General Grant as Commander-in-chief with the Army of the Potomac—How Grant Fought His Men—Not a Retreating 'Man—The Overland Campaign—The Grand Finale—After the War—The Old Commander in Troy—En Route to MacGregor—Mustered Out.

HEN U. S. Grant was promoted to lieutenant-general, and assigned to command all the armies of the United States, the announcement was received by the Army of the Potomac without any marked evidence of approval or disapproval. There was no enthusiasm whatever among the troops in winter quarters around Warrenton.

A few expressed the opinion that the “Western importation” would not come up to the country's expectations when brought face to face with the great rebel chief, who was personally acquainted with every inch of the ground on which the battles of Virginia must be fought. Then there was a feeling, though not outspoken to any great extent, that the new-comer, being a stranger to Lee's tactics, and unacquainted with the Eastern troops, would be placed at such a disadvantage, that the Confederate leader would be enabled to “play all around” Grant, and demoralize the Union army. The veterans of the grand old Army of the Potomac were prepared to fight—to the death, if need be—no matter who received the three stars of a lieutenant-general. They were loyal to their flag, and that carried with it loyalty to the new commander.

Probably it did not occur to a dozen soldiers in the Army of the Potomac that Grant would adopt tactics of his own, instead of following in the beaten paths of former commanders. No one suspected that the lieutenant-general would be able to knock the bottom out of the Southern Confederacy inside of twelve months after his first order for the advance of the army had been promulgated. We all believed that the Union cause would triumph. But when? Three years had rolled round since the rebels fired on Sumter. And “Uncle Robert,” with his veterans in butternut, still flaunted the stars and bars as defiantly as ever, within a few miles of the national capital.

Company I, First Massachusetts cavalry, received the news at first in the same spirit that other companies in our locality received it. The new commander's qualifications were discussed in the light of what had been heard of his career in the West. How much light we had received may be inferred from a discussion around the reserve picket fire on Water Mountain, a detachment of the Sixth Ohio and First Pennsylvania cavalry being on duty with our regimental detail:

“Who's this Grant that's made lieutenant-general?”

“He's the hero of Vicksburg.”

“Well, Vicksburg wasn't much of a fight. The rebs were out of rations, and they had to surrender or starve. They had nothing but dead mules and dogs to eat, as I understand it.”

“Yes; but it required a good deal of strategy to keep Pemberton's army cooped up in Vicksburg till they were so weak for want of grub that they couldn't skedaddle even if they had found a hole to crawl out of.”

“I don't believe Grant could have penned any of Lee's generals up after that fashion. Early, or Long-street, or Jeb Stuart would have broken out some way and foraged around for supplies.”

“Maybe so.”

“Pemberton couldn't hold a candle to Lee.”

“Of course not.”

“What else has Grant done?”

“He has whipped the Johnnies every time they have faced him, all the way from Fort Donelson to Chattanooga.”

“He's a fighter, then?”

“That's what they call him.”

“Bully for Grant!”

“Where does he hail from?”

“Galena, Ill. He was clerking in a leather store when the war broke out.”

“I don't care if he was in Illinois when the war began, he was born in Ohio, graduated at West Point, and served in Mexico and out West.”

“Hurrah for Ohio!” (chorus of the Sixth Ohio cavalry). “Hurrah for Grant!”

“Hurrah!”

“Hurrah!”

“Hurrah!”

“Tiger!”

I do not know but what the “Ohio idee” was inaugurated on our picket line away back there in 1864. At any rate the Sixth Ohio boys insisted, when they were assured that the lieutenant-general was a native of that State, that “Bob Lee's goose was as good as cooked already.” It was rather a crude way of expressing a prophecy that proved as true as Holy Writ. The Ohio Volunteers were ready to cross sabers with the enemy without more ado. Grant was from Ohio, and that settled it.

The Bay State boys indorsed Grant after his record had been established. To be sure there was our own Gen. Butler, the hero of New Orleans. Butler was then in command of the Army of the James, with Fortress Monroe as his base of supplies. Somehow we had come to associate Butler with naval expeditions, and never thought of him in connection with a campaign on land beyond the support of the gunboats. It is probable that our estimates of military men were influenced by what we read in the newspapers. One of the boys declared that in a description of the capture of New Orleans he had read, mention was made of Butler being “lashed to the maintop,” while the fleet under Farragut was fighting its way up the Mississippi under fire from the guns of Forts Jackson and St. Philip. Said an Ohio trooper:

“I don't believe that story.”

“Neither do I. I'm only telling you what I read.”

“I think Butler had better stay in the navy.”

“But he isn't a sailor; he's a major-general of volunteers.”

“Well, there's no telling how he might cut up on dry land. He'd better keep his sea legs on and stay where if he gets whipped he can't run.”

