Presidents at War: Ulysses Grant and the Civil War
Ulysses Grant was doubly distinguished as a General and as President, but there was a time when it seemed like his career was going nowhere. His rise from someone working in his father's tannery to the head of the Union Army was a remarkable transition.
On April 12, 1861, the Civil War began when Confederate troops attacked Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, forcing its surrender. Two days later, President Abraham Lincoln put out the call for 75,000 volunteers. A mass recruiting meeting was called in Galena, Illinois where Grant was living. As the resident West Point grad, Grant was asked to lead the meeting. He helped to recruit a company of volunteers and accompanied it to Springfield, where Illinois Governor Richard Yates offered Grant a position recruiting and training volunteer units. Grant accepted, but he really wanted a field command in the regular Army. He reached out to various contacts, including Major General George B. McClellan, but was unsuccessful. He continued serving at the training camp and was promoted to Colonel on June 14, 1861. Grant was promoted by President Lincoln to Brigadier General, and at the end of August 1861, Major General John C. Frémont assigned Grant to the District of Cairo in southern Illinois.
Grant's troops first saw action in late 1861. The Confederate army was stationed in Columbus, Kentucky, under Major General Leonidas Polk. After Lincoln relieved Frémont from command, Grant attacked Fort Belmont taking 3,114 Union troops by boat on November 7, 1861. He initially took the fort, but his army was later pushed back by the reinforced Confederates. Following Belmont, Grant asked Major General Henry Halleck for permission to move against Fort Henry on the Tennessee River. Halleck agreed, and Grant's troops successfully captured Fort Henry on February 6, 1862, and nearby Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River on February 16. Fort Henry was taken over with few losses. At Fort Donelson, Grant encountered stiff resistance from the Confederate forces. Grant's troops were joined by 10,000 reinforcements and the Confederates were surrounded by Grant's army. Pillow ordered Confederate troops back into the fort and relinquished command to Brigadier General Simon Bolivar Buckner, who surrendered to Grant the next day. Grant's terms were "No terms except an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted." Grant gained celebrity in the North, along with the nickname "Unconditional Surrender" Grant. With these victories, President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to major general of volunteers.
Grant's advance at Forts Henry and Donelson was the most significant advance into the Confederacy the North had accomplished up to that time. His army, known as the Army of the Tennessee, had increased to 48,894 men and was encamped on the western side of the Tennessee River. Grant met with Brigadier General William T. Sherman, and they prepared to attack the Confederate stronghold of Corinth, Mississippi. The Confederates moved first at dawn on April 6, 1862, with a full attack on the Union Army at the Battle of Shiloh. Over 44,000 Confederate troops, led by Generals Albert Sidney Johnston and P.G.T. Beauregard, attacked Grant's army at Pittsburg Landing. The Confederates pushed the Union Army back towards the Tennessee River. Grant and Sherman rallied their troops for a counterattack the next morning. With reinforcement troops from Major General Don Carlos Buell and Major General Lew Wallace's missing division, Grant succeeded in driving the Confederates back to the road from Corinth.
The battle was the costliest of the war to date, with combined casualties of 23,746, and little strategic advantage gained by either side. Grant said that the carnage at Shiloh had made it clear to him that the Confederacy would only be defeated by complete annihilation of its armies. Grant was criticized by Halleck, who transferred command of the Army of the Tennessee to Brigadier General George H. Thomas and promoted Grant to the hollow position of second-in-command of the western armies, removing him from an active field command. Grant was again on the verge of resigning, but Sherman convinced Grant to remain in the army. Halleck allowed the Confederate forces to escape. Lincoln reinstated Grant to his command of the Army of the Tennessee.
