President Trump Presents American Civil War History Lesson

[Gene C]

I like Lincoln's response to the rumors of Grant's excessive drinking.

Thanks for the post above ReignetteC for your clarification on President Trump's comment (post 13)

[David Lockmiller]

From a Lincoln Prize winner's book:

In late April, [1863] when Grant stopped making “side expeditions” and boldly threw his army across the Mississippi, he began a brilliant campaign leading to the capture of Vicksburg on Independence Day. Upon learning that the general had moved south of that citadel and that David D. Porter had successfully run his fleet of gunboats past the Vicksburg batteries, Lincoln exclaimed: “This is more important than anything which is occurring in Virginia!”287

When Grant reached the east bank of the river, below Vicksburg, he could have either moved toward that city or headed south to link up with Banks, whose goal was to take Port Hudson. Lincoln hoped he would choose the latter course, but he did not, despite Halleck’s urging. In May, as Grant daringly marched his army from triumph to triumph in Mississippi, Lincoln said: “I have had stronger influence brought against Grant, praying for his removal, since the battle of Pittsburg Landing, than for any other object, coming too from good men.” (A year earlier, when Grant was caught unprepared for the Confederate onslaught at Shiloh -- also known as Pittsburg Landing -- he was roundly criticized, even though the Rebels were eventually driven from the field.) But, Lincoln added, “now look at his campaign since May 1. Where is anything like it in the Old World that equals it? It stamps him as the greatest general of the age, if not of the world.” 288

[Thus, President Abraham Lincoln recognized Grant to be a “great general” long before President Trump made his statement in Lebanon, Ohio that Grant “is finally being recognized as a great general.”]

According to popular rumor, Lincoln asked critics of Grant’s alleged drunkenness what brand of whiskey the general used, so he could send some to his other generals. The president denied that he had made that witty riposte, speculating that it was probably ascribed to him “to give it currency.” In fact, he pointed out, it was based on King George III’s purported response to those who charged that General Wolfe was insane: “I wish he would bite some of my other generals then.”289 (This anecdote appears in Joe Miller’s Complete Jest Book, a favorite of Lincoln’s.) . . . .

On July 7, Gideon Welles rushed into the White House with a dispatch announcing the surrender of Vicksburg and “in his excess of enthusiasm” almost knocked Lincoln over. Hugging Welles tightly, the president exclaimed: “what can we do for the Secretary of the Navy for this glorious intelligence? He is always giving us good news. I cannot, in words, tell you my joy over this result. It is great, Mr. Welles, it is great!” 291

(Source: Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Vol. Two, page 517.)

And, on pages 518-519 of Professor Burlingame’s book, there is this modest communication from President Abraham Lincoln to General Grant:

“I do not remember that you and I ever met personally. I write this now as a grateful acknowledgment for the almost inestimable service you have done the country. I wish to say a word further. When you first reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, I thought you should do, what you finally did- --march the troops across the neck, run the batteries with the transports, and thus go below; and I never had any faith, except a general hope that you knew better than I, that the Yazoo Pass expedition, and the like, could succeed. When you got below, and took Port-Gibson, Grand Gulf, and vicinity, I thought you should go down the river and join Gen. Banks; and when you turned Northward East of the Big Black, I feared it was a mistake. I now wish to make the personal acknowledgment that you were right, and I was wrong.”296

[My Name Is Kate]

Anyone who cares to do so, can see and hear for themselves exactly what President Trump said or did not say at the Ohio rally, when he was referring to Grant and Lee. The segment is less than three minutes long.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pxPIwqv8AA

Trump never said Grant had "an uncontrollable drinking problem during the American Civil War." It was David Lockmiller who said that in Post #3 above. Trump said Grant "drank a little bit too much" toward the beginning of the segment, then toward the end, he said Grant "had a serious drinking problem." He did not specify whether or not Grant drank during the Civil War.

Aussiemick to David Lockmiller in Post #12: "I think that you have been determined to show that Trump spoke inaccurately. In this case I think you're struggling. I get the feeling that Pres Trump is likely to give you further and more substantial opportunities. Why not wait until then?"

He can't wait.

[David Lockmiller]

(10-15-2018 12:52 PM)L Verge Wrote:  This assessment of Antietam from the website of The American Battlefield Trust - formerly the Civil War Preservation Trust: "The bloodiest single day in American military history ended in a draw, but the Confederate retreat gave President Abraham Lincoln the “victory” he desired before issuing the preliminary Emancipation Proclamation five days later." Please note the word "draw" and also the quotes around "victory..."

