity as to give rise to the hope that he had forever gotten over his diffidence. Five years later, in 1848, after the usual uncertainties of a soldier's courtship, Grant returned and claimed Miss Dent as his bride. [pg. 10] I had been married just six months at that time, and my wife and I were among the guests at the wedding.11 Only a few months ago Mrs. Grant recalled to my memory an incident of our Jefferson life that was connected with Gen. Grant's courtship. Miss Dent had been escorted to the military balls so often by Lieut. Grant that, on one occasion, when she did not happen to go with him, Lieut. Hoskins went up to her and asked, with a pitiful expression on his face: 'Where is that small man with the large epaulets?'12
"In 1844 the Fourth Regiment was ordered to Louisiana to form part of the army of observation. Still later we formed part of the army of occupation in Corpus Christi, Texas. Here, removed from all society without books or papers, we had an excellent opportunity of studying each other. I and every one else always found Grant resolute and doing his duty in a simple manner. His honor was never suspected, his friendships were true, his hatred of guile was pronounced, and his detestation of tale bearers was, I may say, absolute. The soul of honor himself, he never even suspected others either then or years afterward. He could not bring himself to look upon the rascally aide of human nature.
"While we remained in Corpus Christi an incident illustrating Grant's skill and fearlessness as a horseman occurred. The Mexicans were in the habit of bringing in wild horses, which they would sell for two or three dollars. These horses came near costing more than one officer his life. One day a particularly, furious animal was brought in. Every officer in the camp had declined to purchase the animal except Grant, who declared that he would either break the horse's neck or his own. He had the horse blindfolded, bridled, and saddled, and when firmly in the saddle he threw off the blind, sunk his spurs into the horse's flanks, and was soon out of sight. For three hours he rode the animal over all kinds of ground, through field and stream, and when horse and rider returned to camp the horse was thoroughly tamed.13 For years afterward the story of Grant's ride was related at every camp fire in the country. During the Mexican war we were separated, Grant having been made Quartermaster of the Fourth Regiment, while I was assigned to duty as Adjutant of the Eighth. At the Battle of Molino del Rey, however, I had occasion to notice his superb courage and coolness under fire. So noticeable was his bearing that his gallantry was alluded to in the official reports.14
"In the long days of our stay in Louisiana and Texas," continued Gen. Longstreet, "we frequently engaged in the game of brag and five-cent ante and similar diversions. We instructed Grant in the mysteries of these games, but he made a poor player. The man who lost 75 cents in one day was esteemed in those times a peculiarly unfortunate person. The games often lasted an entire day. Years later, in 1858, I happened to be in St. Louis, and there met Capt. Holloway and other army chums. We went into the Planters' Hotel to talk over old times, and it was soon proposed to have an old-time game of brag, but it was found that we were one short of making up a full hand. 'Wait a few minutes,' said Holloway, 'and I will find some one.' In a few minutes he returned with a man poorly dressed in citizen's clothes and in whom we recognized our old friend Grant. Going into civil life Grant had been unfortunate, and he was really in needy circumstances. The next day I was walking in front of the Planters', when I found myself face to face again with Grant who, placing in the palm of my hand a five-dollar gold piece, insisted that I should take it in payment of a debt of honor over 15 years old. I peremptorily declined to take it, alleging that he was out of the service and more in need of it than I. 'You must take it,' [pg. 11] said he, 'I cannot live with anything in my possession which is not mine.' Seeing the determination in the man's face, and in order to save him mortification, I took the money, and shaking hands we parted.
"The next time we met," said Gen. Longstreet, "was at Appomattox, and the first thing that Gen. Grant said to me when we stepped [a]side, placing his army in mine, was: 'Pete, (a sobriquet of mine,) let us have another game of brag, to recall the old days which were so pleasant to us all.' Great God! thought I to myself, how my heart swells out to such a magnanimous touch of humanity! Why do men fight who were born to be brothers?
"During the war my immediate command had engaged the troops of Grant but once--at the battle of the Wilderness. We came into no sort of personal relations, however. In the Spring of 1865, one day, while awaiting a letter from Gen. Grant, Gen. Lee said to me, 'There is nothing ahead of us but to surrender.' It was as one of the Commissioners appointed to arrange the terms of peace that I met Gen. Grant at Appomattox. His whole greeting and conduct toward us was as though nothing had ever happened to mar our pleasant relations.15
"In 1866 I had occasion to visit Washington on business, and while there made a call of courtesy on Gen. Grant at his office. As I arose to leave he followed me out into the hallway, and asked me to spend an evening with his family. I thanked him, promising compliance, and passed a most enjoyable evening. When leaving Grant again accompanied me into the hallway and said: 'General, would you like to have an amnesty?' Wholly unprepared for this I replied that I would like to have it, but had no hope of getting it. He told me to write out my application and to call at his office at noon the next day, and in the meantime he would see President Johnson and Secretary of War Stanton on my behalf. When I called he had already seen these men, and assured me that there was not an obstacle in the way. He indorsed my application by asking that it be granted as a special personal favor to himself.
"In the January before he was inaugurated President for the first time I paid him a passing friendly visit. He then said to me: 'Longstreet, I want you to come and see me after I am inaugurated, and let me know what you want.' After the inauguration I was walking up the avenue one day to see him when I met a friend who informed me that the President had sent in my name for confirmation as Surveyor of the Port of New-Orleans. For several weeks the nomination hung in the Senate, when I went to Grant and begged him to withdraw the nomination, as I did not want his personal friendship for me to embarrass his Administration. 'Give yourself no uneasiness about that,' he said, 'the Senators have as many favors to ask of me as I have of them, and I will see that you are confirmed."
"From what I have already told you," said Gen. Longstreet, in conclusion, "it will be seen that Grant was a modest man, a simple man, a man believing in the honesty of his fellows, true to his friends, faithful to traditions, and of great personal honor. When the United States District Court in Richmond was about to indict Gen. Lee and myself for treason, Gen. Grant interposed and said: 'I have pledged my word for their safety.' This stopped the wholesale indictments of ex-Confederate officers which would have followed. He was thoroughly magnanimous, was above all petty things and small ideas, and, after Washington, was the highest type of manhood America has produced."
