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Don't recall it in his memoirs. Then again, my area of study isn't Grant or his life. I have an associate who has an item that belonged to Maj. Smith and neither of us knows anything about Smith. Sorry, he doesn't even know the first name or unit that Smith came from.
I have a copy of Grant's memoirs in front of me, open to the index.
There are 14 different Smiths listed. They included a governor, two doctors, a lieutenant commander, a whole bunch of generals, a captain, and two lieutenants. Not a major in the bunch.
One of the generals was William F. Smith (aka "Baldy" Smith, but apparently Grant didn't refer to him by that nickname), who held the rank of major general, but he was a field commander, so I don't think he would have been considered part of Grant's staff.
It's not likely Grant would remember his staff members nearly 20 years after the war. But if he did, I doubt he would have found reason to mention any but a few outstanding ones in his memoirs.
Another possibility was on the staff temporarily. Only the highest ranks stayed with Grant for any length of time.
Just thinking out loud.
Ole
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
While Grant commanded the Military Division of the Mississippi with the object of securing Chattanooga, then under siege by Braxton Bragg and the Army of Tennessee, after Bragg's thumping of Rosecrans at Chickamauga, Major General Wm Farrar Smith (the Baldy Smith George refers to) was Chief Engineer of the Union Army of the Cumberland in Chattanooga, then commanded by George Henry Thomas, Rosecrans having been sent packing. This army was starving; by the time Grant arrived in Chattanooga, Baldy Smith had been hard at work devising ways to improve the supply line back to Nashville- rather a knotty problem. Grant liked Smith's proposals and found he worked well with him. He quickly adopted Smith's plans and soon enough they had the 'Cracker Line' open.
Though Smith was never actually on Grant's staff, (being part of the Army of the Cumberland,) during this campaign he worked closely with Grant. Perhaps it is this Major General Smith who is being thought of here.
Grant continued to hold Smith in high esteem. He brought him East when he (Grant) took over all the armies, and placed him in corps command in Ben Butler's Army of the James, to give Butler a solid professional officer to fall back on, (and someone Grant could count on in Butler's command.) But Smith was a carping irascible sort who quickly came to odds with the even moreso carping and irascible Butler. He also got on Meade's bad side, and once his cautious advance on the thinly held Petersburg lines allowed the Confederates to hold on in Petersburg despite the huge surprise advantage of Grant's magnificent move around Lee's right and over the James River, Grant found that the friction of keeping Smith around was not sufficiently balanced by his military worth (which was great, so that shows how much a boil on the butt Smith was,) he was sent packing for the rest of the war.
__________________ 'It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag'
Smith was a brilliant man, and I am sure, like his good buddy McClellan, has left many insights in his written work. How much sooner does he say the war would have been won if everyone had just listened to him?
__________________ 'It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier, who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag, whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag'
Baldy Smith hated Butler's plan for the Bermuda Hundred campaign. He covers it in greater details in Battles and Leaders than he does in his own autobiography (see page 89-90). Butler's silver tongue silenced Smith & Gillmore, both of whom were more experienced in battle. He does cite an engineer who advised McClellan back in '62, "He put his finger on the map at Petersburg and said, 'There is Richmond. When you get Petersburg, you will have Richmond.'"}
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