Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant
Born	Hiram Ulysses Grant 27 4, 1822
Birthplace	Point Pleasant, Ohio, United States
Died	Template:Death date and age Mount McGregor, New York, United States
Nationality	American
Occupation	Military officer, politician, author
Known for	18th President of the United States; Commanding General of the Union Army during the American Civil War
Education	United States Military Academy (B.S., 1843)
Spouse(s)	Julia Dent Grant
Children	4
Awards	General of the Army

Ulysses S. Grant, born Hiram Ulysses Grant on April 27, 1822, in Point Pleasant, Ohio, rose from modest origins to become one of the most consequential figures in American history. As the commanding general who led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War, Grant accepted the surrender of Confederate General Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House in 1865, effectively ending the bloodiest conflict on American soil. His military success propelled him to the presidency, where he served two terms from 1869 to 1877, overseeing the turbulent period of Reconstruction and working to protect the civil rights of formerly enslaved people. Grant's presidency was marked by significant achievements—including the prosecution of the Ku Klux Klan, the peaceful resolution of international disputes, and the establishment of the world's first national park—yet was also shadowed by executive scandals and economic crisis. After leaving office, he became the first president to circumnavigate the globe and, in his final months, composed a memoir that remains one of the most acclaimed works of American nonfiction. Grant died on July 23, 1885, and was at the time of his death among the most popular figures in the nation. His historical reputation, long diminished by the pseudohistorical mythology of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy, has undergone substantial reassessment in the 21st century.

Early Life

Hiram Ulysses Grant was born on April 27, 1822, in Point Pleasant, a small village in Clermont County, Ohio. He was the eldest child of Jesse Root Grant, a tanner, and Hannah Simpson Grant. The family moved to Georgetown, Ohio, shortly after his birth, where Grant spent his childhood. His father operated a tannery, a business the young Grant found disagreeable; he reportedly disliked working with animal hides and preferred laboring with horses, developing an early and notable skill in horsemanship.

Grant's name changed as a result of a clerical error. When he received an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1839, the nominating congressman, Thomas L. Hamer, mistakenly listed his name as "Ulysses S. Grant," using his mother's maiden name of Simpson as the middle initial. Despite Grant's attempts to correct the error, the Academy's records retained the name, and Grant eventually adopted it as his own. The initials "U.S." led to the nicknames "Uncle Sam" and "Sam" among his fellow cadets.

Grant's upbringing in rural Ohio shaped many of his later characteristics. His father, ambitious and outspoken, valued education and ensured that young Grant attended local schools. Jesse Grant's own political connections—he was an acquaintance of several Ohio politicians—proved instrumental in securing the West Point appointment for his son. Grant's mother, by contrast, was reserved and rarely spoke publicly about her son even after he achieved fame. Grant grew up in a household that opposed slavery; his father held abolitionist sentiments, though the family's views were not uncommon in southern Ohio during this period.

Education

Grant entered the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1839 at the age of seventeen. He was not an enthusiastic student in military subjects, and his academic record was mixed. He excelled in mathematics and horsemanship—setting an equestrian high-jump record at the Academy that stood for decades—but ranked in the middle of his class in most other subjects. He graduated in 1843, ranking 21st out of a class of 39 cadets.

At West Point, Grant developed friendships with several cadets who would later serve on both sides of the Civil War. He read extensively during his time at the Academy, favoring novels over military texts. Despite his mediocre academic standing, Grant's time at West Point provided him with the foundational military training that would prove essential in his later career. He had hoped for a posting to a cavalry regiment upon graduation, given his skill with horses, but was instead assigned to the 4th United States Infantry Regiment.

Career

Mexican–American War

After graduating from West Point, Grant was posted to Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis, Missouri, where he met Julia Boggs Dent, the sister of his West Point roommate Frederick Dent. The two became engaged in 1844, though they would not marry until 1848 due to the intervening war with Mexico.

Grant served in the Mexican–American War (1846–1848) under Generals Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott. He participated in several significant engagements, including the battles of Palo Alto, Resaca de la Palma, Monterrey, and the Mexico City campaign. Grant served with distinction and was cited for bravery at the battles of Molino del Rey and Chapultepec. The experience gave him firsthand observation of two different command styles—Taylor's straightforward aggressiveness and Scott's more methodical approach to logistics and planning—both of which influenced his own generalship during the Civil War. Despite his personal bravery and commendations, Grant later described the Mexican–American War as "one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation."