[pg. 12] On April 24, 1899, Mrs. Mary Louise Littleton spoke to Longstreet about Grant and transcribed his comments. Some years later, Mrs. Littleton sent her interview to Major-General Ulysses S. Grant, 3rd, who has supplied a copy to the Newsletter.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, II, 3 (April, 1965). [pg. 13] NEWS NOTES *** Bell I. Wiley, Professor of History at Emory University, has been appointed Harmsworth Professor in American History at Oxford University for 1965-1966. Wiley is a member of the editorial board of the Grant Association, as is Allan Nevins, the current Harmsworth Professor. *** President Lyndon Johnson commemorated Lincoln's birthday with a luncheon at the White House. A sizeable Grant delegation was headed by Major General Ulysses S. Grant 3rd. Those from the Grant Association included Bruce Catton, Carl Haverlin, David C. Mearns, Ralph G. Newman, James I. Robertson, Clyde C. Walton, Harold M. Hyman, Bell I. Wiley, T, Harry Williams, and John Y. Simon. Some one hundred guests heard a thoughtful address by the President in the East Room, adjourned to luncheon in the State Dining Room, visited the Lincoln Room with Mrs. Johnson as guide, and accompanied the President to a wreath-laying ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial. *** The final Assembly sponsored by the U. S. Civil War Centennial Commission will be held May 1-May 4 in Springfield, Illinois. Information on the meeting and a full program can be obtained from the Illinois Civil War Centennial Commission, Centennial Building, Springfield, Illinois. *** George R. Jones of Chicago is the author of a recently published biography of his grandfather, Joseph Russell Jones. Based on manuscripts and scrapbooks still in the possession of the family, as well as considerable [pg. 14] additional material in the Library of Congress, Chicago Historical Society, and elsewhere, this is the first biography of a major figure in the Grant story. At the outbreak of the Civil War, Jones was a leading Republican of Galena, Illinois. Lincoln appointed him United States Marshal for the Northern District of Illinois. During the Civil War be worked to advance the military and personal fortunes of General Grant, who later appointed him Minister to Belgium. Working with the editorial assistance of Richard Penn Hartung, George Jones has probed deeply into a complex career. Copies of a handsome paperbound edition of the 93-page book at $2.00, and a few hardbound copies at $4.00 are available from the Galena Historical Society, Galena, Illinois.
GRANT AT THE RANDOLPH HOUSE *** About noon on April 7, 1865, General Grant and his staff arrived in Farmville, Virginia. The Union army had been pressing the Confederates closely ever since the evacuation of Richmond and Petersburg give days earlier. Grant spent the night in a room in the Randolph House which he was told (probably incorrectly) was used by Lee the night before. Last spring a group headed by Joseph E. Wood of Farmville was renovating the Randolph House (later called the Prince Edward Hotel) for centennial observances, when the structure collapsed. A committee called Randolph Rouse, Inc. has been established which will place a stone marker on the site of the hotel. The committee has published an extensively illustrated 42-page booklet, From Sayler's Creek to Appomattox, written by Scott Hart, of Washington, who was born and raised in Farmville and was formerly on the staff of the U.S. Civil War Centennial Commission. Copies are available for $1.35 from Randolph House, Inc., P.O. Box 528, Farmville, Virginia. Below is the account of Grant's day at Farmville from staff [pg. 15] officer Horace Porter's Campaigning With Grant.
Ord and Gibbon had visited the general at the hotel, and he had spoken with them, as well as with Wright, about sending some communication to Lee that might pave the way to the stopping of further bloodshed. Dr. Smith, formerly of the regular army, a native of Virginia, and a relative of General Ewell, now one of our prisoners, had told General Grant the night before that Ewell had said in conversation that their cause was lost when they crossed the James River, and he considered that it was the duty of the authorities to negotiate for peace then, while they still had a right to claim concessions, adding that now they were not in condition to claim anything. He said that for every man killed after this somebody would be responsible, and it would be little better than murder. He could not tell what General Lee would do, but he hoped that he would at once surrender his army. This statement, together with the news that had been received from Sheridan, saying that he had heard that General Lee's trains of provisions, which had come by rail, were at Appomattox, and that he expected to capture them before Lee could reach them, induced the general to write the following communication:
The results of the last week must convince you of the hopelessness [pg. 16] of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia on this struggle. I feel that it is so, and regard it as my duty to shift from myself the responsibility of any further effusion of blood by asking of you the surrender of that portion of the Confederate States army known as the Army of Northern Virginia.
U. S. GRANT
This he intrusted to General Seth Williams, adjutant-general, with directions to take it to Humphrey's front, as his corps was close up to the enemy's rear-guard, and see that it reached Lee. William's orderly was shot, and he himself came near losing his life in getting this communication through the lines. General Grant decided to remain all night at Farmville and await the reply from Lee, and he was shown to a room in the hotel in which he was told that Lee had slept the night before, although this statement could not be verified. Lee wrote the following reply within an hour after he received General Grant's letter, but it was brought in by a rather circuitous route, and did not reach its destination till after midnight:
GENERAL: I have received your note of this date. Though not entertaining the opinion you express of the hopelessness of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia, I reciprocate your desire to avoid useless effusion of blood, and therefore, before considering your proposition, ask the terms you will offer on condition of its surrender.
R.E. Lee,
The next morning, before leaving Farmville, the following reply was given to General Seth Williams, who again went to Humphrey's front to have it transmitted to Lee:
Your note of last evening, in reply to mine of the same date, asking the conditions on which I will accept the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, is just received. In reply would say that, peace being my great desire, there is but one condition I would insist upon--namely, that the men and officers surrendered shall be disqualified for taking up arms against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged. I will meet you, or will designate officers to meet any officers you may name for the some purpose, at any point agreeable to you, for the purpose of arranging definitely the terms upon which the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia will be received.
U.S. GRANT
The last sentence shows great delicacy of feeling on the part of General Grant, who wished to spare General Lee the mortification of personally conducting the surrender. The consideration displayed has a parallel in the terms accorded by Washington to Cornwallis at Yorktown. Cornwallis took advantage of the privilege, and sent O'Hara to represent him; but Lee rose superior to the British general, and in a manly way came and conducted the surrender in person.
WHAT HIS ENEMIES SAID OF GRANT *** This is the fourth installment of comments on his grandfather gathered by Major General Ulysses S. Grant 3rd. On May 30, 1892, Colonel Charles Marshall, the single staff officer General Lee took with him to the surrender and the only Confederate officer who was an eye-witness of the historical conference in the McLean house, said, in a prepared speech:
On that eventful morning of April 9th, 1865, General Grant was called upon to decide the most momentous question that any American soldier or statesman has ever been required to decide.
The great question was: How shall the war end? What shall be the relations between the victors and the vanquished? Upon the decision of that question depended, as I believe, the future of American institutions.
If the extreme rights of military success had been insisted upon, and had the vanquished been required to pass under the yoke of defeat and bitter humiliation, the war would have ended as a successful war of conquest--the Southern States would have been conquered states, and the Southern people would have been a conquered people, in whose hearts would have been sown all: the enmity and ill-will of the conquered to the conquerors, to be transmitted from sire to son.
With such an ending of the war there would have been United States without an united people....
