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01 - Ulysses S. Grant by Owen Wister · Ulysses S. Grant

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  Speaker 1: Section one of Ulysses S. Grant. This is a LibriVox recording.
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  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
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  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording
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  Speaker 1: by David Wales. Ulysses S. Grant by Owen Wister, author's
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  Speaker 1: preface and Chapters one and two author's preface. This short
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  Speaker 1: book is derived from long ones, from pamphlets, speeches, essays,
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  Speaker 1: and newspapers, from certain pages of the official records, and
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  Speaker 1: from a few personal memories kindly given by friends of
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  Speaker 1: general Grant to the writer. These latter change nothing in
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  Speaker 1: the features, but serve to touch up the likeness of
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  Speaker 1: the established portrait. Grant is a large figure to pack
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  Speaker 1: in a small box. The task been one of omission.
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  Speaker 1: Those authors to whom the writer is most grateful are Richardson, Fisk, Copey, Porter, Humphreys, Sherman, Sheridan, Newhall, Rhodes,
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  Speaker 1: and Bedeaux Grant. In peace, the writer will think that
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  Speaker 1: he has made his own contribution to the subject if
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  Speaker 1: he shall have tempted any reader to become more thoroughly
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  Speaker 1: acquainted with it. Owen Wister, Philadelphia, August one, nineteen hundred
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  Speaker 1: Chapter one, At the age of thirty nine, Grant was
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  Speaker 1: an obscure failure in a provincial town. To him and
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  Speaker 1: his family, for whom he could not earn needful bread,
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  Speaker 1: his father had become a last shelter against the struggle
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  Speaker 1: for life. Not all the neighbors knew his face. At
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  Speaker 1: the age of forty three, his picture hung in the
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  Speaker 1: homes of grateful millions. His name was joined with Washington's.
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  Speaker 1: A little while, and we see him step down amid
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  Speaker 1: discordant reproach from Washington's chair, having helplessly presided over scandal
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  Speaker 1: and villainy, blacker than the country had thus far witnessed. Next,
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  Speaker 1: his private integrity is darkly overcast, and the stroke kills him,
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  Speaker 1: but death clears his sky. At the age of sixty three,
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  Speaker 1: Grant died, and the people paused to mourn and honor
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  Speaker 1: him devotedly. All the neighbors know his face to day.
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  Speaker 1: Chapter two. None of our public men have a story
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  Speaker 1: so strange as this. It is stranger than Lincoln's. It
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  Speaker 1: is very much the strangest of them all. We have
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  Speaker 1: been too near the man and his time to see
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  Speaker 1: them clear. Through personal, political and military feelings, mostly violent,
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  Speaker 1: all the people are not dead yet. Nearly all the
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  Speaker 1: writers have a case to argue. Sheridan must justify his
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  Speaker 1: treatment of Warren. Sherman must bolster up Shiloh Beauregard must
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  Speaker 1: diminish Sidney Johnston. But Oh must be little mead. And
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  Speaker 1: also the losses in the wilderness. These are mere instances.
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  Speaker 1: The heroes and their biographers all right alike, inevitably moved
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  Speaker 1: and biased by the throb of proximity. Such books are
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  Speaker 1: not history. They make inspiring material when read in each
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  Speaker 1: other's light. They are personal reminiscences. History never begins until
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  Speaker 1: reminiscence is ended. Even mister Ropes, in his championing of
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  Speaker 1: Buell the Soldier, omits Buell the man now Buell, sulking
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  Speaker 1: over his wrongs, declined when invited to come back and
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  Speaker 1: take a command again. He found his dignity more important
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  Speaker 1: to him than the union grant meeting singular injustice. After winning,
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  Speaker 1: Donelson has such words as these to say, if my
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  Speaker 1: course is not satisfactory, remove me at once. I do
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  Speaker 1: not wish to impede in any way the success of
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  Speaker 1: our arms. Good authority rates Buell a more military soldier
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  Speaker 1: than Grant, and very likely he was. But Buell thought
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  Speaker 1: of himself and forgot his country, while Grant thought of
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  Speaker 1: his country and forgot himself. Out of this very contrast
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  Speaker 1: of bright light falls and we begin to see Grant
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  Speaker 1: writing intemperately. His friends explain him as a sort of Napoleon,
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  Speaker 1: his enemies as a dull blunderer accidentally reaping the glory
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  Speaker 1: which other people sowed. These extremes meet in error. We
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  Speaker 1: have not produced a Napoleon, and military talents of greater
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  Speaker 1: brilliancy than Grant's fought on both sides purely as Captains Lee, Jackson,
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  Speaker 1: Sherman Thomas, if not others, are likely to stand higher.
