"Man Proposes and God Disposes. There are but few events in the affairs of men brought about by their own choice." And so begins the Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant; considered by many to be the greatest military memoir ever written.
Grant knew that he was dying of throat cancer-too many cigars-as he wrote his autobiography. The pain was excruciating. He quit taking his prescribed opiates because they numbed his mind, making it impossible to write.
As he neared death, Grant must have reflected upon the quote, written by the 15th century German cleric Thomas A. Kempis. He must have thought about the improbable course of his life. How and why did he, the son of a tanner, rise to become the greatest general of his era and the 18th president of the United States.
Ulysses Simpson Grant was born on April 27, 1822, in the small Ohio River town of Point Pleasant. His father, Jesse, always looking for new business opportunities, moved his family to the Village of Georgetown in Brown County, Ohio. He expected his son to follow in his footsteps. Ulysses refused. He hated the dangerous, dirty job and swore that he would never work in the tannery one day past his twenty-first birthday.
Young Grant, instead, wanted to be a horse trader and always found a reason to be around horses. As a toddler he crawled into the horse stalls, but was never stepped on by the horses. He swung upon the horses' tails and was never bitten by them. At age five, he rode an "unrideable" pony. Villagers recalled a young Grant racing through the streets of his Georgetown home riding bareback. At other times he demonstrated his trick riding skills such as riding Indian style or standing on the horse's back, again without a saddle. His mother Hannah reportedly said horses just seemed to understand her son. It was only natural that he would work with horses in some fashion.
Jesse, however, still wanted to determine his son's path in life. When a letter arrived from U.S. Senator Thomas Morris of Bethel, Ohio about giving Ulysses an appointment to West Point Jesse told his son, "Ulysses, I believe you are going to receive the appointment." "What appointment?" asked Ulysses. Jesse replied, "To West Point, I have applied for it." His son retorted, "But I won't go!" Like many things in life, Jesse got his way.
Grant was a mediocre student, landing him in the middle of his class. One student saw Grant as "lazy" and "careless". Ulysses read novels, smoked and slipped out of his barracks at night to drink at local student watering holes. He did excel at mathematics, drawing and painting and not surprisingly at horsemanship. Grant set West Point's horse high jumping record that stood for many years.
Grant's rise to prominence during the Civil War was assisted by his refusal to abide by the rules of the old school. He became an innovator. He was among the first to see that the war would be won by winning campaigns rather than Napoleon's single "great battle" approach. Grant was the first general to synchronize watches so that battles started "on time". He developed the concept of two dimensional warfare, coordinating the operations of the army and navy. Valuing the importance of up to date intelligence, Grant created the Bureau of Military Intelligence. However unlikely, the boy from Point Pleasant became the greatest general of his age.
Grant was a reluctant chief executive, writing in 1878, "I did not want the Presidency and have never quite forgiven myself for resigning the command of the Army to accept it; but it could not be helped". He told Congress "Mistakes have been made, as all can see and I admit, but it seems to me oftener in the selections made...Failures have been errors of judgment not of intent."
Historians have traditionally judged Grant harshly for those failures, especially the financial scandals. Most of the scandals began in the previous administration, but came to light during his tenure. Grant was never tarnished personally with allegations of corruption.
Most recently historians have been more balanced in their assessments of Grant. They point to his civil rights policies, especially his strong support for the 15th Amendment which gave Black men the right to vote, and for sending the army to the South to fight the KKK. Jean Edward Smith wrote that without President Grant's actions the American Indian may have gone extinct. Grant was the first president to settle an international dispute by arbitration. His return to the Gold Standard prepared the way for America's great economic expansion in the late 19th century.
Ulysses Grant's life was one of great accomplishment-not bad for a boy born in Clermont County who aspired to be a horse trader. But then again, "Man proposes and God disposes".
