GRANT, (Hiram) Ulysses Simpson, American general and 18th President of the United States: b. Point Pleasant, Clermont County, Ohio, 27 April 1822; d. Mount McGregor, N. Y., 23 July 1885. He was the eldest of the six children of Jesse R. Grant and Hannah Simpson Grant and on the paternal side is supposed to have been of remote Scottish descent. In 1823, a year after the birth of Ulysses, the family moved to Georgetown, Ohio, where Ulysses was brought up, working on his father's farm in summer and attending school in the winter. He detested the tanning trade, in which business his father was engaged, but was fond of agriculture and loved horses, becoming a remarkably proficient rider and teamster at an early age. After an elementary education in John D. White's subscription school at Georgetown, he was sent to Maysville Seminary, Maysville, Ky., which he attended in 1836-37, and in 1838-39 was provided with a winter term at an academy at Ripley, near Georgetown. In 1839 his father obtained for him an appointment to the Military Academy at West Point, but in making the application for Grant, Congressman Hamer erroneously called him “Ulysses Simpson Grant” instead of Hiram Ulysses, and thus his name appeared on the muster-roll. The young man was not displeased by the change and after a few years himself discarded the Hiram, which he had always disliked.
Grant's record at West Point was excellent
in mathematics and engineering and fair in
other studies but he surpassed all in horsemanship; he graduated in 1843, 2lst in a class of 39, was commissioned brevet second lieutenant, assigned to the Fourth United States Infantry, and sent to Jefferson Barracks, near Saint Louis, Mo. In May 1844 his regiment was ordered to the south western frontier and in September 1845 to Texas as a part of the army under Zachary Taylor. On 30 Sept. 1845 he was promoted to full second lieutenant; in May 1846 took part in the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma (qq.v.); in August, at Camargo, was appointed regimental quartermaster and commissary; in September was present at the battle of Monterey (q.v.), where he performed a daring ride under fire to obtain new supplies for the troops on the firing line; and in December was sent with his regiment to the mouth of the Rio Grande. He participated in all the battles of General Scott's march to Mexico City — Vera Cruz, Cerro Gordo, Contreras, Churubusco, Molina del Rey and Chapultepec (qq.v.), being made first lieutenant for bravery at Molino del Rey and brevetted captain at Chapultepec. His regiment was at Mexico City until June 1848, when it was ordered to Mississippi, but Grant obtained leave of absence and returned home to be married (22 August) to Miss Julia T. Dent. In July 1852 after four years of garrison duty at Detroit and Sackett's Harbor, the regiment was transferred by way of Panama to Fort Vancouver on the Columbia River; while there he endeavored to increase his income by farming,
cattle-raising and other enterprises, but in-
variably failed to improve his fortunes. On 5
Aug. 1853 he was promoted to a captaincy and
ordered to Fort Humboldt, Cal., where he
served until April 1854, but becoming disheartened
by the never-ending vista of barrack life
and far removed from the wholesome influence
of wife and family, he fell into evil ways, began
to drink and finally, was directed to resign or
stand trial on charges. Accordingly he resigned
from the service 11 April 1854 to take effect 31
July, and returned to Saint Louis.
Frederick Dent, who lived near Saint Louis, had given his daughter (Grant's wife) 80 acres of land, and on Grant's return loaned him $1,000 with which to engage in farming. On this property Grant built a log cabin, which he called “Hard Scrabble,” and lived there until 1858, clearing the land, hauling wood, plowing, hoeing and enduring all the hardships and privations of a small farmer. In 1858, however, he abandoned farming because of illness and returned to Saint Louis, where, during the next two years, owing to his inaptitude for ordinary business life and carelessness in money matters, he earned only a scanty subsistence in the real estate business. In 1860 he removed to Galena, Ill., where his father had established a leather store (a branch of his tanning business at Covington, Ky.), and there he worked at an annual salary of $800 until the outbreak of the Civil War.