Southern military power was exhausted. He was in a position to exact the supreme rights of a conqueror and the unconditional submission of his adversary unless that adversary should elect to risk all on the event of a desperate battle, in which much "American" blood would certainly be shed.
General Grant 3rd himself contributes this account--
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, II, 4 (July 1965). [pg. 19] THREE DOUBTFUL GRANT LETTERS *** Early letters of Ulysses S. Grant are rarely found because nobody realized their historical importance before Grant became a general in the Civil War. The earliest known letter from Grant to his father dates from 1856, and no letter to his mother is known. Virtually all of Grant's existing personal letters prior to the Civil War are addressed to his fiancee and wife, Julia Dent Grant. Three purported Grant letters to his parents, however, are printed in The Tanner-Boy: A Life of General U. S. Grant by Major Penniman, published in 1864 in Boston. "Major Penniman" was the pseudonym of Charles Wheeler Denison (1809-1881), a newspaperman and clergyman born in New London, Connecticut. He was the editor of the Emancipator, an antislavery journal published in New York. During the Civil War he spoke for the North to the mill workers of Lancashire, England, and spent the last two years of the war as post chaplain at Winchester, Virginia, and hospital chaplain in Washington. Denison published a volume of poetry in 1845, and for the rest of his life was a prolific writer of uplifting novels and biography. During the Civil War he wrote juvenile biographies of General Grant (The Tanner-Boy), General Nathaniel P. Banks (The Bobbin Boy), and General Winfield Scott Hancock (Winfield, the Lawyer's Son), as well as an adult biography of General Sheridan. "Major Penniman" was the name he used for children's books. His wife, Mary Andrews Denison, who served as a hospital nurse [pg. 20] while her husband was a chaplain, wrote approximately sixty novels, mostly of the Sunday School variety. Almost forgotten today, the Denisons were once extremely popular writers, with Mrs. Denison generously represented in the dime novel series published by Beadle.
The Tanner-Boy was apparently successful, for the publishers reprinted it as late as 1896 with "Tenth Thousand" on the title-page. The early Grant letters were printed in The National Republican on November 5, 1879, and used by William Ralston Balch in a biography of Grant published in 1885. They were quoted by Hamlin Garland in an 1898 Grant biography and by Lloyd Lewis in 1950 in Captain Sam Grant. Below are the letters as they appeared in The Tanner-Boy.
My dear mother, should I progress well with my studies at West Point, and become a soldier for my country, I am looking forward with hope to have you spared to share with me in any advancement I may make. I see now, in looking over the records here, how much American soldiers of the right stamp are indebted to good American mothers. When they go to the field, what prayers go with them! what tender testimonials of maternal affection and counsel are in their knapsacks! I am struck, in looking over the history of the noble struggle of our fathers for national independence, at the evidence of the good influence exerted upon them by the women of the Revolution. Ah! my beloved friend, how can the present generation ever repay the debt it owes the patriots of the past for the sacrifices they have so freely and richly made for us? We may well ask, Would our country be what it is note, if it had not been for the greatness of our patriotic ancestors?
Let me hear from you by letter as often as convenient, and send me such books as you think will help me. They can be forwarded through the courtesy of our member of Congress.
Faithfully and most lovingly your son,
U. S. West-Point Military Academy,
[pg. 21] I find much here that makes me love my dear native land more than ever I am happy in the fact that this stronghold of nature is safely in the hands of the United States. Do you know, father, that it is called the Gibraltar of America? I think that is a very proper name for it. The hills are so different from thaw we have in our part of Ohio! They come down steep to the water's edge; and the points of land shut in so close from one bank of the river to the other, that, when you are below, you can hardly see the way up; and, when you are above it is hard to see the way down. The cliffs rise one above another to towering heights, all scarred with ragged rocks, and crowned on their wild summits with lofty trees. It seems as if the foot of man could never get to the tops, the paths are so full of masses of shattered precipices that lie strewn about in chaotic confusion. I have found my way to the highest peak, however; and was well repaid for my struggle by the view of the noble Hudson beneath my feet, and the distant Catskill Mountains above my head. The highlands here are splendid to behold; and the opening prospects of the east and west shores of the river, with their shady groves, their smiling farms and dotted towns, are beautiful indeed. The steamers and vessels are seen busily passing to and fro in the majestic stream; and, close down by the shore, the pennon of the railway train is fluttering in the breeze. I catch a far-off glimpse of the hills in Connecticut and Massachusetts, resting, like battle-smoked war-shields, against the sky. The rich pastures of Orange County, New York, skirted with herds of cattle, spread out like a pictured carpet before me; and over all bend the arching heavens, where the rifted clouds march on like the squadrons of an army.
As I return from my walk, refreshed by the exercise, inspirited by the grand and varied scenery, and better prepared for my studies, I pass by the cemetery of the academy, where some of our cherished dead repose. Here is the monument erected by our grateful country to the brave hero, Kosciusko, who fell on the field of battle, on American soil, fighting for the liberties of mankind. You remember, father, the line that is recorded of him,--
I am rendered serious by the impressions that crowd upon me here at West Point. My thoughts are frequently occupied with the hatred I am made to feel toward traitors to my country, as I look around me on the memorials that remain of the black-hearted treason of Arnold. I am full of a conviction of scorn and contempt, which my young and inexperienced pen is unable to write in this letter, toward the conduct of any man, who, at any time, could strike at the liberties of such a nation as ours. If ever men should be found in our Union base enough to make the attempt to do this; if, like Arnold, they should secretly seek to sell our national inheritance for the mess of pottage of wealth, or' power, or section,--West Point sternly reminds me what you, my father, would have your son do. As I stand here in this national fort, a student of arms under our country's flag, I know full well how you would have me act in such an emergency. I trust my future conduct, in such an hour, would prove worthy the patriotic instructions you have given.
Yours obediently,
In Camp, en route to Mexico,
My dear Parents,--We are progressing steadily toward the Mexican capital Since I last wrote you my position has been rendered more responsible and [pg. 22] laborious. You may learn the progress of the old Fourth by the paper; and I do not mean you shall ever hear of my shirking my duty in battle. My new post of quartermaster is considered to afford an officer an opportunity to be relieved from fighting; but I do not and cannot see it in that light. You have always taught me that the post of danger is the post of duty. That is the way Warren looked at it, you remember, when he asked Gen. Putnam where he would send him, in the battle of Bunker Hill. "I shall send you, Mr. President," replied Putnam (for you recollect that Warren was the President of the Continental Congress at that time), "to a place of safety."--"No, General," said Warren quickly: "send me where the fight may be the hottest; for there I can do the most good to my country."
So I feel in my position as quartermaster. I do not intend it shall keep me from fighting for our dear old flag, when the hour of battle comes.