There is an important aspect of this Antietam "draw" or "victory" that has not been previously addressed on this thread. A winner of the Pulitzer Prize, historian James M. McPherson, explained this particular aspect as follows:

[Robert E. Lee] invaded Maryland to conquer a peace. The fate of diplomacy rode with Lee in this campaign. The Federals "got a very complete smashing" at Bull Run, wrote Palmerston to Russell on September 14, "and it seems not altogether unlikely that still greater disasters await them, and that even Washington or Baltimore may fall into the hands of the Confederates. If this should happen, would it not be time for us to consider whether . . . England and France might not address the contending parties and recommend an arrangement upon the basis of separation? Russell was ready and willing. On September 17--the very day of the fighting at Sharpsburg--he concurred in the plan to offer mediation, adding that if the North refused, "we ought ourselves to recognise the Southern States as an independent State." But when reports of Antietam reached England (news required twelve days or more to cross the Atlantic), Palmerston turned cautious. When he learned of Lee's retreat to Virginia, Palmerston backed off. "These last battles in Maryland have rather set the North up again," he wrote to Russell early in October. "The whole matter is full of difficulty, and can only be cleared up by some more decided events between the contending armies.

But Antietam did not cool the ardor of Russell and Gladstone for recognition. They insisted on bringing the matter before the cabinet on October 28, despite Palmerston's repeated insistence that matters had changed since mid-September, "when the Confederates seemed to be carrying all before them . . . . I am very much come back to our original view that we must continue merely to be lookers-on till the war shall have a more decided turn." The cabinet voted Russell and Gladstone down. The French weighed in at this point with a suggestion that Britain, France, and Russia propose a six-month armistice--during which the blockade would be suspended. This so blatantly favored the South that pro-Union Russia quickly rejected it. The British cabinet, after two days of discussion, also turned it down.

Thus ended the South's best chance for intervention. (emphasis added.) . . . It had done more, by enabling Lincoln to issue the Emancipation Proclamation the battle also ensured that Britain would think twice about intervening against a government fighting for freedom as well as Union.

(Source: "The Illustrated BATTLE CRY OF FREEDOM *****The Civil War Era," by James M. McPherson, Oxford University Press, (2003), pages 479-480.)

---

(10-16-2018 09:54 AM)My Name Is Kate Wrote:  Anyone who cares to do so, can see and hear for themselves exactly what President Trump said or did not say at the Ohio rally, when he was referring to Grant and Lee. The segment is less than three minutes long.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pxPIwqv8AA

Trump never said Grant had "an uncontrollable drinking problem during the American Civil War." It was David Lockmiller who said that in Post #3 above. Trump said Grant "drank a little bit too much" toward the beginning of the segment, then toward the end, he said Grant "had a serious drinking problem." He did not specify whether or not Grant drank during the Civil War.

Aussiemick to David Lockmiller in Post #12: "I think that you have been determined to show that Trump spoke inaccurately. In this case I think you're struggling. I get the feeling that Pres Trump is likely to give you further and more substantial opportunities. Why not wait until then?"

He can't wait.

I watched the video to which you provided a hyperlink. At the approximate 30 second mark, Trump said this: "It also gave you a general who was incredible. . . . He drank a little too much."

Kate, I assume that you realize that Grant was not made a general until AFTER the Civil War began. I couldn't wait to tell you this.

[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.”

[David Lockmiller]

LINCOLN VISITS GRANT FOR THE FIRST TIME

On Tuesday, June 21, 1864 a white river-steamer arrived at the wharf, bringing President Lincoln, who had embraced this opportunity to visit for the first time the armies under General Grant’s immediate command. As the boat neared the shore, the general and several of us who were with him at the time walked down to the wharf, in order that the general-in-chief might meet his distinguished visitor and extend a greeting to him as soon as the boat made the landing. As our party stepped aboard, the President came down from the upper deck, where he had been standing, to the after-gangway, and reaching out his long, angular arm, he wrung General Grant’s hand vigorously, and held it in his for some time, while he uttered in rapid words his congratulations and expressions of appreciation of the great task which had been accomplished since he and the general had parted in Washington.