Interwar Period and Civilian Life

Following the Mexican–American War, Grant married Julia Dent on August 22, 1848. He was subsequently posted to a series of remote military assignments on the Pacific Coast, separated from his growing family. Stationed at Fort Humboldt in California, Grant grew increasingly isolated and unhappy. He resigned his commission in 1854 under circumstances that have long been the subject of historical debate; accounts suggest that his commanding officer gave him the choice of resignation or facing a court-martial for alcohol-related incidents, though the precise details remain contested among historians.

Grant's return to civilian life proved difficult. He attempted farming on land near St. Louis owned by his wife's family, but the enterprise failed. He tried selling real estate and working as a bill collector, with similarly poor results. By 1860, Grant was working as a clerk in his father's leather goods store in Galena, Illinois, a position he found humiliating. This period of financial hardship and personal struggle marked the lowest point in Grant's life before the Civil War, and it would later fuel narratives—many of them exaggerated or distorted—about his character and habits.

Civil War

The outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861 offered Grant an opportunity to return to military service. Drawing on his West Point training and Mexican–American War experience, he helped organize volunteer regiments in Illinois and was appointed colonel of the 21st Illinois Volunteer Infantry in June 1861. He was subsequently promoted to brigadier general of volunteers.

Grant first gained national attention with the capture of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson in Tennessee in February 1862. At Fort Donelson, when Confederate General Simon Bolivar Buckner requested terms for surrender, Grant responded with his famous demand for "unconditional surrender," earning him the nickname "Unconditional Surrender Grant." These victories were among the first significant Union successes in the war and opened the way for Union advances into the Confederate heartland.

In April 1862, Grant's forces were nearly overrun at the Battle of Shiloh in southwestern Tennessee when Confederate troops launched a surprise attack. Grant rallied his forces and, with reinforcements, counterattacked the following day, forcing a Confederate retreat. The battle's high casualties—more than 23,000 combined—shocked the nation and led to public criticism of Grant, but President Abraham Lincoln reportedly defended him, stating, "I can't spare this man. He fights."

The Vicksburg campaign of 1862–1863 represented Grant's most brilliant strategic achievement. The Confederate fortress city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, controlled a vital stretch of the Mississippi River and had resisted multiple Union attempts at capture. Grant executed a daring campaign in which he marched his troops down the west bank of the Mississippi, crossed the river south of Vicksburg, and then swept inland, winning a series of battles before besieging the city. Vicksburg surrendered on July 4, 1863—one day after the Union victory at Gettysburg—giving Union forces control of the entire Mississippi River and effectively splitting the Confederacy in two.

Following the Vicksburg triumph, Grant was given command of the Military Division of the Mississippi. In November 1863, he directed the Union victory at the Battle of Chattanooga, breaking the Confederate siege of that strategically vital Tennessee city. These successes led Lincoln to promote Grant to the rank of lieutenant general in March 1864, a rank that had been held previously only by George Washington (in a full permanent sense). Grant was placed in command of all Union armies.

As general-in-chief, Grant devised a coordinated strategy to apply simultaneous pressure on the Confederacy across multiple theaters. He personally accompanied the Army of the Potomac in the east, directing the Overland Campaign against Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in the spring and summer of 1864. The campaign involved a series of brutal engagements—the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, Cold Harbor, and the siege of Petersburg—that incurred heavy Union casualties but steadily wore down Confederate resources and manpower. Unlike previous Union commanders in the east, Grant refused to retreat after setbacks and maintained relentless pressure on Lee's forces.

The siege of Petersburg lasted from June 1864 to April 1865. When Lee's lines finally broke, the Confederate army evacuated Richmond and retreated westward. Grant pursued and, on April 9, 1865, Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia. Grant offered generous terms of surrender, allowing Confederate officers to keep their sidearms and permitting soldiers who owned horses to take them home. When Union troops began firing celebratory salutes, Grant ordered them to stop, saying, "The war is over. The Rebels are our countrymen again."

Postwar Military Service and Break with Johnson

After the war, Grant oversaw the demobilization of the Union Army. In 1866, President Andrew Johnson promoted him to the newly created rank of General of the Army, making Grant the first American to hold a four-star general rank.

Grant's relationship with President Johnson became increasingly strained over the question of Reconstruction. Johnson pursued a lenient policy toward the former Confederate states, vetoing civil rights legislation and opposing the Fourteenth Amendment. Grant, who had come to support the rights of formerly enslaved people during the war, found himself in a position of constitutional difficulty as the military officer tasked with implementing policies he increasingly opposed. The crisis of 1866–1867 placed Grant in a position that no American military officer had previously faced, requiring him to navigate competing loyalties to the president and to the law.

