"'Ring out the old, ring in the new!Ring out the false, ring in the true!Ring out a slowly dying cause,And ancient forms of party strife!Ring in the nobler modes of life,With sweeter manners, purer laws.'"
A "new order of things" was indeed begun. South Carolina very soon seceded from the Union, and other southern States followed her example. Sumner now spoke and wrote constantly. He urged Massachusetts to be "firm,FIRM, FIRM! against every word or step of concession.... More than the loss of forts, arsenals, or the national capital, I fear the loss of our principles."
In 1861, Mr. Sumner was made chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations. How different his position from that day, ten years before, when he stood almost alone in the Senate, a hated abolitionist!
When the war began, he saw with prophetic eye the necessity of emancipating the slaves. He urged it in his public speeches. When Lincoln hesitated and the country feared the result, he said to a vast assembly at Cooper Institute, "There has been the cry, 'On to Richmond!' and still another worse cry, 'On to England!' Better than either is the cry, 'On to freedom!'"
As the war went forward he was ever at his post, working for Henry Wilson's bill for the abolishing of slavery in the District of Columbia, for the recognition of the independence of Hayti and Liberia,for the final suppression of the coastwise trade in slaves, for the employment of colored troops in the army, and for a law that "no person shall be excluded from the cars on account of color," on various specified lines of railroad. He spoke words of encouragement constantly to the North, "This is no time to stop.Forward! Forward!Thus do I, who formerly pleaded so often for peace, now sound to arms; but it is because, in this terrible moment, there is no other way to that sincere and solid peace without which there will be endless war.... Now, at last, by the death of slavery, will the republic begin to live; for what is life without liberty?
"Stretching from ocean to ocean, teeming with population, bountiful in resources of all kinds, and thrice happy in universal enfranchisement, it will be more than conqueror, nothing too vast for its power, nothing too minute for its care."
He wrote for the magazines on the one great subject. He helped organize the Freedman's Bureau, which he called the "Bridge from Slavery to Freedom." He urged equal pay to colored soldiers. He was invaluable to President Lincoln. Though they did not always think alike, Lincoln said to Sumner, "There is no person with whom I have more advised throughout my administration than with yourself."
When Lincoln was assassinated, Sumner wept by his bedside. "The only time," said an intimate friend, "I ever saw him weep." When he deliveredhis eloquent eulogy on Lincoln in Boston, he said, "That speech, uttered on the field of Gettysburg, and now sanctified by the martyrdom of its author, is a monumental act. In the modesty of his nature, he said, 'The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here; but it can never forget what they did here.'
"He was mistaken. The world noted at once what he said, and will never cease to remember it. The battle itself was less important than the speech. Ideas are more than battles."
And so the great slavery pioneer and the great emancipator will go down in history together. How the world worships heroic manhood! Those who, with sweet and unselfish natures, seek not their own happiness, but are ready to die if need be for the right and the truth!
Sumner aided in those three grand amendments to the Constitution, the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth. "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.... All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without dueprocess of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.... The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
In June, 1866, Mr. Sumner came home to say good-bye to his dying mother. True to her noble womanhood, she urged that he should not be sent for, lest the country could not spare him from his work. Beautiful self-sacrifice of woman! Heaven can possess nothing more angelic. O mother, wife, and loved one, know thine unlimited powers, and hold them forever for the ennobling of men!
When Mrs. Sumner was buried, her son turned away sorrowfully, and exclaimed, "I have now no home." He had a house in Washington, where he had lived for many years, but it was only home to him where a sweet-faced and sweet-voiced woman loved him.
In 1869, Mr. Sumner made his remarkable speech on the "Alabama" claims, which for a time caused some bitter feeling in England. This vessel, built at Liverpool, and manned by a British crew, was sent out by the Confederate government, and destroyed sixty-six of our vessels, with a loss of ten million dollars. In 1864, she was overtaken in the harbor of Cherbourg, France, by Captain Winslow, commander of the steamer Kearsarge, and sunk, after an hour's desperate fighting. Her commander, Captain Raphael Semmes, was picked upby the English Deerhound, and taken to Southampton. In the summer of 1872, a board of arbitration met at Geneva, Switzerland, and awarded the United States over fifteen million dollars as damages, which Great Britain paid.
On May 12, 1870, Mr. Sumner introduced his supplementary Civil-Rights Bill, declaring that all persons, without regard to race or color, are entitled to equal privileges afforded by railroads, steamboats, hotels, places of amusement, institutions of learning, religion, and courts of law. His maxim was, "Equality of rights is the first of rights."
He supported Horace Greeley for President, thus separating himself from the Republican party, and carrying out his life-long opinion that principle is above party. After another visit to Europe, in 1872, when he was sixty-one years old, feeling that, the war being over and slavery abolished, the two portions of the country should forget all animosity and live together in harmony, he introduced a resolution in the Senate, "That the names of battles with fellow-citizens shall not be continued in the army register or placed on the regimental colors of the United States."
Massachusetts hastily passed a vote of censure upon her idolized statesman, which she was wise enough to rescind soon after. This latter action gave Mr. Sumner great comfort. He said, "The dear old commonwealth has spoken for me, and that is enough."
In his freestone house, full of pictures and books,overlooking Lafayette Square in Washington, on March 11, 1874, Charles Sumner lay dying. The day previous, in the Senate, he had complained to a friend of pain in the left side. On the morning of the eleventh he was cold and well nigh insensible. At ten o'clock he said to Judge Hoar, "Don't forget my Civil-Rights Bill." Later, he said, "My book! my book is not finished.... I am so tired! I am so tired!"
He had worked long and hard. He passed into the rest of the hereafter at three o'clock in the afternoon. Grand, heroic soul! whose life will be an inspiration for all coming time.
The body, enclosed in a massive casket, upon which rested a wreath of white azaleas and lilies, was borne to the Capitol, followed by a company of three hundred colored men and a long line of carriages. The most noticeable among the floral gifts, says Elias Nason, in his Life of Sumner, "was a broken column of violets and white azaleas, placed there by the hands of a colored girl. She had been rendered lame by being thrust from the cars of a railroad, whose charter Mr. Sumner, after hearing the girl's story, by a resolution, caused to be revoked." From there it was carried to the State House in Boston, and visited by at least fifty thousand people. In the midst of the beautiful floral decorations was a large heart of flowers, from the colored citizens of Boston, with the words, "Charles Sumner, you gave us your life; we give you our hearts."
Through a dense crowd the coffin was borne to Mount Auburn cemetery, and placed in the open grave just as the sun was setting, Longfellow, Holmes, Emerson, and other dear friends standing by. The grand old song of Luther was sung, "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott." Strange contrast! the quiet, unknown Harvard law student;—the great senator, doctor of laws, author, and orator. Sumner had his share of sorrow. He lived to see seven of his eight brothers and sisters taken away by death. He who had longed for domestic bliss did not find it. He married, when he was fifty-five, Mrs. Alice Mason Hooper, but the companionship did not prove congenial, and a divorce resulted, by mutual consent.
