Among the autobiographies of generals and statesmen, the Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant ranks with the greatest. Mark Twain called it "the best of any general's since Caesar." And few historians would disagree. Unquestionably, it is the finest literary achievement by any American president, the frankest, least pretentious, most nearly tragic account we have of the failings and triumphs of leadership.Written as Grant was dying of cancer, it tells the straightforward story of his boyhood in Ohio, graduation from West Point, and the grimy military campaigns in the West and Mexico that ended with his resignation in disgrace and a return to Galena where he ran the family store. Then began the rebellion that broke the Union and recast Grant's fortune: the capture of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson, the battles of Shiloh, Corinth, Appomattox, Five Forks, Sailor's Creek, Vicksburg and Lookout Mountain, the bloody Wilderness campaign, Sherman's "March to the Sea,". Grant the tactician, the victim of his friends, the alcoholic, the plain and tough professional soldier, the ideal commander -- all of these images are brightened in the work of Grant the writer as he assesses himself and the events that forged his character.
Among the autobiographies of generals and statesmen, the Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant ranks with the greatest. Mark Twain called it "the best of any general's since Caesar." And few historians would disagree. Unquestionably, it is the finest literary achievement by any American president, the frankest, least pretentious, most nearly tragic account we have of the failings and triumphs of leadership.Written as Grant was dying of cancer, it tells the straightforward story of his boyhood in Ohio, graduation from West Point, and the grimy military campaigns in the West and Mexico that ended with his resignation in disgrace and a return to Galena where he ran the family store. Then began the rebellion that broke the Union and recast Grant's fortune: the capture of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson, the battles of Shiloh, Corinth, Appomattox, Five Forks, Sailor's Creek, Vicksburg and Lookout Mountain, the bloody Wilderness campaign, Sherman's "March to the Sea,". Grant the tactician, the victim of his friends, the alcoholic, the plain and tough professional soldier, the ideal commander -- all of these images are brightened in the work of Grant the writer as he assesses himself and the events that forged his character.
