The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant

“This fine volume leaps straight onto the roster of essential reading for anyone even vaguely interested in Grant and the Civil War. The book is deeply researched, but it introduces its scholarship with a light touch that never interferes with the reader’s enjoyment of Grant’s fluent narrative.”—Ron Chernow, author of GrantUlysses S. Grant’s memoirs, sold door-to-door by former Union soldiers, were once as ubiquitous in American households as the Bible. Mark Twain, Gertrude Stein, Henry James, and Edmund Wilson hailed them as great literature, and countless presidents, including Clinton and George W. Bush, credit Grant with influencing their own writing. Yet a judiciously annotated edition of these memoirs has never been produced until now.The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant is the first comprehensively annotated edition of Grant’s memoirs, clarifying the great military leader’s thoughts on his life and times through the end of the Civil War and offering his invaluable perspective on battlefield decision making. An introduction contextualizes Grant’s life and significance, and lucid editorial commentary allows his voice and narrative to shine through. With annotations compiled by the editors of the Ulysses S. Grant Association’s Presidential Library, this definitive edition enriches our understanding of the pre-war years, the war with Mexico, and the Civil War. Grant provides essential insight into how rigorously these events tested America’s democratic institutions and the cohesion of its social order.The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant is a work of profound political, historical, and literary significance. This celebrated annotated edition will introduce a new generation of readers of all backgrounds to an American classic.

As the first fully annotated edition of Ulysses S. Grant’s Personal Memoirs, this fine volume leaps straight onto the roster of essential reading for anyone even vaguely interested in Grant and the Civil War. The book is deeply researched, but it introduces its scholarship with a light touch that never interferes with the reader’s enjoyment of Grant’s fluent narrative. John F. Marszalek and the folks at the Ulysses S. Grant Presidential Library are building a formidable array of books illuminating many aspects of the general’s life. , A richly annotated new edition… What gives this peculiarly reticent book its power? Above all, authenticity. If Grant’s voice is never confessional, it almost never rings false… Grant’s style is strikingly modern in its economy., [This] new edition, the most thoroughly annotated ever produced, provides the general reader and scholar alike with detailed access to the general’s early life and military career., If Mark Twain called Grant’s Memoirs ‘a great, unique and unapproachable literary masterpiece,’ The Complete Annotated Edition is its ‘unique’ companion. Renowned Civil War historian John Marszalek and his team of editors are owed our gratitude. Their annotated edition will increase appreciation among both longtime admirers and a new generation discovering why Grant is winning his deserved place among American leaders., Grant’s style is direct and plain, but it has a kind of quiet music to it, the indescribable quality of an authentic voice. There is a level of intimacy that no amount of confessional writing could guarantee. Grant’s assessment of the Civil War and the decisions that went into its waging is mostly brisk and engaging, but what really compelled me through the book were the psychological insights on nearly every page—both of the prominent men whom Grant encountered and of the masses of people whose desires and fears he recognized, sympathized with, and often exploited. Grant’s ability to be empathetic and ruthless in the span of a few sentences—coolly calculating the costs of losing lives against the benefits of pushing on; testing what Southerners could bear and what would make them break—is consistently on display. Whatever Grant hides in his memoir is less than what he reveals. He was a man who could cringe at the cruelty of a bullfight but was willing to send men into certain slaughter to gain a riverbank, a man who understood both dignity and disgrace.

John F. Marszalek is W. L. Giles Distinguished Professor of History Emeritus, and Executive Director and Managing Editor of the Ulysses S. Grant Association’s U. S. Grant Presidential Library, at Mississippi State University.