He forgot the heart-hunger of his early years in living for the slaves and the down-trodden, whether white or black. Through all his struggles he kept a sublime hope. He used to say, "All defeats in a good cause are but resting-places on the road to victory at last." He had defeats, as do all, but he won the victory.
Well says Hon. James G. Blaine, in his "Twenty Years of Congress," "Mr. Sumner must ever be regarded as a scholar, an orator, a philanthropist, a philosopher, a statesman, whose splendid and unsullied fame will always form part of the true glory of the nation."
"He belongs to all of us, in the North and in the South," said Hon. Carl Schurz, in his eulogy delivered in Music Hall, Boston, "to the blacks hehelped to make free, and to the whites he strove to make brothers again. On the grave of him whom so many thought to be their enemy, and found to be their friend, let the hands be clasped which so bitterly warred against each other. Upon that grave let the youth of America be taught, by the story of his life, that not only genius, power, and success, but, more than these, patriotic devotion and virtue, make the greatness of the citizen."
U. S. Grant
What Longfellow wrote of Charles Sumner may well be applied to Grant:—
"Were a star quenched on high,For ages would its light,Still travelling downward from the sky,Shine on our mortal sight."So when a great man dies,For years beyond our kenThe light he leaves behind him liesUpon the paths of men."
"Were a star quenched on high,For ages would its light,Still travelling downward from the sky,Shine on our mortal sight.
"So when a great man dies,For years beyond our kenThe light he leaves behind him liesUpon the paths of men."
The light left by General Grant will not fade out from American history. To be a great soldier is of course to be immortal; but to be magnanimous to enemies, heroic in affections, a master of self, without vanity, honest, courageous, true, invincible,—such greatness is far above the glory of battlefields. Such greatness he possessed, who, born in comparative obscurity, came to be numbered in that famous trio, dear to every American heart: Washington, Lincoln, Grant.
Ulysses Simpson Grant was born April 27, 1822, in a log house at Mount Pleasant, Ohio. The boy seems to have had the blood of soldiers in hisveins, for his great-grandfather and great-uncle held commissions in the English army in 1756, in the war against the French and Indians, and both were killed. His grandfather served through the entire war of the Revolution.
His father, Jesse R. Grant, left dependent upon himself, learned the trade of a tanner, and by his industry made a home for himself and family. Unable to attend school more than six months in his life, he was a constant reader, and through his own privations became the more anxious that his children should be educated.
Ulysses was the first-born child of Jesse Grant and Hannah Simpson, who were married in June, 1821. When their son was about a year old, they moved to Georgetown, Ohio, and here the boy passed a happy childhood, learning the very little which the schools of the time were able to impart.
He was not fond of study, and enjoyed the more active life of the farm. He says in his personal memoirs: "While my father carried on the manufacture of leather and worked at the trade himself, he owned and tilled considerable land. I detested the trade, preferring almost any other labor; but I was fond of agriculture, and of all employment in which horses were used. We had, among other lands, fifty acres of forest within a mile of the village. In the fall of the year, choppers were employed to cut enough wood to last a twelve-month. When I was seven or eight years of age, I began hauling all the wood used in the houseand shops. I could not load it on the wagons, of course, at that time, but I could drive, and the choppers would load, and some one at the house unload. When about eleven years old, I was strong enough to hold a plough. From that age until seventeen I did all the work done with horses, such as breaking up the land, furrowing, ploughing corn and potatoes, bringing in the crops when harvested, hauling all the wood, besides tending two or three horses, a cow or two, and sawing wood for stoves, etc., while still attending school. For this I was compensated by the fact that there never was any scolding or punishing by my parents; no objection to rational enjoyments, such as fishing, going to the creek a mile away to swim in summer, taking a horse and visiting my grandparents in the adjoining county, fifteen miles off, skating on the ice in winter, or taking a horse and sleigh when there was snow on the ground."
The indulgent father allowed his son some unique experiences. Ulysses, at fifteen, having made a journey to Flat Rock, Kentucky, seventy miles away, with a carriage and two horses, took a fancy to a saddle-horse and offered to trade one which he was driving, for this animal. The owner hesitated about trading with a lad, but finally consented, and the untried colt was hitched to the carriage with his new mate. After proceeding a short distance, the animal became frightened by a dog, kicked, and started to run over an embankment. Ulysses, nothing daunted, took from hispocket a large handkerchief, tied it over the horse's eyes, and sure that the terrified creature would see no more dogs, though he trembled like an aspen leaf, drove peacefully homeward.
Young Grant was as truthful as he was calm and courageous. He tells this story of himself. "There was a Mr. Ralston living within a few miles of the village, who owned a colt which I very much wanted. My father had offered twenty dollars for it, but Ralston wanted twenty-five. I was so anxious to have the colt that after the owner left I begged to be allowed to take him at the price demanded. My father yielded, but said twenty dollars was all the horse was worth, and told me to offer that price; if it was not accepted, I was to offer twenty-two and a half, and if that would not get him, to give the twenty-five. I at once mounted a horse and went for the colt. When I got to Mr. Ralston's house, I said to him: 'Papa says I may offer you twenty dollars for the colt; but if you won't take that, I am to offer twenty-two and a half; and if you won't take that, to give you twenty-five.' It would not require a Connecticut man to guess the price finally agreed upon....
"I could not have been over eight years at the time. This transaction caused me great heart-burning. The story got out among the boys of the village, and it was a long time before I heard the last of it. Boys enjoy the misery of their companions, at least village boys in that day did, and in later life I have found that all adults arenot free from the peculiarity. I kept the horse until he was four years old, when he went blind, and I sold him for twenty dollars. When I went to Maysville to school, in 1836, at the age of fourteen, I recognized my colt as one of the blind horses working on the tread-wheel of the ferry-boat."
All this time the father was desirous of an education for his child. The son of a neighbor had been appointed to West Point, and had failed in his examinations. Mr. Grant applied for his son. "Ulysses," he said one day, "I believe you are going to receive the appointment." "What appointment!" was the response. "To West Point. I have applied for it." "But I won't go," said the impetuous boy. But the father's will was law, and the son began to prepare himself. He bought an algebra, but, having no teacher, he says, it was Greek to him. He had no love for a military life, and looked forward to the West Point experience only as a new opportunity to travel East and see the country.
At seventeen he took passage on a steamer for Pittsburg, in the middle of May, 1839. Fortunately the accommodating boat remained for several days at every port, for passengers or freight, and meantime the curious boy used his eyes to learn all that was possible. When he reached Harrisburg, he rode to Philadelphia on the first railroad which he had ever seen except the one on which he had just crossed the summit of the Alleghany Mountains."In travelling by the road from Harrisburg," he says, "I thought the perfection of rapid transit had been reached. We travelled at least eighteen miles an hour, when at full speed, and made the whole distance averaging probably as much as twelve miles an hour. This seemed like annihilating space. I stopped five days in Philadelphia; saw about every street in the city, attended the theatre, visited Girard College (which was then in course of construction), and got reprimanded from home afterwards, for dallying by the way so long....