Lincoln was determined to take the strategic Confederate stronghold at Vicksburg, Mississippi, on the Mississippi River. In December 1862, Grant moved to take Vicksburg by an overland route. Confederate cavalry raiders stalled Grant's advance by disrupting his communications. During the second attempt to capture Vicksburg, Grant made a series of unsuccessful movements along bayou and canal water routes. In April 1863, Grant marched his troops down the west side of the Mississippi River and crossed east. After a series of battles, Grant went on to defeat the Confederates at the Battle of Champion Hill. Grant then assaulted the Vicksburg fortress twice and suffered serious losses. After the failed assault, Grant settled in for a siege lasting seven weeks. Vicksburg surrendered to Grant on July 4, 1863. During the campaign, Grant assumed responsibility for refugee-contraband slaves who were displaced by the war. Lincoln had authorized their recruitment into the Union Army.
The fall of Vicksburg gave the Union control over the entire Mississippi and split the Confederacy in two. Although the success at Vicksburg was a great morale boost for the Union, Grant received much criticism for his decisions and reports of drunkenness. Lincoln again sent an agent to keep a watchful eye on Grant, who sent positive reports back to Lincoln.
Lincoln put Grant in command of the newly formed Division of the Mississippi in October 1863, giving Grant charge of the entire western theater of war. After the Battle of Chickamauga, Confederate General Braxton Bragg forced the Army of the Cumberland to retreat into Chattanooga. They surrounded the city, and trapped the Union army inside. Only Major General George H. Thomas and the XIV Corps saved the Army of the Cumberland from complete defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga. As a result, Grant relieved Rosecrans from duty and placed Thomas in charge of the Army of the Cumberland. Grant rode out to Chattanooga and took charge of the situation. Lincoln sent Major General Joseph Hooker and two divisions of the Army of the Potomac to reinforce the Army of the Cumberland, but Confederate forces kept the two armies from meeting. Grant opened up a supply line to the Army of the Cumberland, still trapped in Chattanooga.
On November 23, 1863, Grant organized three armies to attack Bragg's troops on Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. The next day, Sherman's four divisions assaulted Bragg's right flank. Thomas and the Army of the Cumberland overtook Confederates at Missionary Ridge. Hooker's forces took Lookout Mountain. On November 25, Sherman continued his attack on Bragg, who withdrew Confederate troops on the main ridge. Grant ordered Thomas to make a general assault on Missionary Ridge. After a brief delay, the Army of the Cumberland, captured the first Confederate entrenchments. The Army of the Cumberland continued and captured the Confederate's secondary entrenchments, forcing the defeated Confederates into retreat. Although Bragg's army had not been captured, the decisive battle opened Georgia and the heartland of the Confederacy to Union invasion. Grant's fame increased, and he was promoted to Lieutenant General, a rank previously only held by George Washington and Winfield Scott.
Disappointed with Major General George Meade's failure to pursue Lee after the Confederate defeat at the Battle of Gettysburg, Lincoln made Grant commander of all Union armies in March 1864. Grant transferred the Department of the Mississippi to Sherman, and went to Washington, D.C. to devise a strategy with Lincoln. Grant established his headquarters fifty miles away, near Meade's Army of the Potomac in Culpeper, Virginia. The Union strategy was for Sherman to attack Atlanta and Georgia, while Meade would lead the Army of the Potomac to attack Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Major General Benjamin Butler was to attack and advance towards Richmond from the south, going up the James River. Grant was riding a rising tide of popularity, and there were discussions in some corners that a Union victory early in the year could open the possibility of his candidacy for the presidency.
Some of the Union efforts sputtered, and Grant was left to fight Lee in a series of bloody battles of attrition known as the Overland Campaign. Grant crossed the Rapidan River on May 4 and attacked Lee in the Wilderness, a hard-fought three-day battle with many casualties. Grant flanked Lee's army to the southeast and attempted to wedge the Union Army between Lee and Richmond at Spotsylvania. But Lee's army got to Spotsylvania first, and a costly battle began that lasted thirteen days. During the battle, Grant attempted to break through Lee's line of defense. Unable to break Lee's line of defense after repeated attempts, Grant flanked Lee to the southeast east again at North Anna, a battle that lasted three days. This time the Confederate Army had a superior defensive advantage on Grant. Grant then maneuvered the Union Army to Cold Harbor. Lee's men were able to entrench against the Union assault. During the third day of the thirteen-day battle, Grant led a costly assault on Lee's trenches. As news spread in the North, heavy criticism fell on Grant, who was called "the Butcher" because the Union army had suffered 52,788 casualties in thirty days since crossing the Rapidan. Lee suffered 32,907 Confederate casualties, but he was less able to replace them. The two armies fought to a stalemate, and the generals took three days to reach a truce, so that the dead and dying could be removed from the battlefield. Grant pulled out of Cold Harbor and moved his army south of the James River, freed Major General Butler from the Bermuda Hundred, and attacked Petersburg, Richmond's central railroad hub.
