200 Years of Ulysses S. Grant
Celebrating the general who saved America in the Civil War and the president who labored mightily against great odds for a lasting peace.
Coming Up in 2022
victory in battle. leniency to a fallen foe. fairness for black americans.
“The war is over. The rebels are our countrymen again,” said General Ulysses S. Grant after offering Robert E. Lee generous terms of surrender at Appomattox in April 1865. Grant expected defeated Confederates to accept the verdict of the war that slavery was dead. But when unrepentant rebels fought back against Black freedom, Grant stood up to preserve the fruits of his victory: fairness for all regardless of race.
Just as General Grant defeated rebel armies during the Civil War, so President Grant crushed the KKK during Reconstruction.
The True Cause of the Civil War, According to Grant
Hot Topics
What Contemporaries Said about Grant
A man too broad for prejudice, too humane to despise the humblest, too great to be small at any point. In him the Negro found a protector, the Indian a friend, a vanquished foe a brother, an imperiled nation a savior.
Frederick Douglass
AbolitionistNotwithstanding the fact that he talks so well, it is plain he has more brains than tongue. He is one of the most remarkable men I have ever met. He does not seem to be aware of his powers.
Alexander Stephens
Confederate Vice PresidentReviews of the Best Books on Grant & His Times
A revival of interest in Ulysses S. Grant and the era of Reconstruction has produced many excellent new titles to augment the classics on Grant and his time that remain worth reading.
Quotes by Grant
The cause of the great War of the Rebellion against the United States will have to be attributed to slavery.
Ulysses S. Grant
Treat the negro as a citizen and a voter, as he is and must remain, and soon parties will be divided, not on the color line, but on principle.
Ulysses S. Grant
I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly, and had suffered so much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which a people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse.
Ulysses S. Grant
There has never been a moment since Lee surrendered that I would not have gone more than halfway to meet the Southern people in a spirit of conciliation. But they have never responded to it. They have not forgotten the war.
Ulysses S. Grant
Grant Places
Historic sites in Grant’s life, Civil War battlefields and of course, Grant’s Tomb.
Grant News
Congress Considers Posthumous Promotion for Grant to Top Rank
Grant was the only general in US history to capture 3 enemy armies in the field. Tell Congress that he deserves to rank with George Washington at the very top.
Read More Congress Considers Posthumous Promotion for Grant to Top Rank
Exhibit on Grant vs the KKK through 2021
The U.S. Grant National Historic Site in St. Louis is hosting a temporary exhibit on Grant’s efforts to protect freed people in the South and his success in crushing America’s original domestic terrorists.
Grant 200th Anniversary Activities
The bicentennial of Ulysses S. Grant’s birth is coming in April 2022. Events are being planned. Meanwhile, campaigners are asking for a Grant coin and stamps, and more funding for historic sites from Grant’s life.