After a while General Grant said: "Mr. President, let us ride on and see the colored troops, who behaved so handsomely in Smith’s attack on the works in front of Petersburg last week." "Oh yes," replied Mr. Lincoln; "I want to take a look at those boys. I read with the greatest delight the account given in Mr. Dana’s dispatch to the Secretary of War of how gallantly they behaved. He said they took six out of the sixteen guns captured that day. I was opposed on nearly every side when I first favored the raising of colored regiments; but they have proved their efficiency, and I am glad they have kept pace with the white troops in the recent assaults. When we wanted every able-bodied man who could be spared to go to the front, and my opposers kept objecting to the Negroes, I used to tell them that at such times it was just as well to be a little color-blind.

The camp of the colored troops of the Eighteenth Corps was soon reached, and a scene now occurred which defies description. They beheld for the first time the liberator of their race – the man who by the stroke of his pen had struck the shackles from the limbs of their fellow-bondmen and proclaimed liberty to the enslaved. Always impressionable, the enthusiasm of the blacks now knew no limits. They cheered, laughed, cried, sang hymns of praise, and shouted in their Negro dialect, "God bless Massa Linkum!" "De Lord save Fader Abraham!" "De day ob jubilee am come, shuah." They crowded about him and fondled his horse; some of them kissed his hands, while others ran off crying in triumph to their comrades that they had touched his clothes. The President rode with bared head; the tears had started to his eyes, and his voice was so broken by emotion that he could scarcely articulate the words of thanks and congratulation which he tried to speak to the humble and devoted men through whose ranks he rode. The scene was affecting in the extreme, and no one could have witnessed it unmoved.

[David Lockmiller]

General William Tecumseh Sherman speaking of Lincoln, Grant, Sherman discussions taking place on March 27, 1865:

I went to City Point, and I saw Gen. Grant in his little cabin with his wife; and I saw Meade and Orr and Porter, and Mr. Lincoln was there on a boat. Grant said, “Sherman, let’s go up and see Lincoln.”

And he was very kind. I had seen Mr. Lincoln twice before. To me – I almost idolized that man. Oh, how good he was to us!

He turned to me in the most simple manner and says, “Sherman, do you know why I took a shine to Grant and you?”

“A shine!” I said, “I don’t know, Mr. Lincoln. You have been extremely kind to me, Mr. Lincoln, far more than my deserts.”

“Well,” said he, “you have never found fault with me.”

I was arguing with him that if Lee was a general, really a general, he would escape from Richmond and fall upon me. Grant merely said, “I will follow on his heels.” Lincoln said, “My God, my God, can’t you spare more effusion of blood? We have had so much of it.”

(Sources: Report of the Annual Re-Union – Society of The Army of the Potomac, Volume 14, pages 64 – 65. Eighteenth Annual Re-Union. Speaker, General William T. Sherman. See also “Lincoln Talks: A Biography in Anecdote,” by Emanuel Hertz, pages 555-556.)

Generals Sherman and Grant take their leave of President Lincoln and return to their respective armies (Source: “Team of Rivals,” by Doris Kearns Goodwin, pages 713-714.)

The afternoon of March 28, 1865, Sherman left City Point to return to his troops and prepare for the expected battle. Saying goodbye to the president, he “was more than ever impressed by his kindly nature, his deep and earnest sympathy with the afflictions of the whole people,” and his “absolute faith in the courage, manliness, and integrity of the armies in the field.” To be sure, “his face was care-worn and haggard; but, the moment he began to talk, his face lightened up, his tall form, as it were, unfolded, and he was the very impersonation of good-humor and fellowship.” A decade later, Sherman remained convinced of Lincoln’s unparalleled leadership. “Of all the men I ever met, he seemed to possess more of the elements of greatness, combined with goodness, than any other.”

Lincoln walked to the railroad station early the next morning to bid farewell to Grant, who was heading to the front for what they hoped would be the final offensive against Lee. Oppressed by thoughts of the expected battle, “Lincoln looked more serious than at any other time since he had visited headquarters,” recalled Horace Porter; “the lines in his face seemed deeper; and the rings under his eyes were of a darker hue.” As the train pulled away from the platform, Grant and his party tipped their hats in honor of the president. Returning the salute, his “voice broken by an emotion that he could ill-conceal,” Lincoln said: “Good-bye, gentlemen, God bless you all!”

Subsequent Correspondence between General Grant and General Lee on April 7-8, 1865

HEAD-QUARTERS ARMIES OF THE U. S.,

5 P. M., April 7, 1865.

GENERAL R. E. LEE, COMMANDING C. S. A.

