Grant's last campaign was against the capital of the Southern Confederacy, as the key to the Atlantic coast, for until Richmond should be taken and the Confederate government put to flight, the war would not be broken. Therefore Grant concentrated all his forces upon that:—"I will fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." In those awful campaigns Grant came to be called "the butcher," for he was as pitiless as fate, as unyielding as death. One outpost after another fell; one Southern regiment after another surrendered. Battles became mere slaughter-pits. Men went down like forest leaves; the army surgeons, at the spectacle, grew sick; it seemed more like murder than war. The Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Chickahominy, Petersburg, were names to make one shudder. But Lee would not yield, and Grant had one watchword, "Unconditional surrender."
At last, without food, without equipment, without arms, Southern soldiers began to desert by thousands. Lee's army was reduced, his supplies were cut off, his retreat to the mountains and any chance of joining with Johnston from the Carolinas were blocked. Grant demanded surrender to save further bloodshed.
On the morning of April 9, 1865, Grant and Lee met in peace conference. Grant had on an old suit splashed with mud, and was without his sword; Lee wore a splendid new uniform that had just been sent by admirers in Baltimore. Lee asked upon what terms Grant would receive the surrender. Grant answered that officers and men "Shall not hereafter serve in the armies of the Confederate States or in any military capacity against the United States of America, or render aid to the enemies of the latter, until properly exchanged,"—all being then freed on parole. The horses of the cavalry were the property of the men. And Grant said: "I know that men—and indeed the whole South—are impoverished; I will instruct my officers to allow the men to retain their horses and take them home to work their little farms." Lee's final request was for rations for his starving men. Grant and Lee shook hands, after which the Virginian mounted his horse and rode off to his army. The Confederates met their beloved general with tumultuous shouts. With eyes swimming in tears, Lee said, in substance: "I have done what I thought to be best and what I thought was right; go back to your homes, conduct yourselves like good citizens and you will not be molested."
When certain Northern soldiers were preparing to fire salutes to celebrate the victory, Grant stopped the demonstration. "The best sign of rejoicing after victory will be to abstain from all demonstrations in the field." All men in the North felt that the fall of Lee's army meant the fall of the Confederacy. Indeed, it did practically end the war. The final sheaf of victory is reaped when the commander, at the head of his troops, marches into the enemy's capital and makes the palace of his foe to shelter his own horses. The whole South expected Grant to lead his Army of the Potomac into Richmond. But Grant remembered Lee's sorrow, and had no desire for a dramatic triumph. He sent a subordinate to occupy Richmond, and quietly began the work of disbanding the army. Sending his regiments back to the fields and factories, he said, "Let us have peace." From that sentiment issued the new South and the new North.
But the man who had fought the war through to a successful issue became the most beloved man in the North, and soon the people bore him to the White House. The task was one for a giant. Four million slaves, newly emancipated, had to be cared for. Their fidelity to the families of their absent masters during the war was beautiful; while, towards the end of the strife, the enrollment and gallant fighting of 150,000 coloured men (Northern and Southern) in the Federal armies showed their manfulness. And now their Southern millions were free. They had the suffrage, but could not read the names of the men for whom they were voting. They were free men, but they had no land, no plough, no cabin, no anything. Pitiful their plight! In retrospect, no race has ever made such wonderful progress in fifty years. With President Eliot we may say that "their industrial achievements are the wonder of the world."
The second task that confronted President Grant was the reconstruction of the South. It was the era of the carpet-bagger. Northern regiments dwelt in Southern cities. Men were talking about hanging Jefferson Davis, and trying to decide whether or not the Confederate soldiers and officers should receive again the suffrage. Designing whites and ignorant coloured men gained control of legislatures. Corruption was rife. The whole South was prostrated. Ten thousand questions arose in Congress, bewildering, intricate, and the whole land was divided in opinion as to the proper courses. Finally, all the Confederate officers, saving perhaps Jefferson Davis alone, and some who refused to accept, received again their political rights at the hands of the magnanimous North. Slowly chaos became cosmos.
Scarcely less heavy were the financial troubles of Grant's administration. An era of war is an era of extravagance. When hard times came, men were tempted by the dreams of cheap money, and the greenback craze was abroad. But Grant stood for honest money, and attacked lying measures with the zeal of a Hebrew prophet.
After two presidential terms came two years of foreign travel (1877-79), and wherever the great soldier went he exhibited his confidence in democracy, his interest in the working people and the poor. He returned home to receive such an ovation as no American citizen has ever had. Six years of private life were followed by a financial disaster that threatened to destroy his good name itself. Grant was one who made ill-advised haste to become rich. Scandalized by the deceit and impoverished by the failure of men he had trusted as partners, the great soldier was now assaulted by worry and fear. Our best physicians believe that fear, whether related to property or the loss of name, or grievous disappointment, is in some way related to cancer. And within a few months after that awful wreckage, Grant knew that his life was coming to an end.
The soldier became an author. Stricken with death, in the hope of safeguarding his family against poverty Grant decided to write his memoirs. It was an astonishing literary achievement. His style is simple as sunshine. Grant knew what he wanted to say, said it, and had done. Yet all the time a shadow was falling upon the page,—the shadow made by the messenger of death, who stood by Grant's shoulder, ready to claim his own. Slowly the soldier wrote the story of his youth, his campaigns in the West, his battles in the Wilderness, while every day the hand grew feebler.
Reared in a religious atmosphere, Grant's nature was essentially moral and religious. He possessed all the big essential virtues—honesty, justice, truth, honour, good will. He loved the truth. He felt that he had done what he could. Southern soldiers and generals as well as Northern comrades and friends brought to his bedside messages of affection and good cheer. At length he fell asleep. His tomb on the height above the Hudson has become a Mecca for innumerable multitudes.