President Trump Presents American Civil War History Lesson

[David Lockmiller]

Pulitzer Prize Winning historian James M. McPherson wrote in his book “Battle Cry of Freedom” at pages 510 – 511:

Vicksburg stood defiant as ever. Republicans and Democrats joined in assailing Grant as an incompetent failure – and a drunkard to boot. Although many of their complaints came to Lincoln, he refused to throw Grant to the wolves. “I think Grant has hardly a friend left, except myself,” said the President. But “what I want . . . is generals who will fight battles and win victories. Grant has done this, and I propose to stand by him.”

Complaints about Grant’s drinking persisted. . . . It is hard to separate fact from fiction in this matter. Many wartime stories of Grant’s drunkenness are false; others are at best dubious. Grant’s meteoric rise to fame provoked jealousy in the hearts of men who indulged in gossip to denigrate him. . . . If he did get drunk (and this is much disputed by historians) it never happened at a time crucial to military operations.

Despite Lincoln’s continuing faith in Grant, in March 1863 he permitted Secretary of War Stanton to send Charles A. Dana, former managing editor of the New York Tribune and now an assistant secretary of war, to the Mississippi, ostensibly to straighten out the paymaster service in western armies. But Grant was aware of his real mission. Instead of giving Dana the cold shoulder – as some of his staff advised – Grant welcomed him. It was a wise action. Dana sized up the general favorably and began sending a stream of commendatory dispatches to Washington. Grant was “the most modest, the most disinterested and the most honest man I ever knew, with a temper that nothing could disturb,” wrote Dana later in summary of his impressions at the time. “Not a great man except morally; not an original or brilliant man, but sincere, thoughtful, deep and gifted with courage that never faltered.”