" GENERAL,--The results of the last week must convince you of the hopelessness of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia in this struggle. I feel that it is so, and regard it as my duty to shift from myself the responsibility of any further effusion of blood, by asking of you the surrender of that portion of the Confederate Southern army known as the Army of Northern Virginia.”

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General commanding Armies of the U. S.


To which General Lee replied,

April 7, 1865.
"GENERAL,--I have received your note of this day. Though not entertaining the opinion you express on the hopelessness of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia, I reciprocate your desire to avoid useless effusion of blood, and therefore, before considering your proposition, ask the terms you will offer on condition of its surrender.”

R. E. LEE, General.


On the succeeding day General Grant returned the following reply:

April 8, 1865.

TO GENERAL R. E. LEE, COMMANDING C.S.A.

"GENERAL, -- Your note of the last evening, in reply to mine of the same date, asking the condition on which I will accept the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, is just received. In reply I would say that, peace being my great desire, there is but one condition I would insist upon, -- namely, that the men and officers surrendered shall be disqualified for taking up arms again against the government of the United States until properly exchanged. I will meet you, or will designate officers to meet any officers you might name for the same purpose, at any point agreeable to you, for the purpose of arranging definitely the terms upon which the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia will be received.”

U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General.

General Lee immediately responded:

April 8, 1865.

"GENERAL, -- I received at a late hour your note of today. In mine of yesterday I did not intend to propose the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, but to ask the terms of your proposition. To be frank, I do not think the emergency has arisen to call for the surrender of this army, but, as the restoration of peace should be the sole object of all, I desired to know whether your proposals would lead to that end. I cannot, therefore, meet you with a view to surrender the Army of Northern Virginia, but as far as your proposal may affect the Confederate States forces under my command and tend to the restoration of peace, I should be pleased to meet you at ten A. M. to-morrow on the old stage-road to Richmond, between the picket-lines of the two armies.

R. E. LEE, General.

[David Lockmiller]

Headquarters, Army of Northern Virginia, 10th April 1865.
General Order
No. 9
After four years of arduous service marked by unsurpassed courage and fortitude, the Army of Northern Virginia has been compelled to yield to overwhelming numbers and resources.
I need not tell the survivors of so many hard fought battles, who have remained steadfast to the last, that I have consented to the result from no distrust of them.
But feeling that valour and devotion could accomplish nothing that could compensate for the loss that must have attended the continuance of the contest, I have determined to avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose past services have endeared them to their countrymen.
By the terms of the agreement, officers and men can return to their homes and remain until exchanged. You will take with you the satisfaction that proceeds from the consciousness of duty faithfully performed, and I earnestly pray that a merciful God will extend to you his blessing and protection.
With an unceasing admiration of your constancy and devotion to your Country, and a grateful remembrance of your kind and generous consideration for myself, I bid you an affectionate farewell.
— R. E. Lee, General, General Order No. 9

General Robert E. Lee, C.S.A.,
In late 1865, when someone spoke harshly of Grant while Lee was at Washington University (later Washington and Lee) Lee responded: "Sir, if you ever again presume to speak disrespectfully of General Grant in my presence, either you or I will sever his connection with this University.” (Source: “Ulysses S. Grant” by Mark Lardas, page 61.)

[David Lockmiller]

Throughout the night, Stanton dictated numerous dispatches, which were carried to the War Department telegraph office by a relay team of messengers positioned nearby. “Each messenger,” Stanton’s secretary recalled, “after handing a dispatch to the next, would run back to his post to wait for the next.”

The first telegram went to General Grant, requesting his immediate presence in Washington. “The President was assassinated at Ford’s Theater at 10:30 tonight and cannot live. . . . Secretary Seward and his son Frederick were also assassinated at their residence and are in dangerous condition.”

The dispatch reached Grant in the Bloodgood Hotel, where he was taking supper. He “dropped his head,” Horace Porter recalled, “and sat in perfect silence.” Julia Grant guessed that bad news had arrived and asked him to read the telegram aloud. “First prepare yourself for the most painful and startling news that can be received,” he warned.

As he made plans to return to Washington, he told Julia that the tidings filled him “with the gloomiest apprehension. The President was inclined to be kind and magnanimous, and his death at this time is an irreparable loss to the South, which now needs so much both his tenderness and magnanimity.”

(Source: “Team of Rivals," by Doris Kearns Goodwin, pages 742-743.)