Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1866-01-19
GENERAL GRANTS P


Gen. Grant has addressed to Mr.. Secre-
tary Stanton a report which is equivalent
to a complete history Of the civil war in
its latest period. In this country we get
no such elaborate description of events as
American commanders are in the habit of
compiling. Our generals address them
selves TO the War Office in dispatches
which may be published at a future time,
and ultimately, perhaps, reduced to the
form of history; but in the United States
both military and naval commanders de-
scribe, explain and Justify their own opera
tons in reports which take the shape of
connected and amusing narratives. In
the present instance the interest concen-
trated in the document before US is ex-
tranrdinsry. Gen. Grant was Commander
n-Chiof Of all of the United States
during the last and decisive year of the
war. We have been accustomed to regard
him merely as commander of the Army
of the Potomac, because he selected Vir-
ginia as the scene of his personal exer-
tons; but the fact was that the Army of
Virginia was actually under the command
of Meade, just as the Army of Tennessee
was under command of Sherman, while
Grant himself not only dictated the plan
of the campaign, but exercised a direct
supervision over all the armies at onee.
What renders this report, too, the more
remarkable is that it explains a new, and,
as the event proved, a successful system of
tactics devised for the occasion. When
Grant assumed the chief command the
Federal forces were making little progress,
nor could anybody anticipate a speedy
termination of the war; but the new COM
mander adopted a new method of war
fare, and the result was that in twelve
months time the war was at an end. What
this method was, and how it was carried
into execution, is very intelligibly told.
At an "early period of the rebellion"
General Grant had OWNED the secret of
Southern strength and Northern weak
ness. The federals were three to one, at
least, in numbers, and UNNECESSARILY SUI
perior in material resource, and yet the
C~onfederates maintained their ground and
defended their territories against all at
tacks. This, says Grant, was because the
strength of the North was never exerted
on a good system or with sufficient resolu-
ton. The Southern generals held a posi-
ton like the outlines of a fan, extending
from east to west, and covering the coun-
try behind them. By means Of the rail-
roads intersecting the interior they could
bring up their forces to any point of the
circumference; and so long as it was
necessary for them to be strong at one
point only they could always contrive to
be stronger at that point than their ad-
yersaries. The first and most indispensa-
BILE step, therefore, was to deprive them of
this favorable condition of attacking at a
number Of points at once, SO as to retain
every Southern army in its ewn position
and prevent it from reinforcing another.
Hitherto the two main armies of the fed
erals-one in Tennessee and the other in
Virginia-had been acting, as the Genei al
expressed il, t1ike a balky team" When
one was pulling the other was backing,
and so the able generals of the Confeder-
acy could shift or concentrate or relieve
their forces in such a way as either to
eeonomize their strength or employ it tc
to the greatest advantage. If Lee was
hard pressed he could be reinforced by
B~eauregard; if Johnston was in difficulty
he could be supported from Richmond
or Petersburg. Attack on both sides al
once and these tactics would be imprac.
ticable. But, besides all this, General
Grant took a harder and more terrible
view of affairs. Man for man the South,
erners were the best troops, partly, per.
haps, from natural aptitudes, but mainly
no doubt, from the great military ability
Of their commanders. On a fair field, anC
in any one battle, the tederals could no
pretend to reckon confidently on winning
but there was n thing on which they
could reckon, and that was On killing
certain number of Confederates. O.
course they must suffer equal or ever
greater losses themselves, but that they
could we'll afford. If every battle cost the
South a certain proportion of men, &
given number of battles must DESTROY the
Southern power, aver if the battle was
decisive victory. So Grant not only de-
termined to fight, but to fight on, without
stint or stay, come what might. Hard
knocks and incessant blows constituted his
strategy and tactics. If he were to fare
as Mcclellan and Hooker had Jared, he
would not no as Mcclellan add Hooker
had done. He opened the new campaign
resolved to go on fighting whether he won
or lost, and, as he himself says, ito ham,
mer continuously against the armed force
of the enemy and his until by
mere attrition, if in no other way, there
should be nothing left to him but submis-
sion." The literal execution of this policy
is expressed in every line Of the report.
While %recounting the events of the Vir-
ginia campaign the General represents one
engagement as virtually a failure in these
words DIT wa the only general
attack made from the Rapidan
to the James which did not in
fict upon the enemy losses to compensate
for our own losses. l would not be I'M
derstood as saying that all previous attacks
resulted in victories to our arms, or ac-
complished as much as 1 had hoped from
them; but they inflicted upon the enemy
severe losses, which tended in the end to
the overthrow of the rebellion" How
much these tactics cost the North we need
not say. 1t is said that Grant winces to
this hour whenever the figures $1,000"
as representing his losses in Virginia, are
held up before his eyes, and there is a pas
sage in his report which reads very like a
depreciation of eensure. "Whether my
views" says he, rmight have been better
in conception and execution is for the peo-
pie who mourn the loss of friends fallen,
and who have to pay the p~ecuniary cost,
to say. All l can say is that what L have
done has been done to the best of my
ability, and in what 1 conceived to be the
best interests of the whole country"
As far as plains can bejustifed by events
that justification belongs certainly to
Grant. His system was successful where
every other system had failed. His cam
paign brought the war to an end, whereas
every former campaign had left the con-
test pretty nearly as it stood before. 1t
must be understood, too, that wherever
military science appears more conspicu-
Gus than brute force, that merit is Grants
also. The scheme of Sherman's campaign
was dictated by Grant, as were others, less
fortunate. The grand principle of tire
whole system was cooperation. Besides
thetwo great armies of the East and West
which, on this occasion, were to pull well
together, Grant set half a dozen other
armies in motion, to distract, occupy and
punish the enemy at all points together.
The orders originally given to Sherman
were that he should advance steadily and
through all obstacles to Atlanta an i'm
portant railroad center in the north of
Georgia, that he should occupy that town,
and then, by striking some town OF the
east coast, and holding the line of commu-
.nication, cnt the confederacy in two at
that point as had already been done on
the line of the Mississippi. On this under
L