After Grant and the Army of the Potomac had crossed the James River undetected and rescued Butler's army, Grant advanced the army southward to capture Petersburg. Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard, in charge of Petersburg, was able to defend the city, and Lee's reinforcements arrived. Grant forced Lee into a long nine-month siege of Petersburg, and the war effort stalled. The Petersburg siege prevented Lee from reinforcing armies to oppose Sherman and Sheridan. During the siege, Sherman was able to take Atlanta, a victory that advanced President Lincoln's reelection. Grant then ordered Sheridan's cavalry to destroy vital Confederate supply farms in the Shenandoah Valley.
Grant attempted to blow up part of Lee's Petersburg trenches from an underground tunnel, but the explosion created a crater from which Confederates could easily pick off Union troops below. Grant admitted the tactic had been a "stupendous failure." On August 9, 1864, Grant, who had just arrived at his headquarters in City Point, narrowly escaped death when Confederate spies blew up an ammunition barge moored below the city's bluffs. By August 21, the Union had captured the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad.
In March 1865, Lincoln met at City Point with Grant, Sherman, and Porter. Union forces finally took Petersburg and captured Richmond in April. Lee's troops began deserting in large numbers and disease and lack of supplies also weakened Lee's forces. Lee attempted to link up with the remnants of Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston's defeated army, but Union cavalry forces led by Sheridan were able to stop the two armies from converging. Lee and his army surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. Grant gave generous terms to his defeated foe. After four long years, the Civil War was over.
On April 12, 1861, the Civil War began when Confederate troops attacked Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, forcing its surrender. Two days later, President Abraham Lincoln put out the call for 75,000 volunteers. A mass recruiting meeting was called in Galena, Illinois where Grant was living. As the resident West Point grad, Grant was asked to lead the meeting. He helped to recruit a company of volunteers and accompanied it to Springfield, where Illinois Governor Richard Yates offered Grant a position recruiting and training volunteer units. Grant accepted, but he really wanted a field command in the regular Army. He reached out to various contacts, including Major General George B. McClellan, but was unsuccessful. He continued serving at the training camp and was promoted to Colonel on June 14, 1861. Grant was promoted by President Lincoln to Brigadier General, and at the end of August 1861, Major General John C. Frémont assigned Grant to the District of Cairo in southern Illinois.
Grant's troops first saw action in late 1861. The Confederate army was stationed in Columbus, Kentucky, under Major General Leonidas Polk. After Lincoln relieved Frémont from command, Grant attacked Fort Belmont taking 3,114 Union troops by boat on November 7, 1861. He initially took the fort, but his army was later pushed back by the reinforced Confederates. Following Belmont, Grant asked Major General Henry Halleck for permission to move against Fort Henry on the Tennessee River. Halleck agreed, and Grant's troops successfully captured Fort Henry on February 6, 1862, and nearby Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River on February 16. Fort Henry was taken over with few losses. At Fort Donelson, Grant encountered stiff resistance from the Confederate forces. Grant's troops were joined by 10,000 reinforcements and the Confederates were surrounded by Grant's army. Pillow ordered Confederate troops back into the fort and relinquished command to Brigadier General Simon Bolivar Buckner, who surrendered to Grant the next day. Grant's terms were "No terms except an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted." Grant gained celebrity in the North, along with the nickname "Unconditional Surrender" Grant. With these victories, President Abraham Lincoln promoted Grant to major general of volunteers.