When Johnson attempted to remove Secretary of War Edwin Stanton in violation of the Tenure of Office Act, Grant initially served as interim secretary of war but then returned the office to Stanton rather than assist Johnson's defiance of Congress. This decision represented a decisive break between Grant and the president and cemented Grant's standing with the Republican Party and the Radical Republicans in Congress.

Presidency (1869–1877)

Grant was unanimously nominated as the Republican candidate for president in 1868. Running on the slogan "Let Us Have Peace," he defeated Democratic candidate Horatio Seymour. At 46 years old, he was at that time the youngest person ever elected president.

First Term

Grant's first term was marked by significant achievements in civil rights, governance reform, and foreign policy. He worked with Radical Republicans in Congress to enforce Reconstruction in the Southern states and to protect the rights of African Americans. Grant supported and signed the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which prohibited denial of the right to vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

One of Grant's most significant actions was the prosecution of the Ku Klux Klan. He signed the Enforcement Acts of 1870 and 1871 (the latter also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act), which authorized the use of federal troops and the suspension of habeas corpus to combat Klan violence in the South. Grant appointed Amos T. Akerman as attorney general to lead this effort. Akerman, himself a former Confederate soldier who had undergone a conversion in his views on race, pursued the Klan with vigor, securing hundreds of convictions and effectively dismantling the organization in many Southern states.

Grant signed the legislation creating the United States Department of Justice in 1870, providing the federal government with a dedicated legal apparatus to enforce civil rights laws and pursue federal prosecutions. In 1871, he established the first Civil Service Commission, an early attempt to reform the federal patronage system, though the commission lacked sufficient congressional support to achieve lasting change during his tenure.

On March 1, 1872, Grant signed the Yellowstone National Park Protection Act into law, establishing Yellowstone as the world's first national park and introducing the concept of a national park—land set aside by the federal government for preservation and public enjoyment—into American law and, eventually, into the practice of nations worldwide.

In foreign policy, Grant's administration achieved the peaceful resolution of the Alabama Claims, a diplomatic dispute with Great Britain arising from British-built Confederate warships that had damaged Union shipping during the Civil War. Through the Treaty of Washington (1871) and subsequent international arbitration, Britain agreed to pay $15.5 million in damages. The resolution was a landmark in international arbitration and Anglo-American relations. Grant's attempt to annex Santo Domingo (the Dominican Republic), however, was rejected by the Senate.

Grant was reelected in 1872, defeating Liberal Republican and Democratic candidate Horace Greeley by a substantial margin.

Second Term

Grant's second term was overshadowed by economic crisis and political scandal. The Panic of 1873 triggered a severe economic depression—later known as the Long Depression—that lasted through the remainder of Grant's presidency and beyond. Grant's response, which included vetoing an inflationary currency bill and supporting a return to the gold standard through the Specie Payment Resumption Act of 1875, was seen by many as inadequate to address the widespread unemployment and economic hardship. The economic downturn contributed to a Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives in the 1874 midterm elections.

Several scandals tarnished the Grant administration during the second term, including the Whiskey Ring—in which government officials conspired with distillers to defraud the government of tax revenue—and allegations of corruption involving Secretary of War William Belknap. While Grant was not personally implicated in these schemes, his loyalty to subordinates and his initial reluctance to act against those accused damaged his reputation. These scandals contributed to a long-lasting perception of the Grant presidency as corrupt, a characterization that modern historians have argued is significantly overstated.

Grant's commitment to Reconstruction waned during his second term, partly due to political fatigue in the North and the shifting priorities brought about by the economic crisis. During the disputed presidential election of 1876, Grant facilitated a peaceful resolution through congressional compromise, which resulted in the election of Rutherford B. Hayes and the effective end of Reconstruction.

Post-Presidency

After leaving office in March 1877, Grant and his wife Julia embarked on a two-year world tour, becoming the first presidential couple to circumnavigate the globe. They visited Europe, the Middle East, India, China, and Japan, meeting with heads of state including Queen Victoria, Otto von Bismarck, and Emperor Meiji. The tour restored much of Grant's popularity at home.

In 1880, Grant sought the Republican nomination for an unprecedented third presidential term. He led on the first ballot at the Republican National Convention but was unable to secure a majority over the course of 36 ballots, and the nomination ultimately went to James A. Garfield.

Grant subsequently became a partner in a financial firm, Grant & Ward, with Ferdinand Ward. The firm collapsed in 1884 when Ward was revealed to have been running a Ponzi scheme, leaving Grant virtually bankrupt. Compounding his financial ruin, Grant was diagnosed with throat cancer, likely caused by his lifelong cigar smoking.

