Ohio History Journal

CHARACTER SKETCH OF GENERAL ULYSSES S.

GRANT

 

 

BY JUDGE HUGH L. NICHOLS,

Chairman of the U. S. Grant Memorial Centenary Association.

 

My earlier life was spent at New Richmond, Cler-

mont County, Ohio, on the banks of the Ohio River, five

miles west of Point Pleasant, where Ohio's greatest son

first saw the light of day.

As a youth I was greatly interestd in General Grant,

always having regarded him - and it would seem,

rightly- as Ohio's most famous citizen, and since he

was unquestionably Clermont County's greatest son I

have made some study, beginning in those early days,

of his life.

In July, 1885, on the occasion of his death, I chanced

to be Clermont County correspondent for a Cincinnati

paper and following instructions went about the county

and gathered items of information that had, perhaps,

theretofore been unpublished, having to do with his

early life. At that time I met an old uncle of the

General, bearing the name of Samuel Simpson, who, al-

though greatly advanced in years, had a clear mind and

perfect recollection of the early days of his distinguished

nephew. In fact, Samuel Simpson had been an inmate

of the home of General Grant, being at that period of

his life unmarried and remaining a bachelor for many

years thereafter.

Among many interesting facts narrated to me on

this occasion were some circumstances relating to the

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Character Sketch of General Ulysses S. Grant  165

time when the boy was notified by the Washington au-

thorities that he had been nominated by General Hamer

as a cadet to the United States Military Academy at

West Point. This old gentleman informed me that he

prepared with his own hands a rude trunk to hold the

few belongings of the boy, who was then about to leave

home for practically the first time, on a long journey.

It appeared that the boy bore the name, as given in the

family Bible, of Hiram Ulysses Grant, and after the

trunk had been prepared (the uncle of the boy said) he

started to stencil on it the initials of its owner, but to

their amazement they found that the boy would go to

West Point with a trunk bearing the initials, "H. U. G."

It was agreed between the uncle and the nephew that a

boy going there with such initials would probably under-

go a double dose of hazing, and without parental au-

thority they decided to change the initials from "H. U."

to "U. H.", thus relieving the boy of that handicap.

Upon his arrival at West Point and preparing to

matriculate, he wrote his new name, and the commander

observing his signature informed him that the creden-

tials from Washington gave his name as "Ulysses Simp-

son Grant." When young Grant demurred he was in-

formed that the only way his name could be changed

was by special order from the War Department, and so

it was that for the second time within a few weeks he

had the unique experience of having his name changed.

This latter change, I hope to demonstrate, was prophetic

of the boy's future, if not providential. In using these

new initials, "U. S.", I wish to portray, if I may, the

characteristics he developed as he approached and

reached his greatness - in a military sense, at least.

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166     Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

Naturally, it was not long until his associates at

West Point, knowing his initials, dubbed him, "Uncle

Sam Grant", and along with it, "United States Grant."

Carrying the thought a little further, I wish to present

in this little sketch this great man as his character un-

folded, especially in connection with his military career,

under the following heads: "Unconditional Surrender";

"Unprofane Speech"; "Unusual Silence"; "Unaffected

Simplicity"; "Unparalleled Samaritan"; "Unsurpassed

Sepulchre".

"Unconditional Surrender."

The first great victory for the northern armies in

the period of the Civil War was the capture of Fort

Henry and Fort Donelson, thus gaining control to the

North of one of the great southern rivers.  On this

occasion the terms sent to General Simon Bolivar

Buckner, by U. S. Grant, Brigadier-General, then in

command of the besieging forces of the North, included

this famous sentence - "No terms except unconditional

and immediate surrender can be accepted.  I propose

to move immediately upon your works."

Thereafter and until the end of his days - and prob-

ably to the end of all history - Geenral Grant has been

and will be known as "Unconditional Surrender Grant."

"Unprofane Speech."

We are wont to associate with military commanders

violent tempers and profanity under the excitement of

battle. But General Grant has said of himself in his

memoirs (not in any effort to present himself as an

unco-good man, but in a way that carries conviction),

speaking of his first acquaintance with the Mexican

mule at the time when the forces of the United States

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Character Sketch of General Ulysses S. Grant  167

had invaded Mexico, that the invading forces were de-

pendent upon the Mexican mule for their transporta-

tion and some of the drivers used language at times of a

rather risque character and he then said that while he

did not recollect that he had ever used a profane word in

his life, he had no disposition to criticize the drivers

under the circumstances.

It is also related by General Horace Porter that dur-

ing the battle of the Wilderness one evening the staff of

General Grant had gathered in his tent and an officer

with a reputation as a teller of stories of rather an off-

color, looking around the room and saying that there

were no ladies present, started to tell a story the char-

acter, which, from his unsavory reputation in that re-

spect was discounted to some extent, whereupon General

Grant said to him, "No ladies present, but there are

gentlemen here." General Porter stated that the story

teller was effectively shut up - on this occasion, at least.