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  Speaker 1: While Sheridan, during his brief opportunity, proved such a thunderbolt
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  Speaker 1: that did history no men by their promise instead of
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  Speaker 1: by their fruits. He might outshine the whole company and
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  Speaker 1: rank with Charles of Sweden or Conde. Yet Grant sits
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  Speaker 1: above and apart. Is this accident? Is it accident that
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  Speaker 1: at the beginning of a certain four years, this middle
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  Speaker 1: aged man should be nobody, and at the end should
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  Speaker 1: be the one commander out of all to win and
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  Speaker 1: retain the supreme confidence of his government and his people.
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  Speaker 1: It has been called accident by some grown up writers.
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  Speaker 1: His own words give the unconscious explanation. I feel as
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  Speaker 1: sure of taking Richmond as I do of dying. Not
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  Speaker 1: mc clellan, not Meed, not Lincoln himself, not any one
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  Speaker 1: at all, had ever been able to feel as sure
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  Speaker 1: as that. This utter certainty of the Union's success burned
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  Speaker 1: in Grant like a central fire, and with all his
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  Speaker 1: limitations made his will a great natural force which gravitated
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  Speaker 1: simply and irresistibly to its end. Lincoln, beginning to feel
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  Speaker 1: it from afar, answered the grave complaints that rose after
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  Speaker 1: the carnage of Shiloh. I can't spare this man. He fights,
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  Speaker 1: and presently, during the impatient days of Vicksburg failures, he insists,
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  Speaker 1: I rather like the man. I think we'll try him
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  Speaker 1: a little longer. Finally comes the renowned remark, when they
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  Speaker 1: tell him of Grant's intemperance, I wish I knew what
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  Speaker 1: brand of whiskey he drinks. I would send a beryl
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  Speaker 1: to all my other generals. Sherman felt the power near
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  Speaker 1: at hand as he fought under Grant, and wrote to
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  Speaker 1: him that it was something which he could liken to
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  Speaker 1: nothing else than the faith a Christian has in his Savior.
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  Speaker 1: Through this faith, then the obscure man from Galena began
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  Speaker 1: in April eighteen six, and by April eighteen sixty four
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  Speaker 1: was the will power of his country. But why was
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  Speaker 1: such a man still obscure at the age of thirty nine? Again,
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  Speaker 1: his own words give the fundamental explanation. As I grow older,
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  Speaker 1: I become more indolent, my besetting sin through life. This
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  Speaker 1: was written in eighteen seventy three to his minister to England,
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  Speaker 1: and no truer word ever came from him. Together with
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  Speaker 1: the remark about taking Richmond, it reveals the foundation upon
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  Speaker 1: which the whole man was built. Great will and great
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  Speaker 1: indolence met about equally in grant. Therefore he stood still,
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  Speaker 1: needing a push from without to move him. The gun
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  Speaker 1: that fired on Sumter was the push. Until that day.
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  Speaker 1: He resembled a large animal, hibernating to what he did,
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  Speaker 1: and left undone. His other qualities contributed, But these two
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  Speaker 1: controll'd indolence and will. In their light, his story can
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  Speaker 1: be plainly read. His portrait clearly seen end of author's
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  Speaker 1: preface and Chapters one and two