Again, he saw the capture of Richmond, upon which the Army of the Potomac had expended all its efforts, would be futile if Lee's army remained undefeated in the field, and he resolved that Lee and not Richmond should thereafter be the main object of the campaign. "Where Lee's army goes, there you will go also," was the substance of his first order to Meade who virtually became his Chief of Staff, and those who were straining every nerve to discover his plan and expecting something very brilliant or subtle never guessed that those nine words contained the open secret of his whole campaign.
Such, however, was the fact. "I never maneuver," he remarked to his Chief of Staff; and Meade, who had spent the best part of a year in a great series of maneuvers with Lee, listened to this confession with astonishment and dismay, scarcely believing that his superior really meant what he said. But Grant did mean it. No elaborate moves or delicate strategy had been employed in any of his campaigns and he had yet to meet with a serious defeat. To make his first experiment in maneuvering against such an expert in the science of war as Lee, would have been to foredoom himself to defeat. With a far smaller force then either McClellan, Pope, Burnside, Hooker or Meade had possessed, the Confederate leader had practically fought a drawn battle with them for three years. His science had not, it is true, been able to overcome their numbers, but their numbers had not overpowered him. This, as far as anyone could see, might go on forever.
But Grant knew that the North had long been tiring of the war and that unless it were speedily closed the Union might be sacrificed in order to obtain peace. Moreover, he saw that every day the war lasted cost an enormous sum of money, and that the loss of life on the battle field was nothing compared to that in the hospitals and prisons, where disease and starvation were claiming scores of victims every hour.
He, therefore, determined to fight and continue fighting until he pounded his opponent to pieces, well knowing that almost every able-bodied man in the South was already in the army and that there was practically no one left to take the place of those who fell.
This policy, in the minds of many people, proves that Grant was no general, but merely a brute and a butcher. But history has never yet revealed a military leader who, having the advantage of numbers, did not make the most of it. Had Grant been waging war for war's sake, or been so enamored with his profession as to care more for its fine points than for the success of his cause, he might have evolved some more subtle and less brutal plan. But he had no love for soldiering and no sentimental ideas whatever about the war. Common sense, with which he was liberally supplied, told him that the only excuse for fighting was to uphold principles which were vital to the national life and the only way to have those principles upheld was to defeat those who opposed them and to do this he determined to use all the resources at his command.
The two men whom Fate or Chance had been drawing together for over two hundred years were utterly different in appearance and manner, but in other respects they were singularly alike. Lee was, at the time of their meeting, already in his 58th year, his hair and beard were almost white, but his calm, handsome face, clear eyes and ruddy complexion, made him appear younger than he was. His bearing also was that of a young man, for his erect, soldierly carriage showed his height to full advantage; his well-knit figure was almost slight for a man standing over six feet, and, mounted on his favorite horse "Traveller," he was the ideal soldier. Grant was barely forty-two years of age, short of stature, careless in dress and generally indifferent to appearances. His face, though strong, was somewhat coarse, his manners were not polished and he had nothing of the cultivation or charm which Lee so unmistakably possessed.
But though Grant thus reflected his Roundhead ancestors and Lee his Cavalier descent, the contrast between them was mainly external. Both were modest and courageous; both were self-contained; each had his tongue and temper under complete control; each was essentially an American in his ideas and ideals; each fought for a principle in which he sincerely believed, and neither took the least delight in war. Had they met in times of peace, it is not probable that they would have become intimate friends, but it is certain that each would have respected, if not admired the other for his fine qualities, and this was undoubtedly their attitude toward each other from the beginning of the struggle.