But I must not talk all the time about war. I shall try to give you a few descriptions of what I see in this country. It has in it many wonderful things, you are aware, so different from Ohio, West Point, and the Indian territories of Missouri.
Mexico is in many parts very mountainous. Its hillsides are crowned with tall palms, whose waving leaves at a height of fifty or sixty feet from the ground present a splendid appearance. They toss to and fro in the winds like plumes in a helmet; their deep green glistening in the sunshine, or glittering in the moonbeams, in the most beautiful manner. The table-land is high and pleasant, interspersed with many verdant valleys. Some of the mountains, near the coast of the Pacific Ocean, are very lofty, and volcanic in their character. One of these, on the extreme northern border, is over ten thousand feet high above the plain; and the plain is supposed to be eight thousand feet above the level of the sea.
The more central part of the country, through which we are passing, does not have so many high mountains; but it is very much broken, and some of the cliffs are very steep, and the gorges below very deep. As we pass along from the seaboard to the interior we cannot but be struck with the influence produced on the atmosphere by this mountain air. Mexico, you recollect, is located in the torrid zone, where the weather is supposed to be always warm; but here we find it temperate and healthy to a remarkable degree. The soil abounds with grain, such as wheat and maize, and vegetables, sugar-cane, roots, and fruits of various kinds. With proper cultivation, cotton can be produced in large quantities. The number of plants that yield balsams, gums, resins, and oils, is very great. Below the surface of the earth are to be found gold, silver, copper, lead, iron, tin, zinc, sulphur, alum, vitriol, cinnibar, ochre, quicksilver, and other mineral productions. In some places are to be found diamonds, amethysts, cornelians, and other precious stones. There are in the hills, sometimes, great masses of loadstones, as large as the largest houses; and quarries of jasper, porphyry, and moot beautiful green and golden marble. The manufactures are earthen and stone ware, glass, spirits, sugars, tissues of cotton, paper, woollen and silk fabrics. Very large supplies of medical minerals and herbs are constantly produced from the interior.
All kinds of horned cattle abound in these parts of Mexico. They range over the immense plains in droves, occasionally numbering forty thousand. Their meat is not always the most desirable; but their hides are sent in great quantities to England, France, and the United States. Over ten millions of hides of cattle, and skins of smaller animals, are at times sent away from Mexico in a single year.
I have been much delighted with the Mexican birds. They are found here in immense numbers. There are over two hundred different kinds peculiar to the country. Many of these have a plumage that is superlatively splendid; but the display of their music does not equal that of their colors. The [pg. 23] singing of the Mexican birds, as a general thing, is not as clear nor as nor as varied as that of the birds of the United States. They beat ours in show; but they do not equal them in harmony.
The city of Mexico, to which we are now marching, and which we expect to possess in a few weeks, is, as you know, one of the most beautifully located in the world. It was originally built with great care. The streets are wide; and as the cooling winds come down from the neighboring mountains, sweeping over fields of clover, groves of magnolias, orchards of oranges, and gardens of flowers, they fill the air with a delightful and healthful fragrance. The city is built at right angles, with perfect regularity. In this respect it will compare favorably with any other capital or metropolis in either of the four quarters of the earth.
But I hear the taps as I write, and must be on the move. I have written this letter with my sword fastened on my side, and my pistols within reach; not knowing but that the next moment I may be called into battle again.
With remembrance to all our friends, I remain,
If these letters were authentic they presumably were still in existence in 1864, by which time their historical importance would have been appreciated. There is no indication of their history or present existence, although other letters from Grant to his father do exist. One of the printed letters is signed "Ulysses Sidney Grant," despite the evidence that at the time Grant used the signature "Ulysses. H. Grant" and this version of Grant's name was a private delusion of Major Penniman. The letter from Mexico is addressed to Jesse Grant at Georgetown, Ohio; Jesse Grant had moved to Bethel some years earlier, something his son knew and Major Penniman did not. Nowhere in these letters are there references to other members of the family, friends, or anything else of a personal nature. The one known Grant personal letter of West Point days (written to a cousin) is full of such matters. And the authentic letter shows Grant impressed with the patriotic traditions of West Point but by no means enthusiastic over army life. The letters in The Tanner-Boy are insufferably priggish; Grant was not. For stylistic parallels one need look no further than the other pages of The Tanner-Boy; the signature is Grant, but the voice is the [pg. 24] voice of Major Penniman.
A glance at The Tanner-Boy is not likely to inspire confidence in the authenticity of the letters; in fact, the first page of the introduction refers to the hero as Ulysses Sidney Grant. In the early pages are several boyhood conversations of Ulysses in quotation marks, and even some quoted ruminations ("I must make up in wit what I lack in strength."). The narrative bubbles with inaccuracies but never lacks moral lessons for young readers. In short, this is a familiar type of nineteenth century children's literature in which a biography is used as a teaching device and the author does not feel bound by conventional canons of historical accuracy. Until such time as the originals of these letters appear, or some other evidence of their validity is uncovered, there is no reason to accept them as authentic.
NEWS NOTES *** The Ulysses S. Grant Association has received a grant of $7500 from the National Historical Publications Commission for the coming fiscal year. *** Copies of the oval table upon which Grant wrote his surrender terms at Appomattox are being sold by Biggs Antique Company, 792 Peachtree Street, N.E., Atlanta 8, Georgia. *** Allan Nevins, chairman of the editorial board of the Grant Association, recently received an honorary degree from Oxford University. Ralph G. Newman and Carl Haverlin, directors of the Grant Association, attended the ceremony.
The Ulysses S. Grant Association Newsletter, III, 1 (Oct. 1965). ADAM BADEAU ON APPOMATTOX *** In late 1862, Lieutenant Colonel James Harrison Wilson was assigned to General Grant's staff as topographical engineer. An 1860 West Point graduate, Wilson already had considerable staff experience with Generals Thomas W. Sherman, David Hunter, and George B. McClellan. In time he found that both John A. Rawlins, Grant's chief of staff, and Grant himself were not entirely satisfied with current staff personnel. On May 2, 1863, the day after the battle of Port Gibson in the Vicksburg campaign, Wilson first suggested to Grant that he obtain a military secretary. Grant replied that he had been thinking about that himself, and asked if Wilson had someone in mind. Wilson suggested Adam Badeau, asking if Grant recalled seeing him during the Corinth campaign. At first Grant did not, but when Wilson described him as a "short, stoop-shouldered, red-headed fellow who wore glasses," Grant began to recall "a little pale, blue-eyed man, who wore spectacles and looked like a bent fo'-pence." Grant soon requested that Badeau be assigned to his staff. Badeau, the descendant of a Huguenot family, was born in New York City and had a secondary-school education in Tarrytown, New York. He wrote articles for newspapers and, in 1859, published a collection of essays, The Vagabond. The outbreak of the Civil War found him a clerk in the State Department. He accompanied the expedition to Port Royal, South Carolina, as a reporter for the New York Express. As his stay in Port Royal lengthened [pg. 2] and news for New York decreased, he organized and edited a soldier paper, the Port Royal New South, and eventually joined General Thomas W. Sherman's staff. Even before officially joining the army he served as a volunteer aide on the staff of General Quincy A. Gillmore during the bombardment of Port Pulaski. Although Badeau's nearsightedness and weakness were severe handicaps in military life, his intelligence and determination were compensations.