The veterans from the Keystone State had not lost faith in “Little Mac.” They contended that McClellan had been handicapped just at a moment when he was “about to execute a coup de main that would prove a coup de grÂce to the Southern Confederacy!” Meade was the second choice of the Pennsylvanians. His splendid victory over Lee at Gettysburg had brought him into the front rank. He had won the gratitude of the whole North, Copperheads excepted. Checking Lee's advance Northward, whipping the rebel army and compelling the defeated Confederacy to “about face” and put for home, gave Gen. Meade a big place in the hearts of the soldiers and the loyal people of the Keystone State. Surely the patriots of the North had good cause to rejoice on the eighty-seventh anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. On that day Grant's victorious army raised the stars and stripes over the rebel fortifications at Vicksburg, and the Mississippi was opened to the sea; and Lee's army of Northern Virginia was retreating from the scene of its unsuccessful attack on Meade's army at Gettysburg.

Within forty-eight hours after the Union troops had crossed the Rapidan under the direction of Gen. Grant, there was not a soldier in the Army of the Potomac but what felt that the lieutenant-general meant business. The official records on file at Washington show that during that two days' terrible struggle in the Wilderness—May 5 and 6, 1864—the loss sustained by the Army of the Potomac was 13,948, of which 2,261 were killed, 8,785 wounded and 2,902 taken prisoners or missing. Then came Spottsylvania, with an aggregate Union loss of 13,601. The total loss sustained by the Army of the Potomac, the Army of the James and by Sheridan's operations in the valley, from May 1, 1864, to the surrender of Lee at Appomattox, April 9, 1865, is given in official compilations at 99,772—14,601 killed, 61,452 wounded and 23,719 missing. In the meantime the Federal forces operating in Virginia captured 81,112 Confederates, and Lee's killed and wounded are believed to have been equal to Grant's, but the “scattering” of the rebels after Richmond fell, and the destruction of Confederate records, made it impossible to arrive at the exact figures.

As already stated, the veterans of the Army of the Potomac were satisfied that Grant was a fighting man. During the period beginning with the opening skirmish in the Wilderness, and continuing down to the end of the conflict at Appomattox, there was not wanting evidence of Grant's determination to “fight his men” for all they were worth whenever opportunity presented for hammering the rebels. There was no going back this time. It was “On to Richmond” in earnest. The Army of the Potomac was ready to be led against the enemy. There was general rejoicing all along the line when the command was given, “By the left flank, forward!” and the Federals moved toward Spottsylvania instead of retreating across the Rapidan, as President Lincoln said any previous commander of the Army of the Potomac would have done at the close of such a battle as that fought in the Wilderness.

In Richardson's “Personal History of U. S. Grant,” it is stated that in the rebel lines it was believed that our army was falling back at the close of the conflict in the Wilderness. The account continues:

Gordon said to Lee: “I think there is no doubt but that Grant is retreating.”

“You are mistaken,” replied the Confederate chief earnestly, “quite mistaken. Grant is not retreating; he is not a retreating man.”

Lee was right. The Army of the Potomac was never again marched back across the Rapidan until after the backbone of the Confederacy had been broken, and the gallant Union soldiers were en route to Washington to be mustered out.

I first saw Gen. Grant while the battle of the Wilderness was going on. In changing position during the fight, our regiment was marched around by Meade's headquarters. There were a dozen or more officers grouped about Gen. Grant and Gen. Meade. The latter wore the full uniform of a major-general, including sword and sash. He was somewhat fussy in giving directions, and a stickler for red tape. But Meade was a soldier “from heels up.” Grant was plainly dressed, and wore no sword. His coat was unbuttoned, and not until he was pointed out as the commander-in-chief was he recognized by the troopers who were riding across the field.

“There's Gen. Grant.”

“Where?”

“On the left of Gen. Meade.”

“That officer with his coat open?”

“Yes; that's Grant.”

Off went our caps, and the commander acknowledged our cheer by raising his hat.

Just then there was a terrific firing along Hancock's front, and Grant galloped over in that direction after a moment's conversation with Meade. We took up the trot, and in a few minutes found plenty to do out on the road leading to Todd's tavern. When a breathing spell came, the boys had their say about the lieutenant-general.

“I expected to see him all covered with gold lace and other fixin's,” said one.

“He looks as if he would stay with 'em till somebody cried enough.”

“He's got good qualities, anyway,” remarked Taylor.

“How can you tell?”

“Because he smokes fine cigars, and rides a good hoss. I got a smell of that cigar as he cantered by to see what was going on in front of the second corps. I think—”

The discussion was cut short by another attempt of the Johnnies to hustle us back from the position held by our brigade. We protested so vigorously that the rebels retreated after making three or four dashes against our advance squadrons. It was warm work in the Wilderness. One of our boys exclaimed:

“If any of us get out of this Wilderness alive, our chances will be good to see the end of the Southern Confederacy.”