Grant's advance at Forts Henry and Donelson was the most significant advance into the Confederacy the North had accomplished up to that time. His army, known as the Army of the Tennessee, had increased to 48,894 men and was encamped on the western side of the Tennessee River. Grant met with Brigadier General William T. Sherman, and they prepared to attack the Confederate stronghold of Corinth, Mississippi. The Confederates moved first at dawn on April 6, 1862, with a full attack on the Union Army at the Battle of Shiloh. Over 44,000 Confederate troops, led by Generals Albert Sidney Johnston and P.G.T. Beauregard, attacked Grant's army at Pittsburg Landing. The Confederates pushed the Union Army back towards the Tennessee River. Grant and Sherman rallied their troops for a counterattack the next morning. With reinforcement troops from Major General Don Carlos Buell and Major General Lew Wallace's missing division, Grant succeeded in driving the Confederates back to the road from Corinth.
The battle was the costliest of the war to date, with combined casualties of 23,746, and little strategic advantage gained by either side. Grant said that the carnage at Shiloh had made it clear to him that the Confederacy would only be defeated by complete annihilation of its armies. Grant was criticized by Halleck, who transferred command of the Army of the Tennessee to Brigadier General George H. Thomas and promoted Grant to the hollow position of second-in-command of the western armies, removing him from an active field command. Grant was again on the verge of resigning, but Sherman convinced Grant to remain in the army. Halleck allowed the Confederate forces to escape. Lincoln reinstated Grant to his command of the Army of the Tennessee.
Lincoln was determined to take the strategic Confederate stronghold at Vicksburg, Mississippi, on the Mississippi River. In December 1862, Grant moved to take Vicksburg by an overland route. Confederate cavalry raiders stalled Grant's advance by disrupting his communications. During the second attempt to capture Vicksburg, Grant made a series of unsuccessful movements along bayou and canal water routes. In April 1863, Grant marched his troops down the west side of the Mississippi River and crossed east. After a series of battles, Grant went on to defeat the Confederates at the Battle of Champion Hill. Grant then assaulted the Vicksburg fortress twice and suffered serious losses. After the failed assault, Grant settled in for a siege lasting seven weeks. Vicksburg surrendered to Grant on July 4, 1863. During the campaign, Grant assumed responsibility for refugee-contraband slaves who were displaced by the war. Lincoln had authorized their recruitment into the Union Army.
The fall of Vicksburg gave the Union control over the entire Mississippi and split the Confederacy in two. Although the success at Vicksburg was a great morale boost for the Union, Grant received much criticism for his decisions and reports of drunkenness. Lincoln again sent an agent to keep a watchful eye on Grant, who sent positive reports back to Lincoln.
Lincoln put Grant in command of the newly formed Division of the Mississippi in October 1863, giving Grant charge of the entire western theater of war. After the Battle of Chickamauga, Confederate General Braxton Bragg forced the Army of the Cumberland to retreat into Chattanooga. They surrounded the city, and trapped the Union army inside. Only Major General George H. Thomas and the XIV Corps saved the Army of the Cumberland from complete defeat at the Battle of Chickamauga. As a result, Grant relieved Rosecrans from duty and placed Thomas in charge of the Army of the Cumberland. Grant rode out to Chattanooga and took charge of the situation. Lincoln sent Major General Joseph Hooker and two divisions of the Army of the Potomac to reinforce the Army of the Cumberland, but Confederate forces kept the two armies from meeting. Grant opened up a supply line to the Army of the Cumberland, still trapped in Chattanooga.
On November 23, 1863, Grant organized three armies to attack Bragg's troops on Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. The next day, Sherman's four divisions assaulted Bragg's right flank. Thomas and the Army of the Cumberland overtook Confederates at Missionary Ridge. Hooker's forces took Lookout Mountain. On November 25, Sherman continued his attack on Bragg, who withdrew Confederate troops on the main ridge. Grant ordered Thomas to make a general assault on Missionary Ridge. After a brief delay, the Army of the Cumberland, captured the first Confederate entrenchments. The Army of the Cumberland continued and captured the Confederate's secondary entrenchments, forcing the defeated Confederates into retreat. Although Bragg's army had not been captured, the decisive battle opened Georgia and the heartland of the Confederacy to Union invasion. Grant's fame increased, and he was promoted to Lieutenant General, a rank previously only held by George Washington and Winfield Scott.