Henry Adams, who dined regularly with Badeau in Washington in 1869, described him as "exceedingly social, though not in appearance imposing. He was stout; his face was red, and his habits were regularly irregular; but be was very intelligent, a good newspaper man, and an excellent military historian." Grant had chuckled for days at the comic sight of Badeau and his saddle lying on the ground after he had ridden his horse between two close-set trees. But Grant also turned to Badeau for his first serious talk about the significance of Appomattox. The very day Badeau received his orders to report to Grant's headquarters (May 27, 1863) he received a wound in his foot while accompanying General Sherman in a charge at Port Hudson. During part of a lengthy recuperation in New York City, Badeau was cared for by his old friend Edwin Booth and his brother, John Wilkes Booth. Badeau finally joined Grant at Nashville in February, 1864, shortly before Grant shifted headquarters to the Army of the Potomac. When Grant went east he took with him Rawlins, Badeau, and five other staff officers, none a regular, but the staff was soon augmented by Horace Porter and Orville E. Babcock, both young West Point graduates of considerable promise; Cyrus Comstock, an experienced engineer, rejoining the staff; Frederick Dent, Grant's brother-in-law and roommate at West Point; and in September, Ely S. Parker, to share the duties of military secretary with Badeau. Between the winnowing away of old members of the western staff and the addition of young military pro[pg.3]fessionals, Grant had a competent and efficient staff by the close of the war.
In the meantime, the career of James Harrison Wilson had advanced with dazzling speed. In the same month in which Badeau joined the staff, Wilson left it to become Chief of the Cavalry Bureau of the War Department. After a few months there, during which he effected a complete reorganization, he led the Third Cavalry Division of Sheridan's corps through the 1864 Virginia campaigns. In October, he was reassigned to command the cavalry corps under General W. T. Sherman, and Led the last campaign of the war which captured Selma, Montgomery, and Jefferson Davis. At the end of the war, aged 28, he was a brevet Major General of Volunteers. Wilson never lost touch with Grant's headquarters nor his interest in the staff. The Princeton University Library has seventy-nine letters from Badeau to Wilson, including the one printed below. Badeau wrote two printed accounts of the last days of the Civil War, neither, however, containing all the details in his letter to Wilson. Badeau found Grant "as kind as I had anticipated" at their first meeting. The longer he knew Grant the greater grew his admiration. "As for Grant," wrote Badeau, "I love him better every day. His magnanimity, his unselfishness, his freedom from vanity, his purity place him beyond any character in history."
Your deeply interesting letter containing the account of Jeff Davis's capture reached me yesterday; I have read portions of it to a great many interested listeners, who found a great deal to admire in the style as well as in the matter. I wish you joy again and again dear Harry, of all your good fortune. All your friends here are prouder of you than ever; all but me. I am proud for you, but I felt just as proud of you years ago, when our intimacy first commenced. I have just read Gen Thomas's flattering despatch to Gen. Grant, a copy of which was forwarded to you.1 copied the part that would delight Delie and sent it to her. You are very good to write to me so often amid all your engagements. I should have sent you full details of occurrences here had I dreamed that you were so isolated. I have however been away the last three weeks myself, on the [pg. 4] Mississippi, but got back in time to witness the review of Sherman's army. Of course the occasion was magnificent and inspiring beyond any spectacle of modern times. The General and Shezmm seem to be as true friends as ever. Sherman put his arm around Grant's waist, after the review, but while every body was still on the platform. And indeed Sherman now owes Grant more than ever. Public opinion stands thus. The condemnation of Sherman's act is universal, but in consideration of his brilliant services the country is willing to forgive and forget it. Grant's wonderful magnanimity in throwing the mantle of his protection around his ambitious subordinate is equal to the generosity he displayed to Lee. What a wonderful man he is. His goodness is greater than his greatness. History presents no such character in all her crowded pages. Sherman seems determined to make a fight with the Sec., and the more he and his partisans stir the matter the worse it will be for his fame. He cannot be defended, only excused or rather pardoned. I have no doubt whatever that I have already told you the actuating cause of his conduct. Every [man] about the General, agrees with me. He of course will not see it. But Sherman is full of fascinations, and I can concieve of nothing more interesting than to hear him tell for hours the story and incidents of his campaigns.
I like Mr. Johnson's looks and manner very much. He impressed me as a man of character and ability; also of much dignity. All that I know of his action since his advent to power, also impresses me favorably. He does not display that bitterness which is attributed to him. He is bitter only to that pestilent doctrine which has caused all of our trouble--state sovereignty, and has no mercy for that. The General thinks he (G) has every reason to be satisfied with the support that Johnson gives him. Mrs. Grant is living in Washington, at Halleck's former residence.
You ask me to tell you every thing, but it is two months since I have really written up to you; and the crowd of events through which I have passed in that time would take me a month more to tell of. I cant describe the campaign, with its wonders. Let me remember two or three things which you would like to know, and then I'll tell you a little about the surrender, Lee, and Richmond. I'm afraid twill all be stale though before it reaches you. Yet only at your urgent and repeated request that I go back to it now.
First, about the news just now. We havnt heard definitely today from Kirby Smith; but expect to hear of his surrender, daily. Lee has not taken the oath, but his three sons have. W. H. Lee is raising vegetables and brought a load to market the other day. Lee is willing to take the oath, but thinks his precepts will have more weight, if not preceded by his example. The developments of the conspiracy fasten guilt very plainly upon prominent people in Canada and Richmond. Judge Campbell is especially implicated: yet I had a conversation with him in Richmond about the assassination in which he reprobated it strongly. I urged him to get up a card or something of that sort but he didnt take to the suggestion, though he said he had no objection to the use of his name. Lee too told me that he was indignant that the attempt should be made to saddle the advisor of this upon the south.
