He joined the Union Army after the American Civil War broke out in 1861 and rose to prominence after winning several early Union victories on the Western Theater. Grant resigned from the army in 1854 and returned to his family but lived in poverty. In 1848, he married Julia Dent, and together they had four children. Admitted to West Point, Grant graduated 21st in the class of 1843 and served with distinction in the Mexican–American War. Raised in Ohio, Grant possessed an exceptional ability with horses. Later, as president, Grant was an effective civil rights executive who signed the bill that created the Justice Department and worked with Radical Republicans to protect African Americans during Reconstruction. As Commanding General, he led the Union Army to victory in the American Civil War in 1865 and thereafter briefly served as Secretary of War. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant / ˈ h aɪ r ə m juː ˈ l ɪ s iː z/ HY-rəm yoo- LISS-eez April 27, 1822 – July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. He was educated at Harvard and the University of California at Berkeley.Ulysses S. Geoffrey Perret’s other books include Old Soldiers Never Die: The Life of Douglas MacArthur and A Country Made by War. From a frontier boyhood to West Point from heroic feats in the Mexican War to electoral triumph from his two-year journey around the world to his final battle to finish his Personal Memoirs Grant is wholly captured in this absorbing and exciting account. Perret describes Grant’s innovative military genius and his efforts to lead the rich, industrialized United States as the first modern president. Geoffrey Perret’s account, based on extensive research and using new material, offers fresh insights into Grant the commander and Grant the president. Grant’s story is one of the great American adventures. Perret persuasively presents a man who endured and conquered all: binge drinking, rivals, false friends, and even the cancer that could not stop him from completing his memoirs." " What distinguishes this narrative are Perret’s bristling style and his skillful blend of tactical analysis and conventional biography. Lessly moving forward despite any setback." In lively prose, Perret delivers a vivid portrait of a resolute man in a tumultuous century, courageously and cease. " The Grant that emerges is astonishingly human. Readers will find a Grant they never before encountered. " I was impressed by the sweep and power of the narrative. –Eric Foner, The New York Times Book Review McPherson, and others who have captured the drama and tragedy of the Civil War." His color-įul and lucid accounts of military engagements, which constitute the bulk of the book, make Perret a worthy successor to Bruce Catton, James M. " Thanks to Perret’s own skill at exposing the inner dynamics of warfare, the reader comes to understand what actually happened on Civil War battlefields. Louis from his return to the army and eventual election to the presidency from his two-year journey around the world to his final battle to finish his Personal Memoirs-is one of the most adventurous and moving in American history. Grant’s story-from a frontier boyhood to West Point from heroic feats in the Mexican War to grinding poverty in St. That was mainly because he was, as Perret shows, the first modern president-the first man to preside over a rich, industrialized America that had put slavery behind it and was struggling to provide racial justice for all. He was, says Perret, “the man who taught the army how to fight.”Īs president, Grant was widely misunderstood and underrated. Grant’s military genius ultimately triumphed as he created a new approach to battle. “Grant is a mystery to me,” said William Tecumseh Sherman, “and I believe he is a mystery to himself.” Geoffrey Perret’s account offers new insights into Grant the commander and Grant the president that would have astonished both his friends, such as Sherman, and his enemies.īased on extensive research, including material either not seen or not used by other writers, this biography explains for the first time how Ulysses S. Not since Bruce Catton has there been such an absorbing and exciting biography of Ulysses S.
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