"I reported at West Point on the 30th or 31st of May, and about two weeks later passed my examinations for admission, without difficulty, very much to my surprise. A military life had no charms for me, and I had not the faintest idea of staying in the army even if I should be graduated, which I did not expect. The encampment which preceded the commencement of academic studies was very wearisome and uninteresting. When the 28th of August came—the date for breaking up camp and going into barracks—I felt as though I had been at West Point always, and that if I stayed to graduation I would have to remain always. I did not take hold of my studies with avidity, in fact I rarely ever read over a lesson the second time during my entire cadetship. I could not sit in my room doing nothing. There is a fine library connected with the academy, from which cadets can get books to read in their quarters. I devoted more time to these than to booksrelating to the course of studies. Much of the time, I am sorry to say, was devoted to novels, but not those of a trashy sort. I read all of Bulwer's then published, Cooper's, Marryat's, Scott's, Washington Irving's works, Lever's, and many others that I do not now remember. Mathematics was very easy to me, so that when January came I passed the examination, taking a good standing in that branch. In French, the only other study at that time in the first year's course, my standing was very low. In fact, if the class had been turned the other end foremost, I should have been near the head."
The years at West Point did not go by quickly; only the ten weeks of vacation which seemed shorter than one week in school. Sometimes at the academy a great general, like Winfield Scott, came to review the cadets. "With his commanding figure," says young Grant, "his quite colossal size, and showy uniform, I thought him the finest specimen of manhood my eyes had ever beheld, and the most to be envied. I could never resemble him in appearance, but I believe I did have a presentiment, for a moment, that some day I should occupy his place on review—although I had no intention then of remaining in the army. My experience in a horse trade ten years before, and the ridicule it caused me, were too fresh in my mind for me to communicate this presentiment to even my most intimate chum." How often into lives there comes a feeling that there is a specified work tobe done by us that no other person can or will ever do!
When the years were over at West Point, each "four times as long as Ohio years," young Grant was anxious to enter the cavalry, especially as he had suffered from a cough for six months, and his family feared consumption. Having gone home, he waited anxiously for his new uniform. "I was impatient," he says, "to get on my uniform and see how it looked, and probably wanted my old school-mates, particularly the girls, to see me in it. The conceit was knocked out of me by two little circumstances that happened soon after the arrival of the clothes, which gave me a distaste for military uniform that I never recovered from. Soon after the arrival of the suit I donned it, and put off for Cincinnati on horseback. While I was riding along a street of that city, imagining that every one was looking at me with a feeling akin to mine when I first saw General Scott, a little urchin, bareheaded, barefooted, with dirty and ragged pants held up by a single gallows—that's what suspenders were called then—and a shirt that had not seen a washtub for weeks, turned to me and cried: 'Soldier, will you work? No sir-ee; I'll sell my shirt first!' The horse trade and its dire consequences were recalled to mind.
"The other circumstance occurred at home. Opposite our house in Bethel stood the old stage tavern where 'man and beast' found accommodation. The stable-man was rather dissipated, butpossessed of some humor. On my return, I found him parading the streets, and attending in the stable, barefooted, but in a pair of sky-blue nankeen pantaloons—just the color of my uniform trousers—with a strip of white cotton sheeting sewed down the outside seams in imitation of mine. The joke was a huge one in the minds of many of the people, and was much enjoyed by them; but I did not appreciate it so highly."
In September, 1843, Grant reported for duty at Jefferson Barracks, St. Louis, the largest military post in the United States at that time. His hope was to become assistant professor of mathematics at West Point, and he would have been appointed had not the Mexican War begun soon after.
A new page was now to be turned in the eventful life of the young officer; when he was to have, as Emerson beautifully says of love, "the visitation of that power to his heart and brain which created all things anew; which was the dawn in him of music, poetry, and art; which made the face of nature radiant with purple light; the morning and the night varied enchantments; when a single tone of one voice could make the heart bound, and the most trivial circumstance associated with one form is put in the amber of memory; when he became all eye when one was present, and all memory when one was gone; ... when the moonlight was a pleasing fever, and the stars were letters, and the flowers ciphers, and the air was coined into song; when all business seemed an impertinence,and all the men and women running to and fro in the streets were pictures."
At West Point, Grant's class-mate was F. T. Dent, whose family resided five miles west of Jefferson Barracks. "Two of his unmarried brothers," says Grant, "were living at home at that time, and, as I had taken with me from Ohio my horse, saddle, and bridle, I soon found my way out to White Haven, the name of the Dent estate. As I found the family congenial, my visits became frequent. There were at home, besides the young men, two daughters, one a school miss of fifteen, the other a girl of eight or nine. There was still an older daughter, of seventeen, who had been spending several years at boarding-school in St. Louis, but who, though through school, had not yet returned home.... In February she returned to her country home. After that I do not know but my visits became more frequent; they certainly did become more enjoyable. We would often take walks, or go on horseback together to visit the neighbors, until I became quite well acquainted in that vicinity.... If the fourth infantry had remained at Jefferson Barracks it is possible, even probable, that this life might have continued for some years without my finding out that there was anything serious the matter with me; but in the following May a circumstance occurred which developed my sentiment so palpably that there was no mistaking it."
This "circumstance" was the annexation ofTexas, the probability of a war with Mexico, and the necessity of leaving Jefferson Barracks for the Texan frontier. Alas! now that days full of hope, and the sweet realization of a divine companionship had come, they must have sudden ending. Grant took a brief furlough, went to say good-bye to his father and mother, and then to White Haven to see Julia Dent. In crossing a swollen stream, his uniform was wet through, but he donned the suit of a future brother-in-law, and appeared before his beloved to ask her hand in marriage, to receive her acceptance, and then to hasten to the scene of action. He saw her but once in the next four years and three months; four anxious years to her, when death often stared her lover in the face.
As soon as Texas was admitted to the Union, in 1845, the "army of occupation," as the three thousand men under General Zachary Taylor were called, advanced to the Rio Grande and built a fort. When the first hostile gun was fired, Grant says, "I felt sorry that I had enlisted. A great many men, when they smell battle afar off, chafe to get into the fray. When they say so themselves, they generally fail to convince their hearers that they are as anxious as they would like to make believe, and as they approach danger they become more subdued. This rule is not universal, for I have known a few men who were always aching for a fight when there was no enemy near, who were as good as their word when the battle did come on. But the number of such men is small."
The first battle was at Palo Alto, meaning "tall trees or woods," six miles from the Rio Grande. Early in the forenoon of May 8, Taylor's three thousand men were drawn up in line of battle, opposed by superior numbers. The infantry was armed with flintlock muskets and paper cartridges charged with powder, buckshot, and ball. "At the distance of a few hundred yards," says Grant, "a man might fire at you all day without your finding it out." The artillery consisted of two batteries and two eighteen-pounder iron guns, with three or four twelve-pounder howitzers throwing shell. The firing was brisk on both sides. One cannon-ball passed near Grant, killing several of his companions. After a hard day's fight, the enemy retreated in the night. The war had now begun in earnest, and the man who at the first hostile gun "felt sorry that he had enlisted" was ready to brave danger on any field.