Sheridan was the fighter of the campaign. Twas his personal influence over his men that decided the fight at Five Forks. We had not been successful the day before; his own cavalry had been fighting infantry and compelled to retire before the very force which had just come from whipping Warren; Sheridan took the same troops, the 5th corps, and his own command, and overwhelmed the enemy. Then Grant rose to those magnificent proportions which he always develops in an emergency: After all his experience in assaulting works, after the year since Culpeper, it required more courage than any other man could show to order an assault all along our lines. But when he got the full news of Sheridan's success, he did not wait a moment to con[pg.5]sider or consult; ran into his tent, wrote two or three lines; first ordering an assault that night (twas near 9 P. M.) but the corps commanders could not get ready; and then he designated daybreak as the hour. He hadn't a doubt that we should get inside. After this, there was no pause, no hesitancy, no doubt what to do. He commanded Lee's army as much as he did his own; caused and knew beforehand every movement that Lee made, up to the actual surrender. The marching of the troops contributed to the last and complete result as much as the fighting. There was no let up; fighting and marching, and Grant negotiating and fighting all at once. This accounts for the change in Lee's views; at the beginning of the correspondence you remember, he said he didnt agree with Grant that surrender was inevitable, and he didn't think so on the very morning that it occurred. Then Grant had him completely surrounded: Meade was chasing him on one road, and Sheridan with Ord and the 5th Corps were sent to head him off; outmarched him and got around him; so that after the surrender, Grant who was with Sheridan, communicated with Meade on the shortest line, thro Lee's army. I was present at the interview which terminated in the surrender. Lee behaved with great dignity and courtesy, but no cordiality; he seemed depressed, and talked but little. Grant was perfect in his demeanor, because completely simple and natural. Lee made no demands whatever, accepted whatever Grant suggested. He asked what terms the General would allow him; Grant said the surrender of men and public property, officers and men to be paroled. Lee acquiesced, and Grant says that while putting on paper these terms, he was so touched by Lee's absence of hauteur, in his complete acquiescence, that he inserted the paragraph allowing officers to retain their side arms and personal property. Lee then asked whether the horses of the men were to be given up, stating that in his army they were personal property. Grant said the terms included them. Lee acknowledged this, when Grant said he would not change the terms, but would instruct his officers who superintended the paroling, to allow the men to retain their horses. So that they could take them home to work their farms. Lee said this would have a very good effect.
Next day the Gen started out for a ride into the Rebel lines, with his staff, but the pickets had no instructions to allow us to enter, and an officer was sent up to Gen Lee. He came in person to the front, and he and the General had an interview of an hour and a half. Lee had nobody with him but an orderly; Grant had Sheridan Gibbon, Griffin, Merritt, and his own staff; all kept aloof in a sort of semi-circle around Grant, too far to hear the conversation. Twas on a hill just between the two armies. Both armies were in full sight. I had not got such a view of the Rebels since we left Culpeper. Appomattox is on this hill right in a long valley; on the two opposite sides of the valley lay the two armies, completely in sight of each other. Their conversation developped Lee's views very fully. He was for peace, submission, giving up slavery and state sovereignty as having both been "In the summer of 1864--immediately after the National Convention at which Mr. Lincoln was nominated the second time; I asked him, one day, in a private conversation, what precisely, was his idea of that greatness, on the part of Grant, as a commander--which seemed to have impressed him, so very deeply. After a moment's hesitation, he said: 'Nothing could persuade this man, that he was whipped--till he was actually whipped: he could never be made to believe, even under a complete surprise, that fifty men were five hundred: he had as much sense and as complete possessession [sic] of his faculties, when suddenly waked up under attack, as when he plans & leads the attack; in the very crisis of the greatest battle, his senses, his faculties, his knowledge--are as much under his full & instant power of use, as under any other circumstances. And then Mr. Lincoln illustrated, by various great & striking circumstance--these great qualities of Grant--which mustered into professional language--explains so large a part of the grand career he has run--and so large a part of our hopes, for the career still, as I trust, before him.
Major General Ulysses S. Grant, 3rd, first grandson of President Grant, graduated from West Point as his father and grandfather before him, and served over forty years in the army. During this time he was in the Philippines, 1903-1904, in Cuba in 1906, in Mexico in 1914 and 1916, a member of the General Staff Corps during the First World War, with the Supreme War Council and the American Commission to Negotiate Peace at Versailles, and in the Office of Civilian Defense during the Second World War.
"Visiting a gentleman's estate when in Great Britain, [Grant] was invited out on the links to witness a game of golf. Induced to enter the game and being given a club by the caddy, the General looked earnestly at the ball, then at his club, and having measured the distance carefully made a strike, his club going six inches above the ball. Disappointed at this failure, a more careful estimate was made of length of club and distance to ball and another swing was made, the club striking the ground one [pg. 5] foot before reaching the ball. Without change of countenance, the General made several other efforts to hit the ball, but without success. Returning the club to the caddy, General Grant remarked to the gentleman beside him, "I have always understood the game of golf was good outdoor exercise and especially for the arms. I fail, however, to see what use there is for a ball in the game."
The birth of a son to Jesse R. Grant and Hannah Simpson Grant on April 27, 1822, at Pt. Pleasant, Ohio, brought about an animated family conference on the subject of his name. The baby's maternal grandmother and father favored Ulysses, since both had recently read a novel in which the legendary Greek hero appeared. The maternal grandfather argued for the sturdy Biblical name of Hiram. The mother and aunt preferred Albert, in honor of the distinguished statesman, Albert Gallatin, while another aunt clung to the romantic Theodore. Finally, the matter was decided by having each put a name in a hat. Although the name drawn was Ulysses, it was finally decided that the baptismal name would be Hiram Ulysses Grant, to satisfy both grandparents. But Jesse chose to call his son Ulysses, and gradually Hiram was forgotten. The boy's contemporaries called him Ulyss or Lyss, although some corrupted the name to "Useless."
Ohio State University.
[pg. 10] "Pittsburg, April 11 1862. On the Battlefield."
Your husband,
W. S. Hillyer.He went quite freely everywhere alone. I remember one spot in particular where I often crossed him--a little cottage on the outskirts of Washington: he was frequently there--going there often. I learned that an old couple of whom he was very fond lived there. He had met them in Virginia--they received him in a plain democratic way: I would see him leaning on their window sills outside: all would be talking together: they seeming to treat him without deference for place--with dignity, courtesy, appreciation.9
Sept. 28, '79.--So General Grant, after circumambiating the world, has arrived home again--landed in San Francisco yesterday, from the ship City of Tokio from Japan. What a man he is! what a history! what an illustration--his life--of the capacities of that American individuality common to us all. Cynical critics are wondering "what the people can see in Grant" to make such a hubbub about. They aver (and it is no doubt true) that he has hardly the average of our day's literary and scholastic culture, and absolutely no pronounc'd genius or conventional eminence of any sort. Correct: but he proves how an average western farmer, mechanic, boatman, carried by tides of circumstances, perhaps caprices, into a position of incredible military or civic responsibilities, (history has presented none more trying, no born monarch's, no mark more shining for attack or envy,) may steer his way fitly and steadily through them all, carrying the country and himself with credit year after year--command over a million armed men--fight more than fifty pitch'd battles--rule for eight years a land larger than all the kingdoms of Europe combined--and then, retiring, quietly (with a cigar in his mouth) make the [pg. 17] promenade of the whole world, through its courts and coteries, and kings and czars and mikados, and splendidest glitters and etiquettes, as phlegmatically as he ever walk'd the portico of a Missouri hotel after dinner. I say all this is what people like--and I am sure I like it. Seems to me it transcends Plutarch. How those old Greeks, indeed, would have seized on him! A mere plain man--no art, no poetry--only practical sense, ability to do, or try his best to do, what devolv'd upon him. A common trader, money-maker, tanner, farmer of Illinois--general for the republic, in its terrific struggle with itself, in the war of attempted secession--President following, (a task of peace, more difficult than the war itself)--nothing heroic, as the authorities put it--and yet the greatest hero. The gods, the destinies, seem to have concentrated upon him.