“Yea, verily,” groaned a corporal who had been shot in the arm.

That Grant had no suspicion of being in a tight box, as the rebel sympathizers at the North declared he was, is shown by the fact that at the very moment when his defamers asserted he was so badly crippled that had Lee attacked the Union army Grant's forces would have been destroyed, the lieutenant-general was so much on the aggressive that he was marching to renew the battle at Spottsylvania, and felt able to spare Sheridan and his splendid cavalry corps for a raid on Lee's communications.

We saw Grant again when we rejoined the army; at Cold Harbor, on the march to the south side of the James several times, and during the assaults in front of Petersburg. While in winter quarters we saw the lieutenant-general often at City Point and along the line, and the more we saw of him the higher he rose in our estimation. Then came the campaign of 1865, ending with the surrender of the rebel army at Appomattox. Grant was a modest officer, not given to display, but when the Army of the Potomac awoke to the fact that Lee's army was in the “last ditch,” then, and not till then, did the soldiers begin to appreciate the true greatness of the commander-in-chief.

The downfall of Richmond and the capture of Lee's army silenced even the assistant Confederates at the North. It was a grand victory—a magnificent triumph of superior generalship combined with a patriotism that had never wavered in the face of armed rebellion.

After the surrender I next saw Grant in Washington on the grand review in May, 1865. He was on the stand in front of the White House with a large crowd of dignitaries, including President Johnson.

I saw the old commander but three times after the war closed. The first time was on the occasion of his visit to Troy, N. Y., several years ago. He attended and spoke at a public installation of Post Willard, Grand Army of the Republic, at Music Hall. He was accompanied to the city by Governor Cornell, and a grand parade was had in which all the local military organizations and veterans participated. The general and the governor occupied a carriage with Gen. J. B. Carr and Honorable John M. Francis, and dined with Mr. Francis at his residence. I was glad of the opportunity to grasp the old commander's hand.

I had the pleasure, as a representative of the Troy Daily Times, to accompany the Grant family from Albany to Saratoga about the middle of June, 1885. It was, indeed, a pleasure to meet the hero of Appomattox again, but the heart of the soldier who had served under Grant from the Wilderness to Appomattox and had been present when the surrender took place, was saddened to find the old warrior only a shadow of his former self. Only once on the trip to Mount MacGregor did the general display any of that martial spirit that twenty years before had animated the commander-in-chief and inspired his gallant army. It was at Saratoga Springs during his transfer from the palace coach on which he traveled from New York to Saratoga to the car that was to convey him up the mountain to MacGregor. The Grand Army veterans and the local national guard company gave the distinguished visitor a military salute. The general raised himself on his crutches, took in the situation at a glance, and as he acknowledged the salute with his hand, the old-time light came into the eye, and the foremost general of modern times was recognized in the person of the almost helpless invalid.

Thursday, July 23, 1885, the news of the brave general and honored ex-President's death was flashed over the wires from the top of Mount MacGregor, and a whole nation was in mourning. Old soldiers met in the streets and grasped each other by the hand. “The old commander's dead,” was about all they could say; their sorrow was too deep for words. From all sections of the Union, and from across the ocean messages of condolence and sympathy were sent to the bereaved family at MacGregor.

I attended the funeral of the dead hero at Mount MacGregor, Tuesday, August 4, 1885. Of the pallbearers two, Buckner and Joe Johnston, had fought under the stars and bars, while Sherman and Sheridan had been the deceased commander's most trusted lieutenants. Never before had a funeral taken place under such circumstances. The exercises were remarkably impressive. The closing verse of the beautiful hymn which was sung before the Rev. Dr. J. P. Newman began his memorial sermon seemed particularly appropriate:

After Dr. Newman's glowing tribute came the closing hymn, led by Mrs. Whitney, soprano, of Boston, and in which the congregation joined:

As the echoes of the general's favorite hymn rang through the tall trees that surmounted the mountain top, the benediction was pronounced, and the remains of the old commander were borne to the funeral train. Gen. Hancock was in charge. Down the mountain to Saratoga the train proceeded. At the village the casket was transferred to the funeral car in which the remains were taken to Albany and subsequently to New York. The gallant Sherman, Sheridan, Hancock and other noble heroes have since answered their last roll-call on earth—gone to swell the ranks of the great majority beyond the river. In a few years the veterans who fought under Grant will all pass over, but their deeds of valor will ever live in song and story. The name of Grant is inscribed on the nation's roll of patriots side by side with that of the martyred Lincoln. Of the hero of Appomattox it can be truly said that he was—

Note—This chapter was published in the Troy Daily Times at the time of Gen. Grant's death, and it is deemed best to insert it without change, although the events are not presented in chronological order with the other chapters.—S. P. A.