Hiram Ulysses S. Grant Research Paper

Hiram Ulysses Grant was born in Ohio, but soon after Grant 's birth, his father, Jesse R. Grant, moved the family to nearby Georgetown, where he opened a tannery. Growing up, Grant found that he hated the tannery business and lacked any business knowledge, which would plague him for the entirety of his life

Luckily, Grant did find a good outlet for his energy at West Point, which he entered at seventeen. A bureaucratic mistake changed his name to Ulysses S. Grant–something Grant never bothered to correct, as he had had never liked the initials H.U.G. very much. At West Point Grant remained solidly mediocre at every task except for equestrian skills, where he excelled. Soon after he graduated and arrived at his first posting in St. Louis, he

Louis and after resurrecting his marriage, Grant tried his hand at farming and built his family a massive house on his father-in-law 's farm. However, even with his in-laws ' help and loans of money and slaves, Grant could not make the farm work, and was reduced to selling firewood on the street corner in St. Louis. Eventually, in 1859, he admitted failure and headed for home with his family. Grant 's father offered him a place in the family store in Galena, Illinois, where he worked until war clouds again began to gather with the presidential Election of Abraham Lincoln in 1860.

In the early part of the Civil War, the North had few successes–and several of the major ones belonged to Grant. He successfully attacked two crucial Confederate forts, and his demands at both locations for "unconditional surrender" earned him the nickname "Unconditional Surrender Grant." As Confederate General Robert E. Lee battled an ever-changing succession of Union generals in Virginia, Grant moved his army south towards Mississippi, but was temporarily halted by the disastrous near-rout at

The North wanted to cut the Confederacy in half at the Mississippi River, and only the fortress city of Vicksburg blocked their move. After a bloody battle outside the city, Grant settled in for a siege. On July 3, 1863, the Confederate commander asked for terms of surrender; Grant issued his trademark reply: "unconditional surrender." The surrender of the city, coming at the same time as the decisive battle of Gettysburg, helped turn the tide of the war.

Grant became commander of all the Union armies and soon set about to wear down the Confederates. After years of skirmishes in Virginia, he began a yearlong battle that would exhaust the Confederacy. Grant sent General William T. Sherman tearing through Georgia, while himself fighting continuously against Lee. The battles had a terrible cost in lives, but succeeded in wearing the Confederate forces down. In the spring of 1865, Lee abandoned Petersburg and then Richmond before finally surrendering near Appomattox.

The next step for Grant was logically the Presidency–the only honor higher than the military honors he had already received. In 1868, the Grant was elected to the White House, thus beginning one of the most scandal-ridden administrations ever in American history. Grant unknowingly aided in a scheme to corner the gold market for two financiers, his cabinet members were caught in various graft attempts, and his Reconstruction policies failed miserably; however, despite this Grant was