In the hard-fought battle of Monterey, between sixty-five hundred men under Taylor and ten thousand Mexicans, Grant's curiosity got the better of his judgment, and, leaving the camp, where he had been ordered to remain, he mounted a horse and rode to the front. He made the charge with the men, when about a third of their number were killed. He loaned his horse to the adjutant of the regiment, Lieutenant Hoskins, who was soon killed, and Grant was designated to act in his place.
The ammunition became low, and to return for it was so dangerous that the general commanding didnot like to order any one to fetch it, so called for a volunteer. Grant modestly says, "I volunteered to go back to the point we had started from.... My ride back was an exposed one. Before starting, I adjusted myself on the side of my horse furthest from the enemy, and with only one foot holding to the cantle of the saddle, and an arm over the neck of the horse exposed, I started at full run. It was only at street-crossings that my horse was under fire, but these I crossed at such a flying rate that generally I was past and under cover of the next block of houses before the enemy fired. I got out safely, without a scratch."
When Monterey was conquered, and the garrison marched out as prisoners, young Grant was moved to pity, as he says in his Memoirs, thus showing a gentle nature, which he bore years later when thousands were falling around him, and he was still obliged to say, "Forward."
After the capture of Vera Cruz and the surprise at Cerro Gordo, where three thousand Mexicans were made prisoners, the army advanced toward the City of Mexico. Between three and four miles from the city stood Molino del Rey, the "mill of the King," an old stone structure, one story high, flat-roofed, and several hundred feet long. Sandbags were laid along the roof, and good marksmen fought behind them. Near by was Chepultepec, three hundred feet high, fortified on the top and on its rocky sides. From the front, guns swept the approach to Molino. Yet, on the morning of September8, the assault upon Molino was made, young Grant being among the foremost. The loss was severe, especially among commissioned officers.
Grant says, "I was with the earliest of the troops to enter the mills. In passing through to the north side, looking toward Chepultepec, I happened to notice that there were armed Mexicans still on top of the building, only a few feet from many of our men. Not seeing any stairway or ladder reaching to the top of the building, I took a few soldiers, and had a cart that happened to be standing near brought up, and, placing the shafts against the wall, and chocking the wheels so that the cart could not back, used the shafts as a sort of ladder, extending to within three or four feet of the top. By this I climbed to the roof of the building, followed by a few men, but found a private soldier had preceded me by some other way. There were still quite a number of Mexicans on the roof, among them a major and five or six officers of lower grades, who had not succeeded in getting away before our troops occupied the building. They still had their arms, while the soldier before mentioned was walking as sentry, guarding the prisoners he hadsurrounded, all by himself. I halted the sentinel, received the swords from the commissioned officers, and proceeded, with the assistance of the soldiers now with me, to disable the muskets by striking them against the edge of the wall, and throwing them to the ground below."
Five days after the fall of Molino, Chepultepec was taken, with severe loss. Grant was mentioned in the official report as having "behaved with distinguished gallantry." Just before the City of Mexico fell into our hands, Grant was made first lieutenant. Promotion had not come rapidly. It is sometimes better if success does not come to us early in life. To learn how to work steadily, day after day, with an unalterable purpose; to learn how to concentrate thought and will-power, how to conquer self through failure and hope deferred, is often essential for him who is to govern either by physical or moral power.
After Mexico fell, and General Scott lived in the halls of the Montezumas, he controlled the city as a Havelock or a Gordon might have done; and Grant learned by observation the best of all lessons for a soldier, to be magnanimous to a fallen foe. He learned other valuable lessons in this war; made the acquaintance of the officers with whom he was to measure his strength, in the most stupendous war of modern times, twenty years later.
When the treaty of peace was signed between our country and Mexico, February 2, 1848, whereby we paid fifteen million dollars for the territory ceded to us, Grant obtained leave of absence for four months. One person must have been inexpressibly thankful that his life had been spared. Four years, and she had seen him but once! How noble we often become by the mellowing power ofcircumstances which prevent our having our own way! Discipline may be only another word for achievement.
U. S. Grant and Julia Dent were married August 22, 1848, when he was twenty-six, and began a life of affection and helpfulness, which grew brighter till the end came on Mt. McGregor. There was reason why the affection lasted through all the years; in the best sense they lived for each other. Those who find their happiness outside the home are apt to find little inside the home. Devotion begets devotion, and men and women must expect to receive only what they give. Affection scattered produces a scanty harvest.
The winter of 1848 was spent at the post at Sackett's Harbor, New York; the next two years at Detroit, Michigan. In 1852, Grant was ordered to the Pacific coast. And now the young husband and wife must be separated; she to go to her home in St. Louis, and he to the then unsettled West. When Aspinwall was reached the streets of the town were a foot under water, in a blazing, tropical sun. Cholera broke out among the troops, as it had among the inhabitants, and a third of the people died. The crossing of the Isthmus of Panama, on the backs of mules, was tedious and trying. San Francisco was reached early in September. The gold-mining fever was at its height. Soon the troops passed up to Fort Vancouver, on the Columbia River, and a quiet and dull life began. Measles and small-pox were killing the Indians so rapidlythat the gun of the white man was superfluous as an agent of destruction.
In 1854, six years after Grant's marriage, despairing of supporting his wife and two children on the Pacific coast with his pay as an army officer, he resigned. His prospects now were not bright. Without a profession, save that of arms, he was to begin, at thirty-two, a struggle for support, which must have tested the affection of the woman who married the young officer in her hopeful girlhood. She owned a farm in St. Louis, and thither they moved as their home. He says of the farm: "I had no means to stock it. A house had to be built also. I worked very hard, never losing a day because of bad weather, and accomplished the object in a moderate way. If nothing else could be done, I would load a cord of wood on a wagon and take it to the city for sale. I managed to keep along very well until 1858, when I was attacked by fever and ague. I had suffered very severely and for a long time from this disease while a boy in Ohio. It lasted now over a year, and, while it did not keep me in the house, it did interfere greatly with the amount of work I was able to perform. In the fall of 1858 I sold out my stock, crops, and farming utensils at auction, and gave up farming."
Four years of struggling had not paid pecuniarily. Poverty is not a pleasant school in which to be nurtured. Blessings upon those who do not grow harsh or discontented with its bitter lessons.To keep sunshine in the face when want knocks at the heart is to win the victory in a dreadful battle. And yet many are able to accomplish this, and brighten with their happy faces lives more prosperous than their own.