Disappointed with Major General George Meade's failure to pursue Lee after the Confederate defeat at the Battle of Gettysburg, Lincoln made Grant commander of all Union armies in March 1864. Grant transferred the Department of the Mississippi to Sherman, and went to Washington, D.C. to devise a strategy with Lincoln. Grant established his headquarters fifty miles away, near Meade's Army of the Potomac in Culpeper, Virginia. The Union strategy was for Sherman to attack Atlanta and Georgia, while Meade would lead the Army of the Potomac to attack Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Major General Benjamin Butler was to attack and advance towards Richmond from the south, going up the James River. Grant was riding a rising tide of popularity, and there were discussions in some corners that a Union victory early in the year could open the possibility of his candidacy for the presidency.
Some of the Union efforts sputtered, and Grant was left to fight Lee in a series of bloody battles of attrition known as the Overland Campaign. Grant crossed the Rapidan River on May 4 and attacked Lee in the Wilderness, a hard-fought three-day battle with many casualties. Grant flanked Lee's army to the southeast and attempted to wedge the Union Army between Lee and Richmond at Spotsylvania. But Lee's army got to Spotsylvania first, and a costly battle began that lasted thirteen days. During the battle, Grant attempted to break through Lee's line of defense. Unable to break Lee's line of defense after repeated attempts, Grant flanked Lee to the southeast east again at North Anna, a battle that lasted three days. This time the Confederate Army had a superior defensive advantage on Grant. Grant then maneuvered the Union Army to Cold Harbor. Lee's men were able to entrench against the Union assault. During the third day of the thirteen-day battle, Grant led a costly assault on Lee's trenches. As news spread in the North, heavy criticism fell on Grant, who was called "the Butcher" because the Union army had suffered 52,788 casualties in thirty days since crossing the Rapidan. Lee suffered 32,907 Confederate casualties, but he was less able to replace them. The two armies fought to a stalemate, and the generals took three days to reach a truce, so that the dead and dying could be removed from the battlefield. Grant pulled out of Cold Harbor and moved his army south of the James River, freed Major General Butler from the Bermuda Hundred, and attacked Petersburg, Richmond's central railroad hub.
After Grant and the Army of the Potomac had crossed the James River undetected and rescued Butler's army, Grant advanced the army southward to capture Petersburg. Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard, in charge of Petersburg, was able to defend the city, and Lee's reinforcements arrived. Grant forced Lee into a long nine-month siege of Petersburg, and the war effort stalled. The Petersburg siege prevented Lee from reinforcing armies to oppose Sherman and Sheridan. During the siege, Sherman was able to take Atlanta, a victory that advanced President Lincoln's reelection. Grant then ordered Sheridan's cavalry to destroy vital Confederate supply farms in the Shenandoah Valley.
Grant attempted to blow up part of Lee's Petersburg trenches from an underground tunnel, but the explosion created a crater from which Confederates could easily pick off Union troops below. Grant admitted the tactic had been a "stupendous failure." On August 9, 1864, Grant, who had just arrived at his headquarters in City Point, narrowly escaped death when Confederate spies blew up an ammunition barge moored below the city's bluffs. By August 21, the Union had captured the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad.
In March 1865, Lincoln met at City Point with Grant, Sherman, and Porter. Union forces finally took Petersburg and captured Richmond in April. Lee's troops began deserting in large numbers and disease and lack of supplies also weakened Lee's forces. Lee attempted to link up with the remnants of Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston's defeated army, but Union cavalry forces led by Sheridan were able to stop the two armies from converging. Lee and his army surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. Grant gave generous terms to his defeated foe. After four long years, the Civil War was over.