The tide of patriotism that surged through the North after the fall of Fort Sumter in April, 1861, lifted many strong but discouraged men out of their plight of hard conditions and floated them on to better fortune. Grant was one of these. At last he found reason to be glad that he had the education and experience of a soldier.

On Monday, April 15, 1861, Galena learned that Sumter had fallen. The next day there was a town meeting, where indignation and devotion found utterance. Over that meeting Captain Grant was called to preside, although few knew him. Elihu B. Washburn, the representative of the district in Congress, and John A. Rawlins, a rude, self-educated lawyer, who had been a farmer and a charcoal burner, made passionate, fiery speeches on the duty of every man to stand by the flag. At the close of that meeting Grant told his brothers that he felt that he must join the army, and he did no more work in the shop. How clearly he perceived the meaning of the conflict was shown in a letter to his father-in-law, wherein he wrote: "In all this I can see but the doom of slavery."

He was offered the captaincy of the company formed in Galena, and declined it, although he aided in organizing and drilling the men, and accompanied them to the state capital, Springfield. As he was about starting for home, he was asked by Governor Richard Yates to assist in the adjutant-general's office, and soon he was given charge of mustering in ten regiments that had been recruited in excess of the quota of the State, under the President's first call, in preparation for possible additional calls. His knowledge of army forms and methods was of great service to the inexperienced state officers.

Later, but without wholly severing his connection with the office, he returned home, and wrote a letter to the adjutant-general of the regular army, at Washington, briefly setting forth his former service, and very respectfully tendering his service "until the close of the war in such capacity as may be offered," adding, that with his experience he felt that he was "competent to command a regiment, if the President should see fit to intrust one to him." The letter brought no reply. He went to Cincinnati and tried, unsuccessfully, to see General McClellan, whom he had known at West Point and in Mexico, hoping that he might be offered a place on his staff. While he was absent Governor Yates appointed him colonel of the Twenty-First Regiment of Illinois Infantry, then in camp near Springfield, his commission dating from June 15. It was a thirty-day regiment, but almost every member reËnlisted for three years, under the President's second call. Thus, two months after the breaking out of the war, he was again a soldier with a much higher commission than he had ever held, higher than would have come to him in regular order had he remained in the army.

At Springfield he was in the centre of a great activity and a great enthusiasm. He met for the first time many leading men of the State, and became known to them. Their personality did not overwhelm him, famous and influential as many of them were, nor did he solicit from them any favor for himself. His desire was to be restored to the regular army rather than to take command of volunteers. When the sought-for opportunity did not appear, he accepted the place that was offered, a place in which he was needed; for the first colonel, selected by the regiment itself, had already by his conduct lost their confidence. They exchanged him for Grant with high satisfaction.