In the winter of 1858 Captain Grant established a partnership with a cousin of his wife in the real estate business. Again separation came. The little family were left on the farm while the father tried another method of earning a living for them. "Our business," he says, "might have become prosperous if I had been able to wait for it to grow. As it was, there was no more than one person could attend to, and not enough to support two families. While a citizen of St. Louis, and engaged in the real estate agency business, I was a candidate for the office of county engineer, an office of respectability and emolument which would have been very acceptable to me at that time. The incumbent was appointed by the county court, which consisted of five members. My opponent had the advantage of birth over me (he was a citizen by adoption), and carried off the prize. I now withdrew from the co-partnership with Boggs, and, in May, 1860, removed to Galena, Illinois, and took a clerkship in my father's store."
He was once more in the tannery business, which he had so hated when a boy. It is well that men and women are spurred to duty because somebody depends upon them for daily food, otherwise this life of often uncongenial labor would be unbearable.We rarely do what we like to do in this world;—we do what the merciless goad of circumstance forces us to do. He is wise who goes to his work with a smile.
The year 1860 opened upon a new era in this country. Slavery and anti-slavery had struggled together till the election of Abraham Lincoln to the presidency told that the decisive hour had come. The nation could no longer exist "half slave and half free."
When Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated, March 4, 1861, the Southern States seceded, one after another, until eleven had separated from the Union. Most of the Southern forts were already in the hands of the Confederates. Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, still remained under the control of the Union. While besieged by the South, an effort was made to send supplies to our starving garrison. The fort was fired upon April 11, 1861, and that shot, like the one at Concord, was "heard round the world."
From that hour slavery was doomed. The President issued his first call for seventy-five thousand volunteers for ninety days. The North and West seemed to respond as one man. The intense excitement reached the little town of Galena. The citizens were at once called together. Business was suspended. In the evening the court-house was packed. Captain Grant was asked to conduct the meeting. The people naturally turned to one who understood battles, when they saw war close athand. With much embarrassment Grant presided. The leather business was finished for him from that eventful night. The women of Galena were as deeply interested as the men. They came to Grant to obtain a description of the United States uniform for infantry, subscribed and bought the material, procured tailors to cut the garments, and made them with their own willing hands. More and more, with their superior education, women are to play an important part in this country, both in peace and war.
Captain Grant was now asked by Governor Yates, of Illinois, to go into the adjutant-general's office, and render such assistance as he could, which position he accepted, but he modestly says, "I was no clerk, nor had I any capacity to become one. The only place I ever found in my life to put a paper so as to find it again was either a side coat-pocket or the hands of a clerk or secretary more careful than myself. But I had been quartermaster, commissary, and adjutant in the field. The army forms were familiar to me, and I could direct how they should be made out."
Though a man of few words, those few could be effective if Grant chose to use them. Meeting in St. Louis, in a street-car, a young braggart, who said to him, "Where I came from, if a man dares to say a word in favor of the Union we hang him to a limb of the first tree we come to," Grant replied, "We are not so intolerant in St. Louis as we might be. I have not seen a single rebel hung yet,nor heard of one. There are plenty of them who ought to be, however." The young man did not continue the conversation. In May, 1861, Grant wrote a letter to the adjutant-general of the army at Washington, saying that, as he had been in the regular army for fifteen years, and educated at government expense, he tendered his services for the war. No notice was ever taken of the letter, and, of course, no answer was returned. Soon after he spent a week with his parents, in Covington, Kentucky. Twice he called upon Major-General McClellan, at Cincinnati, just across the river, whom he had known slightly in the Mexican War, with the hope that he would be offered a position on his staff. But he failed to see the general, and returned to Illinois. He was not to serve under McClellan. A different destiny awaited him.
President Lincoln now called for three hundred thousand men to enlist for three years or the war. Governor Yates appointed Grant colonel of the Twenty-First Illinois regiment. Another separation from wife and children had come; the beginning of a great career had come also. The regiment repaired to Springfield, Illinois, and, after some time spent in drill, was ordered to move against Colonel Thomas Harris, encamped at the little town of Florida. There was no bravado in the man who had fought so bravely in all the battles of the Mexican War. He says: "As we approached the brow of the hill from which it was expected we could see Harris' camp, and possibly find his men readyformed to meet us, my heart kept getting higher and higher until it felt to me as though it was in my throat. I would have given anything then to have been back in Illinois, but I had not the moral courage to halt and consider what to do; I kept right on. When we reached a point from which the valley below was in full view, I halted. The place where Harris had been encamped a few days before was still there, and the marks of a recent encampment were plainly visible, but the troops were gone. My heart resumed its place. It occurred to me at once that Harris had been as much afraid of me as I had been of him. This was a view of the question I had never taken before, but it was one I never forgot afterwards. From that event to the close of the war, I never experienced trepidation upon confronting an enemy, though I always felt more or less anxiety. I never forgot that he had as much reason to fear my forces as I had his. The lesson was valuable."
Soon after this Lincoln asked the Illinois delegation in Congress to recommend some citizens of the State for the position of brigadier-general, and Grant, to his great surprise, was recommended first on a list of seven. After his appointment he spent several weeks in Missouri, whither he had been ordered. His first battle was at Belmont, where, in a severe engagement of four hours, the loss on our side was 485, and the Confederate loss 642. Grant's horse was shot under him. After the battle the Confederates received reënforcements, andthere was danger that our men could not return to the transports on which they had come to Belmont. "We are surrounded," they cried.
"Well," said their cool leader, "if that be so, we must cut our way out as we cut our way in;" and so they did.
Grant, meantime, rode out into a cornfield alone to observe the enemy. While there, as he afterwards learned, the Southern General Polk and one of his staff saw the Union soldier, and said to their men, "There is a Yankee; you may try your marksmanship on him if you wish;" but, strangely enough, nobody fired, and Grant's valuable life was spared.
He soon perceived that he was the only man between the Confederates and the boats. His horse seemed to realize the situation. Grant says: "There was no path down the bank, and every one acquainted with the Mississippi River knows that its banks, in a natural state, do not vary at any great angle from the perpendicular. My horse put his fore feet over the bank without hesitation or urging, and, with his hind feet well under him, slid down the bank and trotted aboard the boat, twelve or fifteen feet away, over a single gangplank. I dismounted and went at once to the upper deck.... When I first went on deck I entered the captain's room, adjoining the pilot-house, and threw myself on a sofa. I did not keep that position a moment, but rose to go out on the deck to observe what was going on. I hadscarcely left when a musket-ball entered the room, struck the head of the sofa, passed through it, and lodged in the boat." Thus again was his life saved.
Until February of the following year, 1862, little was done by the troops, except to become ready for the great work before them. The enemy occupied strong points on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers, at Forts Henry and Donelson, points as essential to us as to them. These Grant determined to take, if possible. Truly said President Lincoln, "Wherever Grant is things move. I have noticed that from the beginning."
On February 2 the expedition started against Fort Henry, with about seventeen thousand men. Several gun-boats, under Commodore Foote, accompanied the army. At a given hour the troops and gun-boats moved together, the one to invest the garrison, the other to attack the fort. After a severe fight of an hour and a half every gun was silenced. General Lloyd Tilghman surrendered, with his seventeen heavy guns, ammunition, and stores.