To U. S. G. return'd from his World's TourWhat best I see in thee,
is not that where thou mov'st down history's great highways,
Ever undimm'd by time shoots warlike victory's dazzle,
Or that thou sat'st where Washington say, ruling the land in peace,
Or thou the man whom feudal Europe feted, venerable Asia swarm'd upon,
Who walk'd with kings with even pace the round world's promenade;
But that in foreign lands, in all thy walks with kings
Those prairie sovereigns of the West, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois,
Ohio's, Indiana's millions, comrades, farmers, soldiers, all to the front,
Invisibly with thee walking with kings with even pace the round world's promenade,
Were all so justified.When a visitor spoke the name of Grant, Walt Whitman bowed his head as the whole nation has bowed beneath a common grief. When at last the poet spoke it was in the tone of one who has lost a dear friend, yet he pondered his words and weighed each sentence carefully.
2. Ibid., I, 446.
3. Ibid., II, 139.
4. Ibid., I, 257. See ibid., II, 467-468.
5. Ibid., III, 341.
6. Whitman to his mother, April 26, 1864, Edwin Haviland Miller, ed., Walt Whitman: The Correspondence (N.Y., 1961- ), I, 213.
7. Whitman to John Swinton, Feb. 3, 1865, ibid., I, 252-253. Traubel, Whitman in Camden, II, 425-427.
8. Whitman to his mother, [December, 1871], Whitman, Correspondence, II, 147. See also Whitman to Grant, [February, 1874], June 22, 1874, ibid., II, 280-281, 306.
9. Traubel, Whitman in Camden, I, 257-258.
10. (Philadelphia, 1882-1883), 153-154.
11. Traubel, Whitman in Camden, II, 269-270.
12. XXIX, 1482 (May 16, 1885), 310.
13. Herman Dieck, The most Complete and Authentic History of the Life and Public Services of General U. S. Grant.... (Philadelphia, 1885), 743-744.
Galena Ill May 28th '60
Hon C. M. Clay
Dear Sir,[pg. 24] ...I will say, in the first place, that I was never so much disappointed in my life, in my previously formed opinions, of either the personal appearance or bearing of any one, about whom I had read and heard so much. The disappointment, moreover, was in every respect favorable and agreeable. I was instantly struck with the great simplicity and perfect naturalness of his manners, and the entire absence of everything like affectation, show, or even the usual military air or mien of men in his position. He was plainly attired, sitting in a log-cabin, busily writing on a small table, by a Kerosene lamp. It was night when we arrived. There was nothing in his appearance or surroundings which indicated his official rank. There were neither guards nor aids about him. Upon Colonel Babcock's rapping at his door, the response, "Come in," was given by himself, in a tone of voice, and with a cadence, which I can never forget.
The officers of the army on duty at Washington were very civil to me, especially General Grant, whom I had known prior to and during the Mexican war as a modest, amiable, but by no means promising, lieutenant In a marching regiment. He came frequently to see me, was full of kindness, and anxious to promote my wishes. His action in preventing violation of the terms of surrender, and a subsequent report that he made of the condition of the South--a report not at all pleasing to the radicals--endeared him to all Southern men. Indeed, he was in a position to play a role second only to that of Washington, who founded the Republic; for he had the power to restore it. His bearing and conduct at this time were admirable, modest, and generous; and I talked much with him of the noble and beneficent work before him. While his heart seemed to respond, he declared his ignorance of and distaste for politics and politicians, with which and whom he intended to have nothing to do, but confine himself to his duties of commander-in-chief of the army. Yet he expressed a desire for the speedy restoration of good feeling between the sections, and an intention to advance it in all proper ways.
Within a few weeks of Grant's death, a member of General Lee's staff said to a friend, who had mentioned Hancock's high opinion of his old chief: "That reminds me of Lee's opinion of your great Union general, uttered in my presence in reply to a disparaging remark on the part of a person who referred to Grant as a 'military accident, who had no distinguishing merit, but had achieved success through a combination of fortunate circumstances.' General Lee looked into the critic's eye steadily, and said: 'Sir, your opinion is a very poor compliment to me. We all thought [pg. 26] Richmond, protected as it was by our splendid fortifications and defended by our army of veterans, could not be taken. Yet Grant turned his face to our capital, and never turned it away until we had surrendered. Now, I have carefully searched the military records of both ancient and modern history, and have never found Grant's superior as a general. I doubt if his superior can be found in all history.'"
There is one West Pointer, I think In Missouri, little known, and whom I hope the Northern people will not find out. I mean Sam Grant. I knew him well at the Academy and in Mexico. I should fear him more than any of their officers I have yet heard of. He is not a man of genius, but he is clear-headed, quick, and daring.
Surely no Southerner would take more pleasure than I do in honoring the memory of General Grant, and no place could be more congenial than the city of Philadelphia.
"He was the truest as well as the bravest man that ever lived," was the remark made by Gen. James Longstreet, when he recovered to-day from the emotion caused by the sad news of Gen. Grant's death. Gen. Longstreet lives in a two-story house of modern style about three miles from Gainesville, where, amid his vines and shrubs, he was seen by The Times's correspondent. He was dressed in a long and many colored dressing gown; his white whiskers were trimmed after the pattern of Burnside's, and he looked little like the stalwart figure which was ever in the thickest of the fight during the bloody battles of the late war.