"Unusual Silence."

General Grant has come down in history bearing the

reputation of a man of unusual silence.  In fact, he

was known throughout the war as "the silent man on

horseback." This quality, it was thought, was inherited

from his mother, Hannah Simpson, of whom it was

said that when she bade farewell to her boy at Ripley,

where he was taking the boat for West Point, via Pitts-

burgh, that she gave him a shake of the hand and a kiss

upon the forehead, without a word passing between

them - although the boy was to be gone for a period of

two years.

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168      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

"Utmost Serenity."

It is said of General Grant by General Horace

Porter, with reference to the composure and calmness

displayed by the great Captain, at the battle of the Wil-

derness, where for the first time he was meeting that

great southern commander, Robert E. Lee, and where,

indeed, the very fate of the nation was at stake, that

"during the most critical movements, he manifested no

perceptible anxiety.  He received news calculated to

create apprehension, and commanded and gave orders

upon sudden emergencies without the change of a

muscle in his face or the slightest alteration of the tones

of his voice." This same serenity was manifested by

this great man upon his death-bed. There was found,

pinned to his night-robe, a letter addressed to his wife

by the dying general while he was undergoing unspeak-

able anguish; The letter was as follows:

 

"Look after our dear children and direct them in the paths

of rectitude. It would distress me far more to think that any of

them could depart from an honorable, upright and virtuous life,

than it would to know that they were prostrated on a bed of

sickness from which they were never to arise. With these few

injunctions and the knowledge I have of your love and the duti-

ful affection of all our children, I bid you a final farewell until

we meet in another, and I trust, a better world."

 

I feel impelled to present this letter to the American

people with the thought that it illustrates in a most

beautiful way the devotion of this great man to his

family; that it is an evidence of the fact that the serenity

which sustained him on the field of battle possessed his

soul when the last great moment came; that this expres-

sion is worthy of study as an example of pure and

beautiful English, especially when we consider the cir-

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Character Sketch of General Ulysses S. Grant  169

cumstances under which it was written and the further

fact that General Grant's early education was by no

means more thorough than that of the great Lincoln

himself.

"Unaffected Simplicity."

Appamatox Court House will always stand out con-

spicuous, in American history. Here Grant concluded

the terms of capitulation which ended the most dreadful

fratricidal war in history.  On this occasion General

Lee came to the meeting dressed in a new suit of Con

federate gray, wearing at his side a jeweled sword pre-

sented to him by the people of the state of Virginia, and

riding his. famous war horse, "Traveler."  General

Grant came attired as a private soldier, with the insignia

of his high rank pinned upon his shoulder. He wore

an old slouch hat and the war horse that he rode by no

means satisfied the eye as did that of General Lee.

A noteworthy fact in connection with the close of the

war was the circumstance that General Grant did not

enter Richmond. History does not record any parallel

conduct.  There lay at his feet, conquered, the capital

of the Confederacy, that for four hard years had re-

sisted the efforts of the North to subdue it, and accord-

ing to custom, he should have entered it at the head of

his army, with bands playing and colors flying, but he

so despised the pomp, circumstance and splendor of war

that he denied himself any such glory.

On that same occasion he heard in the distance the

first of a salute of a hundred guns being fired by the

artillery in honor of the great victory he had accom-

plished, and when this sound reached him he at once

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sent his aide with orders to stop it, saying, "Not a gun

-not a gun!"

"Unparalleled Samaritan."

I wish to present General Grant at Appamatox in the

light of a Good Samaritan.  It is to be remembered

that he was making terms with an army that for the

whole period of the war had struggled to destroy our

blessed government which we now enjoy, and when

General Lee indicated that he and his men were without

food, he ordered at once that rations should be served

the entire Confederate force, and then said to his ad-

versary, "General Lee, it is springtime.  Your men

will be in need of their horses for plowing. Let them

go home and take with them their horses and side arms,

and so long as they observe their parole they may be

certain that they will be unmolested by the United States

Government." And not one of them was molested.

"Unsurpassed Sepulchre."

General Grant lies buried on Riverside Drive, New

York City, overlooking the city in an unsurpassed

sepulchre erected by the people of New York City to

receive his body as a resting place forevermore.  Here

countless thousands of American people, as well as

thousands of those of foreign birth, annually pay their

tribute of respect to the honored dead. This tomb bears

but one inscription, the words of the dying General,

uttered with respect to his feelings toward the South -

"Let us have peace."

These words are strikingly apropos of the situation

that exists in the United States today, happily not with

respect to the southern people, our sectional differences

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Character Sketch of General Ulysses S. Grant  171 with them having long since been settled, but with the broader world outlook. It would seem to have been a legacy left by the dying man to his fellow countrymen, into the possession of which we are just now coming.

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