Facing impending death and desperate to provide for his family, Grant began writing his memoirs. Working with publisher Mark Twain, Grant composed the two-volume Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant in a race against his deteriorating health. He completed the manuscript just days before his death on July 23, 1885, at a cottage on Mount McGregor, New York. The memoirs were published posthumously and became both a critical and commercial success, earning approximately $450,000 for Grant's family. The work is considered one of the finest military memoirs in the English language, praised for its clarity, honesty, and literary quality.

Personal Life

Grant married Julia Boggs Dent on August 22, 1848. Julia was the daughter of Frederick Dent, a slaveholder from a plantation near St. Louis, Missouri. The couple had four children: Frederick, Ulysses Jr. (known as "Buck"), Ellen (known as "Nellie"), and Jesse. By all accounts, Grant and Julia shared a devoted marriage that endured long separations, financial hardship, and the pressures of public life.

Grant's relationship with alcohol has been the subject of extensive historical commentary. While accounts of heavy drinking during the prewar period and parts of the Civil War exist, modern biographers have noted that these stories were frequently exaggerated by political rivals and have been used to construct an inaccurate portrait of Grant as a habitual drunkard. Biographer Ronald C. White and others have argued that Grant's drinking was episodic rather than chronic and that it did not impair his military or presidential performance in any significant way.

Grant's decision to issue General Orders No. 11 in December 1862, which expelled Jewish people from the Department of the Tennessee, remains one of the most controversial episodes of his career. The order, which Grant later acknowledged was wrong, was issued amid frustration over wartime smuggling in cotton trading. It was revoked by President Lincoln within weeks. Grant later expressed regret for the order and, as president, appointed numerous Jewish Americans to federal positions.

Recognition

Grant received numerous honors during and after his lifetime. His tomb, Grant's Tomb, located in Riverside Park in Manhattan, New York City, was at the time of its completion in 1897 the largest mausoleum in North America. Both Ulysses and Julia Grant are interred there.

Grant's likeness appears on the United States fifty-dollar bill, where it has been featured since 1913. Numerous cities, counties, parks, and schools across the United States bear his name.

In October 2024, Grant received a posthumous promotion to the rank of General of the Armies of the United States, a distinction previously held only by George Washington (who received it posthumously in 1976) and John J. Pershing. The promotion, which had been sought by Grant's admirers for many years, was signed into law more than 139 years after his death.

Descendants of Grant have continued to participate in public life and in preserving his legacy. In 2026, descendants of Grant, along with those of Presidents James Garfield and Grover Cleveland, were scheduled to speak at a public forum in Caldwell, New Jersey.

Legacy

Grant's historical reputation has undergone significant revision over the course of the 20th and 21st centuries. At the time of his death in 1885, he was among the most admired Americans and was widely memorialized as a symbol of national unity. However, beginning in the late 19th century and accelerating in the early 20th century, the spread of the Lost Cause mythology—a pseudohistorical and negationist interpretation of the Civil War promoted by Confederate sympathizers—worked to diminish Grant's standing. Lost Cause adherents elevated Robert E. Lee while portraying Grant as a crude, drunken butcher who won only through numerical superiority. This narrative also minimized Grant's presidential achievements in civil rights while emphasizing the scandals of his administration.

By the mid-20th century, Grant's presidency was routinely ranked among the worst in American history by scholars. However, beginning in the early 21st century, a reassessment fueled by new biographies and shifting historical perspectives led to a substantial reappraisal. Biographies by Jean Edward Smith (2001), Ronald C. White (2016), and Ron Chernow (2017) drew on extensive primary sources to present a more nuanced portrait of Grant as both a military and political leader. These works emphasized his commitment to civil rights for African Americans, his prosecution of the Klan, his integrity in personal dealings, and the considerable achievements of his foreign policy.

Grant's role during the constitutional crisis of 1866–1867, when he navigated the competing demands of President Johnson and Congress, has also attracted renewed scholarly attention. His decision to follow the law rather than the president's wishes has been cited as a model for civil-military relations in a democracy.

The establishment of Yellowstone National Park under Grant's presidency has been recognized as one of the most far-reaching conservation measures in American history, establishing a model that has been replicated in countries around the world.

Grant's Personal Memoirs remain in print and are studied both as a historical document and as a work of American literature. Mark Twain, who published the memoirs, considered Grant's prose among the finest he had encountered. Literary critics have praised the memoirs for their directness, economy of expression, and honesty in assessing both triumphs and failures.