June 8, 1863, The New York Herald
General Grant does not appear to have ever made a speech, or to have told any one what he would like to do against the rebels. No phrases of his live in the popular memory, and he does not even electrify the nation or the troops under his command with congratulatory orders. But he fights a great deal. He has been sneered at; he has been maligned; he has been neglected, and has done more against the rebellion than any other general now in the field. Like the other Ulysses, he has delight of […..] battle with his peers,” on terribly contested fields, where it seemed at the time that the existence of the rebellion was in question, and he has been successful always. All this a glance at his career in this war will show.
His name first came prominently before the public in connection with the fight at Belmont, in November, 1861. Price was then doing his utmost to push the fortunes of the rebellion in Missouri, and there was a rebel force of at least fifteen thousand men at Columbus, on the Mississippi, a portion of which it was expected would be thrown across to reinforce Price. There was danger also that some small bodies of Union troops out in Southeastern Missouri, in pursuit of Jeff. Thompson, would be picked up by this rebel advance. Grant was at Cairo, with a small force. He could not, of course, have hoped to make any impression on Columbus or assume the offensive in any way upon a large scale. But he resolved to keep the enemy busy, to protect the detachments, and to prevent, if possible, the reinforcement of Price. This is the whole nature of the affair at Belmont. It was a diversion. After a successful deception of the enemy as to his intentions, he suddenly landed above Belmont with only twenty-eight hundred men of all arms. With this force he captured and destroyed an intrenched camp, took two field batteries and two hundred prisoners, under the fire of the guns at Columbus. Immediately after the commencement of the fight General Polk, at Columbus – as we learn by his own statement – threw across eight regiments and crossed in person. Grant was thus threatened with capture. He could not get away, and was compelled with his twenty-eight hundred to fight this whole force. He accordingly took a position in the field, from which the rebels under Polk and Pillow made three furious attempts to dislodge him. They were repulsed each time, and were at last content to let Grant go to his boats and return to Cairo, having completely accomplished his object and inflicted upon the enemy a loss far greater than his own.
Early in the winter he arranged the expedition against Fort Henry, which work, however, was reduced by the fire of the gunboats, without the engagement of the land force. From that point he advanced at once and invested Fort Donelson. Here the gunboats did not succeed so well and the harder part of the work was done by Grant’s army. Against his right the rebels made a gallant sortie. They were driven in after a very hard fight, and then, without a chance for respite, Grant’s left assaulted their position, and with such force and success that the capitulation of the place was the result. With the fort were taken, besides heavy guns, one hundred and forty-six field pieces. Different accounts have been given of the number of prisoners taken there; but, under the head of prisoners, the government has paid for the transportation of more men than Grant had engaged against the place.
Everywhere the news of the fall of Fort Donelson was received with extravagant demonstrations of joy. But against Grant’s part of it, and as an evidence that what he had done was not well done – as an evidence, even in the very face of success, that the advance and assault were not properly made – it was stated that Grant was addicted to the use of whiskey. Such is the popular estimate of heroic achievements.
When we remember the charges made against Gen. Grant in connection with the battle at Shiloh – charges the least of which was that of incompetency – we would expect to read in the history of that battle the history of national humiliation and of the annihilation of our Southwestern army. Instead of that we read of thirty thousand good troops and ten thousand poor ones who are engaged in battle all day with at least sixty thousand, and who hold at the close of the day all that which was the object of the battle. And that is the worst of it. “By a rapid and vigorous attack on Grant,” says Beauregard, “it was expected he would be beaten back into his transports and the river, or captured, in time to enable us to profit by the victory, and remove the stores and munitions that would fall into our hands, before the arrival of Buell.” Such, then, was the object of the rebel leaders, and by the extent to which he defeated that object must we take the measure of Grant success or failure. He defeated it completely; and not only that, but held the enemy so many hours that Buell came up, and the enemy paid for the ground he had won by demoralization and rout. So sure was the rebel general of his ability to crush Grant at a blow that he fought as nearly a parallel battle as the nature of the ground would permit. And by what he thought Grant could do we may judge of what Grant did. Instead of stampede we read here of one of the few battle fields of this war in which there was actually some manoeuvre. We read of divisions that move under fire to new positions, and are found to be just where they are wanted when the fight becomes fiercest, and of at least one column whose well timed and well directed advance compels the enemy to relinquish his final great attempt. And in all we see Grant, and see him at last add to his ability as a general the valor and impetuosity of a leader, and go forward at the head of the decisive charge.
And now every day we watch the progress of this same man at the pivot of all the operations in the Southwest. But a few weeks ago we saw him almost hopelessly in front of Vicksburg. Every attempt failed, and the place seemed stronger and stronger at each new point at which it was felt. Suddenly he had seized, as a base of operations, a point on the river below it, and had fought and defeated the rebels under Bowen, near Port Gibson. Bowen retreated across Bayou Pierre, prepared to dispute the passage of the Big Black river, and seems to have thought that he could compel Grant to fight there. But Grant advanced at once to Willow Spring, Raymond, Jackson, and thence, by Champion’s Hill, toward Vicksburg – fighting all the time. His line had been in peril from the start, and on this advance he completely gave it up, on the faith of a new base – to be won. And that new one was won by his simple advance from this direction, which rendered Haines’ Bluff untenable. At present he has the open country, a good base, a position between the city and succor, and he has interior lines. If he is supported against the reinforcement of Johnston Vicksburg must fall.
Yet, even if there should be a final failure there, that will not detract from the great merit of what he has already done in this remarkable campaign; though, of course, as a rule, military operations much be judged by their final success; and, judged in that way, General Grant may confidently place his record before the world – a record, so far, without a failure – and with great successes.