Fort Donelson must now be taken, strongly fortified as it was. It stood on high ground, with rifle-pits running back two miles from the river, and was defended by fifteen heavy guns, two carronades, and sixty-five pieces of artillery. Outside the rifle-pits, trees had been felled, so that the tops lay toward the attacking army. Our men had no shelter from the snow and rain in this midwinter siege. No campfires could be allowed where theenemy could see them. In the march from Fort Henry to Fort Donelson numbers of the tired troops had thrown away their blankets and overcoats, and there was much real suffering. But war means discomfort and woe as well as death itself.
At three o'clock, February 14, Commodore Foote's gun-boats attacked the water batteries, and after a severe encounter several of them were disabled. The one upon which the commodore stood was hit about sixty times, one shot killing the pilot, carrying away the wheel, and wounding the commander. The night came on intensely cold. The next morning, the enemy, taking heart, came against the national forces to cut their way out. Then Grant rode among his men, saying, "Whichever party first attacks now will whip, and the rebels will have to be very quick if they beat me.... Fill your cartridge-boxes quick, and get into line; the enemy is trying to escape, and he must not be permitted to do so."
Our men worked their way through the abatis of trees, took the outer line of rifle-pits, and bivouacked within the enemy's lines. A driving storm of snow and hail set in, and many soldiers were frozen on that dismal night. There must have been little sleep amid the firing of the Confederate pickets and the groans of the wounded on that frozen ground.
During the night the Confederate Generals Floyd and Pillow left the fort with three thousandmen and Forrest with another thousand. On the morning of February 16, Brigadier-General S. B. Buckner sent a note to General Grant, suggesting an armistice. The following reply was returned at once:—
"Sir,—Yours of this date, proposing armistice and appointment of commissioners to settle terms of capitulation, is just received. No terms except an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works."
"Sir,—Yours of this date, proposing armistice and appointment of commissioners to settle terms of capitulation, is just received. No terms except an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works."
From that day U. S. Grant became to the people of the North "Unconditional Surrender" Grant; precious words, indeed, to the army as well as the people, to whom decisive action meant peace at last.
General Buckner considered the terms "ungenerous and unchivalrous," but he surrendered his sixty-five guns, seventeen thousand six hundred small arms, and nearly fifteen thousand troops. Our loss in killed, wounded, and missing was about two thousand; the Confederate loss was believed to be about twenty-five hundred.
This victory, the first great victory of the war, caused much rejoicing at the North, and Grant was at once made major-general of volunteers. Two weeks from this time he was virtually under arrest for not conforming to orders which he never received, but he was soon restored to his position. The country was to learn later, what Lincoln learned early in the war, that one head for an army is better than several heads.
The next great battle under Grant was at Shiloh, near Pittsburg Landing. On the morning of April 6, 1862, the Confederates, under General Albert Sidney Johnston and Beauregard, rushed upon the national lines. All day Sunday the battle raged, and at night the Union forces had fallen back a mile in the rear of their position in the morning. Sherman, who commanded the ridge on which stood the log meeting-house of Shiloh, was twice shot, once in the hand and once in the shoulder, a third ball passing through his hat. Grant could well say of this brave officer, "I never deemed it important to stay long with Sherman."
During the night after the desperate battle the rain fell in torrents upon the two armies, who slept upon their arms. General Grant's headquarters were under a tree, a few hundred yards back from the river. "Some time after midnight," he says, "growing restive under the storm and the continuous rain, I moved back to the log house under the bank. This had been taken as a hospital, and all night wounded men were brought in, their wounds dressed, a leg or an arm amputated, as the case might require, and everything being done to save life or alleviate suffering. The sight was more unendurable than encountering the enemy's fire, and I returned to my tree in the rain."
In battle, the great general could look on men falling about him apparently unmoved; when the battle was over, he could not bear the sight of pain. The men revered him, because, while heled them into death, he almost surely led them into victory.
On April 7 the battle raged all along the line, and the enemy were everywhere driven back. At three o'clock Grant gathered up a couple of regiments, formed them into line of battle, and marched them forward, going in front himself to prevent long-range firing. The command "Charge" was given, and it was executed with loud cheers and a run, and the enemy broke. Grant came near losing his life. A ball struck the metal scabbard of his sword, just below the hilt, and broke it nearly off. Night closed upon a victorious Union army, but the victory had been gained at a fearful cost.
"Shiloh," says General Grant, "was the severest battle fought at the West during the war, and but few in the East equalled it for hard, determined fighting. I saw an open field, in our possession on the second day, over which the Confederates had made repeated charges the day before, so covered with dead that it would have been possible to walk across the clearing, in any direction, stepping on dead bodies, without a foot touching the ground. On our side national and Confederate troops were mingled together in about equal proportions; but on the remainder of the field nearly all were Confederates. On one part, which had evidently not been ploughed for several years, probably because the land was poor, bushes had grown up, some to the height of eight or ten feet. There was not one ofthese left standing unpierced by bullets. The smaller ones were all cut down."
During the first day the brave Albert Sidney Johnston was wounded. He would not leave the battle-field, but continued in the saddle, giving commands, till, exhausted by loss of blood, he was taken from his horse, and died soon after. The Union loss was reported to be over thirteen thousand. Some estimate the losses as not less than fifteen thousand on each side. Up to this time, Grant had hoped that a few such victories as Fort Donelson would dishearten the South; now he saw that conquest alone could compel peace, with a brave and heroic people, of our own blood and race. From this time the work of laying waste the enemy's country began, with the hope that the sooner supplies were exhausted the sooner peace would be possible.
On October 25, the battle of Corinth having been fought October 3, General Grant was placed in command of the Department of the Tennessee, and began the Vicksburg campaign. The capture of this place would afford free navigation of the Mississippi. For three months plan after plan was tried for the reduction of this almost impregnable position. Sherman made a direct attack at the only point where a landing was practicable, and failed. Grant's army was stationed on the west bank of the river, on marshy ground, full of malaria, from recent rains. The troops were ill of fever, measles, and small-pox, and many died.There could be found scarcely enough dry land on which to pitch their tents.
It was finally decided to cut a canal across the peninsula in front of Vicksburg, that the gun-boats might safely pass through to a point below the city. Four thousand men began work on the canal, but a sudden rise in the river broke the dam and stopped the work. A second method was tried, by breaking levees and widening and connecting streams between Lake Providence, seventy miles above Vicksburg, through the Red River, into the Mississippi again four hundred miles below, but this project was soon abandoned. Meantime, the North had become restless, and many clamored for Grant's removal, declaring him incompetent, but, amid all the reproaches, he kept silent. When Lincoln was urged to make a change, he said simply, "I rather like the man; I think we'll try him a little longer!"