The fame of Grant is of the kind that endures. Times will reveal more distinctly the strong, simple, massive grandeur of his character and career. The 20th century will nationalize more and more its heterogeneous civilization and will nationalize its heroes, and Grant will hold a place with Washington in the hearts of his countrymen. His military genius was of the highest order. He is of the class and kind of Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte, superior to them in that his military achievements were actuated by the purest patriotism. The victorious leader of a mighty army, he was guilty of none of the excesses of Napoleon; "Let us have Peace" were words of sincerity--spoken by one who accomplished mighty deeds without ostentation, content with having done his duty. My friendship for Grant began at West Point and continued unbroken even by the Civil War to the day of his death. At West Point he concealed under an excessive modesty those qualities which later led to eminence in peace and war. Personally Grant was a warm-hearted, lovable friend, a magnanimous opponent. More than any man of the century he embodied in his character the genius of the American people; loyalty to the Constitution, tireless activity, executive power and swiftness and profound respect for American citizenship. His greatness was marked by a modesty of mind and manner that never forsook him, a modesty so noticeable as to win for him the appellation of 'the silent man of destiny." His life taken as a whole was rounded and complete. Victorious as a soldier, eminent as a statesman, honored as a private citizen with the salutations of the world, happy in his domestic relationship, he closed his long and brilliant career as the historian of the era he so largely shaped.
2. James Longstreet, From Manassas to Appomattox (Philadelphia, 1896), 18.
3. Ibid., 20.
4. Helen D. Longstreet, Lee and Longstreet at High Tide (Gainesville, Ga., 1904), 196.
5. John Russell Young, Around the World with General Grant (N.Y., 1879), II, 212; Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant (N.Y., 1885-1886), II, 86-87.
6. Horace Porter, Campaigning with Grant (N.Y., 1897), 46-47.
7. Longstreet to Lee, April 2, 1864, O.R., I, XXXII, 3, 737.
8. An account of Grant-Longstreet postwar relations will appear in a future Newsletter.
9. Printed July 24, 1885.
10. James Grant Wilson, General Grant (N.Y., 1897), 29-30.
11. Longstreet, Lee and Longstreet, 101. See Lloyd Lewis, Captain Sam Grant (Boston, 1950), 285; Sanger and Hay, Longstreet, 13.
12. Longstreet, Manassas to Appomattox, 18.
13. Wilson, General Grant, 69-7l; Longstreet, Lee and Longstreet, 140-141.
14. See Speech of Senator Pomerene, Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly, XXXI, 3 (July, 1922), 268.
15. Longstreet, Manassas to Appomattox, 630; Longstreet, Lee and Longstreet 102-103.
A little before noon on April 7, 1865, General Grant, with his staff, rode into the little village of Farmville, on the south side of the Appomattox River, a town that will be memorable in history as the place where he opened the correspondence with Lee which, two days later, led to the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. He drew up in front of the village hotel, a comfortable brick building, dismounted, and established headquarters on its broad piazza. News come in that Crook was fighting large odds with his cavalry on the north side of the river, and I was directed to go to his front and see what was necessary to be done to assist him. I found that he was being driven back, the enemy (Munford's and Rosser's cavalry divisions under Fitzhugh Lee) having made a bold stand north of the river. Humphreys was also on the north side, isolated from the rest of our infantry, confronted by a large portion of Lee's army, and having some heavy fighting. On my return to general headquarters that evening, Wright's corps was ordered to cross the river and move rapidly to the support of our troops there. Notwithstanding their long march that day, the men sprang to their feet with a spirit that made every one marvel at their pluck, and come swinging through the main street of the village with a step that seemed as elastic as one the first day of their toilsome tramp. It was now dark, but they spied the general-in-chief watching them with evident pride from the piazza of the hotel as they marched past. Then was witnessed one of the most inspiring scenes of the campaign. Bonfires were lighted on the sides of the street; the men seized straw and pine-knots, and improvised torches; cheers arose from their throats, already hoarse with shouts of victory; bands played, banners waved, and muskets were swung in the air. A regiment now broke forth with the song of "John Brown's body," and soon a whole division was shouting the swelling chorus of that popular air, which had risen to the dignity of a national anthem. The night march had become a grand review, with Grant as the reviewing officer.
HEADQUARTERS, ARMIES OF THE U.S.
5 P.M., April 7, 1865
General R. E. Lee, Commanding C.S.A.:
Lieutenant-generalApril 7, 1865
General
LIEUTENANT-GENERAL U.S. GRANT,
Commanding Armies of the U.S.April 8, 1865
GENERAL R. E. LEE, Commanding C. S. A.:
Lieutenant-GeneralThe day after the meeting at McLean's House, at which the terms of surrender had been agreed upon, another interview took place between General Grant and General Lee upon the invitation of General Grant.... The conversation turned on the subject of a general peace, as to which General Grant had already declared the want of power to treat, but in speaking of the means by which a general pacification might be effected General Grant said to General Lee, with great emphasis and strong feeling: "General Lee I want this war to end without the shedding of another drop of American blood." Not "Northern" blood, not "Southern" blood, but "American" blood, for in his eyes all the men around him and all those who might be then confronting each other on other fields over the wide area of war were "Americans."
Many years ago, about 1926, a very gentle, charming old lady called at my office in the Navy Building. She said she was from Mississippi and wished before she died to tell same member of our family her experience with General Grant. During the Vicksburg campaign, when she was still a young girl, he had occupied the first floor of her family's home for a few days, the family being left entire use of the upper floors and kitchen. One day she had been coming through the hall with a tray of food, when unexpectedly and much to her terror, she met the Union General in the hall with all escape cut off. He had rather insistently asked her what the tray was for and, trembling, she had to admit that it was for her brother, and that he was a Confederate officer who had been wounded and had come home to recover. The family had been hiding him in the cellar and had suffered tortures of fear lest he be discovered, not knowing what his fate might be. She was greatly surprised to have the General immediately arrange for him to be carried upstairs and treated by the Headquarters surgeon. They had all felt the greatest gratitude and relief at such kindness and consideration, and being 83 years old she had become very worried for fear that she would pass away without a chance to tell some member of his family what a grand and generous foe General Grant was.
My dear Mother,--I have occasionally been called to be separated from you; but never did I feel the full force and effect of this separation as I do now. I seem alone in the world, without my mother. There have been so many ways in which you have advised me, when, in the quiet of home, I have been pursuing my studies, that you cannot tell how much I miss you. When I was busy with father in the tannery and on the farm, we were both more or less surrounded by others, who took up our attention, and occupied our time. But I was so often alone with you, and you spoke to me so frequently in private, that the solitude of my situation here at the academy, among my silent books and in my lonely room, is all the more striking: it reminds me all the more forcibly of home, and most of all, my dear mother, of you. But, in the midst of all this, your kind instructions and admonitions are ever present with me. I trust they may never be absent from me, as long as I live. How often I think of them! and how well do they strengthen me in every good word and work!
Ulysses.
June 4, 1839.
Ulysses Sidney Grant.
May 10, 1847.
Dear parents, your son,
U. S. Grant.
Mr. Jesse R. Grant, Georgetown, Brown County, O.HEADQUARTERS ARMIES OF THE UNITED STATES,
Washington, May 27 1865.
Dear Harry