At the time of his death, Ulysses S. Grant was the most famous person in
America, considered by most citizens to be equal in stature to George
Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Yet today his monuments are rarely
visited, his military reputation is overshadowed by that of Robert E.
Lee, and his presidency is permanently mired at the bottom of historical
rankings.
In an insightful blend of biography and cultural history, Joan Waugh
traces Grant's shifting national and international reputation,
illuminating the role of memory in our understanding of American
history. She captures a sense of what led 19th-century Americans to
overlook Grant's obvious faults and hold him up as a critically
important symbol of national reconciliation and unity. Waugh further
shows that Grant's reputation and place in public memory closely
parallel the rise and fall of the Northern version of the Civil War
story, in which the United States was the clear, morally superior victor
and Grant was the emblem of that victory. After the failure of
Reconstruction, the dominant Union myths about the war gave way to a
Southern version that emphasized a more sentimental remembrance of the
honor and courage of both sides and ennobled the "Lost Cause." By the
1920s, Grant's reputation had plummeted. Most Americans today are
unaware of how revered Grant was in his lifetime. Joan Waugh uncovers
the reasons behind the rise and fall of his renown, underscoring as well
the fluctuating memory of the Civil War itself.