At length it was decided to attempt to run the gun-boats past the batteries, march the troops down the west bank of the river, cross over to the east side, and attack the rear of Vicksburg. The steamers were protected as far as possible with bales of hay, cotton, and grain, for the boilers could not bear the enemy's fire. On the 16th of April, 1863, on a dark night, the fleet was ready for the dangerous passage. As soon as the boats were discovered, the batteries opened fire, piles of combustibles being lighted along the shore that proper aim might be taken against the fleet. Every transportwas struck. As fast as the shots made holes, the men put cotton bags in the openings. For nearly three hours the eight gun-boats and three steamers were under a merciless fire. The Henry Clay was disabled, and soon set on fire by the bursting of a shell in the cotton packed about her boilers. Grant watched the passage of the fleet from a steamer in the river, and felt relieved as though the victory were close at hand.
Soon after, the whole force of thirty-three thousand men were crossed below Vicksburg. Fifty miles to the east, the Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston had a large army, which must be crippled before Vicksburg could be besieged. Port Gibson, near the river, was first taken by our troops; then Raymond, May 12; Jackson, May 18; Champion Hill, May 16; and then Black River Bridge. Grant had beaten Johnston in the rear; now he must beat Pemberton with his nearly fifty thousand men shut up in Vicksburg.
On May 19, the city of Vicksburg was completely invested by our troops. Says General Grant, "Five distinct battles had been fought and won by the Union forces; the capital of the State had fallen, and its arsenals, military manufactories, and everything useful for military purposes had been destroyed; an average of about one hundred and eighty miles had been marched by the troops engaged; but five days' rations had been issued, and no forage; over six thousand prisoners had been captured, and as many more of the enemy had beenkilled or wounded; twenty-seven heavy cannon, and sixty-one field-pieces had fallen into our hands; and four hundred miles of the river, from Vicksburg to Port Hudson, had become ours."
And now the siege began. By June 30, there were two hundred and twenty guns in position, besides a battery of heavy guns, manned and commanded by the navy. The besiegers had no mortars, save those of the navy in front of the city, but they took tough logs, bored them out for six or twelve-pound shells, bound them with strong iron bands, and used them effectively in the trenches of the enemy.
The eyes of the whole country were centred on Vicksburg. Mines were dug by both armies, and exploded. Among the few men who reached the ground alive after having been thrown up by the explosions was a colored man, badly frightened. Some one asked how high he had gone up. "Dunno, massa; but tink 'bout t'ree mile," was the reply.
Meantime, the people in Vicksburg were living in caves and cellars to escape the shot and shell. Starvation began to stare them in the face. Flour was sold at five dollars a pound; molasses at ten and twelve dollars a gallon. Yet the brave people held out against surrender. A Confederate woman, says General Badeau, in his graphic "Military History of U. S. Grant," asked Grant, tauntingly, as he stopped at her house for water, if he ever expected to get into Vicksburg.
"Certainly," he replied.
"But when?"
"I cannot tell exactly when I shall take the town; butI mean to stay here till I do, if it takes me thirty years."
All through the siege, the men of both armies talked to each other; the Confederates and Unionists calling each other respectively "Yanks" and "Johnnies." "Well, Yank, when are you coming into town?"
"We propose to celebrate the Fourth of July there, Johnnie."
The Vicksburg paper said, prior to the Fourth, in speaking of the Yankee boast that they would take dinner in Vicksburg that day, "The best receipt for cooking a rabbit is, 'First ketch your rabbit!'" The last number of the paper was issued on July 4, and said, "The Yankees have caught the rabbit."
On July 3, at ten o'clock, white flags began to appear on the enemy's works, and two men were seen coming towards the Union lines, bearing a white flag. They bore a message from General Pemberton, asking that an armistice be granted, and three commissioners appointed to confer with a like number named by Grant. "I make this proposition to save the further effusion of blood," said General Pemberton, "which must otherwise be shed to a frightful extent, feeling myself fully able to maintain my position for a yet indefinite period."
To this Grant replied: "The useless effusion ofblood you propose stopping by this course can be ended at any time you choose, by the unconditional surrender of the city and garrison. Men who have shown so much endurance and courage as those now in Vicksburg will always challenge the respect of an adversary, and, I can assure you, will be treated with all the respect due to prisoners of war."
In the afternoon of July 3, Grant and Pemberton met under a stunted oak-tree, a few hundred yards from the Confederate lines. They had known each other in the Mexican War. A kindly conference was held, and honorable terms of surrender agreed upon, the officers taking their side-arms and clothing, and staff and cavalry officers one horse each. When the men passed out of the works they had so gallantly defended, not a cheer went up from our men nor was a remark made that could cause pain. The garrison surrendered at Vicksburg numbered over thirty-one thousand men, with sixty thousand muskets, and over one hundred and seventy cannon. Five days later, Port Hudson, lower on the river, surrendered, with six thousand prisoners and fifty-one guns.
There was great rejoicing at the North. Lincoln wrote to Grant: "My dear general, I do not remember that you and I have ever met personally. I write this now as a grateful acknowledgment for the almost inestimable service you have done the country. I write to say a word further. When you first reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I thought you should do what you finally did, marchthe troops across the neck, run the batteries with the transports, and then go below; and I never had any faith, except a general hope that you knew better than I, that the Yazoo Pass expedition and the like could succeed. When you got below and took Port Gibson, Grand Gulf, and vicinity, I thought you should go down the river and join General Banks, and when you turned northward, east of the Big Black, I feared it was a mistake. I wish now to make the personal acknowledgment that you were right and I was wrong."
Rare is that soul which is able to see itself in the wrong, and rarer still one which has the generosity to acknowledge it.
In October, Grant, who had now been made a major-general in the regular army, as he had before been appointed to the same rank in the volunteers, was placed in command of the military division of the Mississippi. Later he defeated Bragg at Chattanooga, November 24 and 25, 1863, in the memorable battles of Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. General Halleck said in his annual report, "Considering the strength of the rebel position and the difficulty of storming his intrenchments, the battle of Chattanooga must be considered the most remarkable in history. Not only did the officers and men exhibit great skill and daring in their operations on the field, but the highest praise is due to the commanding general for his admirable dispositions for dislodging the enemy from a position apparently impregnable."
How our brave men fought at Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain has never been more graphically and touchingly told than by the late lamented Benjamin F. Taylor: "They dash out a little way and then slacken; they creep up hand over hand, loading and firing, and wavering and halting, from the first line of works to the second; they burst into a charge, with a cheer, and go over it. Sheets of flame baptize them; plunging shots tear away comrades on left and right; it is no longer shoulder to shoulder; it is God for us all! Under tree-trunks, among rocks, stumbling over the dead, struggling with the living, facing the steady fire of eight thousand infantry poured down upon their heads as if it were the old historic curse from heaven, they wrestle with the Ridge. Ten, fifteen, twenty minutes go by, like a reluctant century. The batteries roll like a drum. Between the second and last lines of rebel works is the torrid zone of the battle. The hill sways up like a wall before them at an angle of forty-five degrees, but our brave mountaineers are clambering steadily on—up—upward still!... They seem to be spurning the dull earth under their feet, and going up to do Homeric battle with the greater gods."
