Horace Porter Horace Porter , ( April 15 , 1837 – May 29 , 1921 ) was an American soldier and diplomat who served as a lieutenant colonel , ordnance officer and staff officer in the Union Army during the American Civil War , personal secretary to General and President Ulysses S . Grant and to General William T . Sherman , vice president of the Pullman Palace Car Company and U . S . Ambassador to France from 1897 to 1905 . In 1866 , he was appointed to the brevet grade of brigadier general , United States Army . Early life . Porter was born in Huntingdon , Pennsylvania on April 15 , 1837 , the son of David R . Porter , an ironmaster who later served as Governor of Pennsylvania . A first cousin , Andrew Porter , was a Mexican - American War veteran and Union Army brigadier general . Horace Porter was educated at The Lawrenceville School in Lawrenceville , New Jersey ( class of 1856 ) and Harvard University . He graduated from West Point July 1 , 1860 . Porter was commissioned a second lieutenant on April 22 , 1861 and a first lieutenant on June 7 , 1861 . American Civil War . Porter served in the Union Army in the Civil War , reaching the grade of lieutenant colonel by the end of the war . He initially served in the ordnance department of the Union Department of the South , Army of the Potomac , Department of the Ohio , Army of the Cumberland and Military Division of the Mississippi . He was distinguished in the Battle of Fort Pulaski , Georgia , at the Battle of Chickamauga , the Battle of the Wilderness and the Second Battle of Ream ' s Station ( New Market Heights ) . On June 26 , 1902 or July 8 , 1902 , Porter received the Medal of Honor for the Battle of Chickamauga as detailed in the citation noted below . In the last year of the war , he served on the staff of Gen . Ulysses S . Grant , later writing a lively memoir of the experience , " Campaigning With Grant " ( 1897 ) . On July 17 , 1866 , President Andrew Johnson nominated Porter for appointment as brevet brigadier general , to rank from March 13 , 1866 , and the U . S . Senate confirmed the appointment on July 23 , 1866 . From April 4 , 1864 to July 25 , 1865 , Porter was aide - de - camp to General Ulysses S . Grant with the grade of lieutenant colonel in the regular army . From July 25 , 1866 to March 4 , 1869 , Porter was aide - de - camp to General Ulysses S . Grant with the grade of colonel in the regular army . Grant administration . From 1869 to 1872 , Porter served as President Grant ' s personal secretary in the White House . At the same time , he held the grade of colonel and an appointment as aide - de - camp to General William T . Sherman . Porter had refused to take a $ 500 , 000 vested interest bribe from Jay Gould , a Wall Street financier , in the Black Friday gold market scam . He told Grant about Gould ' s attempted bribery , thus warning Grant about Gould ' s intention of cornering the gold market . However , during the Whiskey Ring trials in 1876 , Treasury Solicitor Bluford Wilson claimed that Porter was involved with the scandal . Porter testified before the committee investigating the scandal , and was never formally charged with wrongdoing . Later life . Resigning from the army on December 31 , 1873 , Porter became vice president of the Pullman Palace Car Company . He was U . S . Ambassador to France from 1897 to 1905 , paying for the recovery of the body of John Paul Jones and sending it to the United States for re - burial . He received the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor from the French government in 1904 . In addition to " Campaigning with Grant " , he also wrote " West Point Life " ( 1866 ) . Porter was president of the Union League Club of New York from 1893 to 1897 . In that capacity , he was a major force in the construction of Grant ' s Tomb . He was elected an honorary member of the Pennsylvania Society of the Cincinnati in 1902 . He was also a member of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States . Horace Porter died at New York , New York , May 29 , 1921 . He was buried in West Long Branch Cemetery , West Long Branch , New Jersey . Medal of Honor citation . Rank and Organization : Citation :