When this costly victory had been gained, President Lincoln appointed a day of national thanksgiving. Congress passed a unanimous vote of thanks to Grant and his officers and men, and ordered a medal to be struck in his honor: his face on one side, surrounded by a laurel wreath; on theother side, Fame seated on the American eagle, holding in her right hand a scroll with the words, Corinth, Vicksburg, Mississippi River, and Chattanooga.
Early in 1864, a distinguished honor was paid him. Since the death of Washington, only one man had been appointed a lieutenant-general in the army of the United States,—Winfield Scott. Congress now revived this grade, and on March 1, 1864, Lincoln appointed Grant to this position. On March 9, before the President and his cabinet, his commission was formally presented to him, Lincoln saying, "As the country herein trusts you, so, under God, it will sustain you." Grant now had all the Union armies under his control—over seven hundred thousand men. When he was in the Galena leather store, men said his life was a failure! Was it a failure now? And yet he was the same modest, unostentatious man as when he tried farming to support his beloved family.
Immediately Grant planned two great campaigns: one against Richmond, which was defended by Lee; the other against Atlanta, under Sherman, defended by Joseph E. Johnston. Sherman's march to the sea immortalized him; Grant's march to Richmond was the crowning success in the greatest of modern wars. President Lincoln reposed the utmost confidence in Grant. He wrote him: "The particulars of your plans I neither know nor seek to know. You are vigilant and self-reliant, and, pleased with this, I wish not to obtrude anyconstraints or restraints upon you. While I am very anxious that any great disaster or the capture of our men in great numbers shall be avoided, I know these points are less likely to escape your attention than they would be mine. If there is anything wanting which is within my power to give, do not fail to let me know it. And now, with a brave army and a just cause, may God sustain you."
The end was coming. On May 4, 1864, Grant crossed the Rapidan with the Army of the Potomac, about one hundred and twenty thousand men, intending to put his forces between Lee and Richmond. Lee, perceiving this design, met the army at the Wilderness, a portion of country covered by a dense forest. The undergrowth was so heavy that it was scarcely possible to see more than one hundred paces in any direction. All day long, May 5, a bloody battle was waged in the woods.
Says Private Frank Wilkeson, "I heard the hum of bullets as they passed over the low trees. Then I noticed that small limbs of trees were falling in a feeble shower in advance of me. It was as though an army of squirrels were at work cutting off nut and pine-cone laden branches preparatory to laying in their winter's store of food. Then, partially obscured by a cloud of powder smoke, I saw a straggling line of men clad in blue. They were not standing as if on parade, but they were taking advantage of the cover afforded by trees, and they were firing rapidly. Their lineofficers were standing behind them or in line with them. The smoke drifted to and fro, and there were many rifts in it.... We had charged, and charged, and charged again, and had gone wild with battle fever. We had gained about two miles of ground. We were doing splendidly. I cast my eyes upward to see the sun, so as to judge of the time, as I was hungry, and wanted to eat, and I saw that it was still low above the trees. The Confederates seemed to be fighting more stubbornly, fighting as though their battle-line was being fed with more troops. They hung on to the ground they occupied tenaciously, and resolutely refused to fall back further. Then came a swish of bullets and a fierce exultant yell, as of thousands of infuriated tigers. Our men fell by scores. Great gaps were struck in our lines. There was a lull for an instant, and then Longstreet's men sprang to the charge. It was swiftly and bravely made, and was within an ace of being successful. There was great confusion in our line. The men wavered badly. They fired wildly. They hesitated.... The regimental officers held their men as well as they could. We could hear them close behind us, or in line with us, saying, 'Steady, men, steady, steady, steady!' as one speaks to frightened and excited horses."
Grant says, "More desperate fighting has not been witnessed on this continent than that of May 5 and 6.... The ground fought over had varied in width, but averaged three-quarters of a mile.The killed and many of the severely wounded of both armies lay within this belt where it was impossible to reach them. The woods were set on fire by the bursting shells, and the conflagration raged. The wounded who had not strength to move themselves were either suffocated or burned to death. Finally the fire communicated with our breastworks in places. Being constructed of wood, they burned with great fury. But the battle still raged, our men firing through the flames until it became too hot to remain longer."
After a loss of from fourteen to fifteen thousand men on each side, Lee remained in his intrenchments and Grant still moved on toward Richmond. The armies met at Spottsylvania Court-House, and here was fought one of the bloodiest battles of the war, with about the same loss as in the Wilderness. Sometimes the conflict was hand to hand, men using their guns as clubs, being too close to fire. In one place a tree, eighteen inches in diameter, was cut entirely down by musket balls. Grant wrote to Washington, May 11: "We have now ended the sixth day of very hard fighting. The result up to this time is much in our favor. But our losses have been heavy, as well as those of the enemy. We have lost to this time eleven general officers killed, wounded, and missing, and probably twenty thousand men. I think the loss of the enemy must be greater. We have taken over four thousand prisoners in battle, whilst he has taken from us but few excepta few stragglers. I am now sending back to Belle Plain all my wagons for a fresh supply of provisions and ammunition, and purposeto fight it out on this line if it takes all summer."
After this came the battles of Drury's Bluff, North Anna, Totopotomoy, and Cold Harbor, with its brilliant assault and deadly repulse, with a loss of from ten to fourteen thousand men on the latter field.
Lee had now been driven so near to Richmond, and the swamps of the Chickahominy were so impassable, that Grant determined to move his army, one hundred and fifteen thousand men, south of the James River and attack Richmond in the rear. The move was hazardous, but he reached City Point safely. General Butler here joined him, and the siege of Petersburg, twenty miles below Richmond, began, and was continued through the winter and spring.
On July 30, 1864, a mine was exploded under one of the enemy's forts. The gallery to the mine was over five hundred feet long from where it entered the ground to the point where it was under the enemy's works. Eight chambers had been left, requiring a ton of powder each to charge them. It exploded at five o'clock in the morning, making a crater twenty feet deep and about one hundred feet in length. Instantly one hundred and ten cannon and fifty mortars commenced work to cover our troops as they entered the enemy's lines. "The effort," says Grant, "was a stupendous failure. Itcost us about four thousand men, mostly, however, captured, and all due to inefficiency on the part of the corps commander and the incompetency of the division commander who was sent to lead the assault."
Meanwhile Sheridan had destroyed the power of the South in the Shenandoah valley. Again the army began its march toward Richmond. On April 1, 1865, the battle of Five Forks was fought, nearly six thousand Confederates being taken prisoners; then Petersburg was captured, and on April 3 General Weitzel took possession of Richmond, the enemy having evacuated it, the city having been set on fire before their departure.
For five days Lee's army was pursued with more or less fighting. On April 7, Grant wrote a letter to Lee, saying: "The results of the last week must convince you of the hopelessness of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia in this struggle. I feel that it is so, and regard it as my duty to shift from myself the responsibility of any further effusion of blood, by asking of you the surrender of that portion of the Confederate States Army known as the Army of Northern Virginia."