Grant Best book on Grant (as a commander)

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If I were to read one book on Grant, which one should I read - and why that particlar book? (And reversely, are there any real stinkers that should be avioded?)

I would prefer a book that focus on Grant's Civil war years, his generalship, G as a commander, but appreciate views on books with a broader scope.

The two best ones are:

1. General Grant and the Rewriting of History by Dr. Frank Varney.

2. Grant Under Fire by Joseph Rose.
 
Seems like Simpson and Ronald Whites Bio are really the only true accurate and easy read bios out there currently
 
Anyone who hasn’t read Varney’s or Rose’s books can’t really consider himself informed on Grant.
Ignorance may be bliss but it’s not conducive to being informed. Education should be about broadening one’s perspective.
For a readable summary of the “revisionist” look at Grant one should read Victors in Blue by Albert Castel.
 
Anyone who hasn’t read Varney’s or Rose’s books can’t really consider himself informed on Grant.
Ignorance may be bliss but it’s not conducive to being informed. Education should be about broadening one’s perspective.
For a readable summary of the “revisionist” look at Grant one should read Victors in Blue by Albert Castel.
This is not true, unless by "informed" you mean a reader needs to be exposed to every falsehood pertaining to Grant.

Accurate information in non-fiction historical books is far more valuable to the reader than just arbitrarily "broadening one's perspective" by reading falsehoods. Most readers of history would consider reading falsehoods as wasting their time, rather than being educational.
 
Be wary of someone suggesting not to read a book. Im not telling anyone not to read any book. On the contrary I’m saying read as much as possible. To be intellectually honest one should read alternative interpretations of history. Ultimately it is the reader who must decide how much they want to know about a subject.
 
One could also read 19th century accounts about Grant - available on line- but the easy way to get introduced to an against the 20 th century consensus take on Grant (and other generals) is Victors in Blue. I don’t see how anyone can consider themselves a serious CW student without having read it.
 
One could also read 19th century accounts about Grant - available on line- but the easy way to get introduced to an against the 20 th century consensus take on Grant (and other generals) is Victors in Blue. I don’t see how anyone can consider themselves a serious CW student without having read it.

Of course, they must be carefully cherrypicked 19th Century accounts. Ignore such things as Winfield Scott giving Grant a copy of his memoirs inscribed, "From the oldest general to the greatest general." We have to ignore the fact Grant was the most popular American man in the 19th Century. We should only read accounts from those who had axes to grind.

I've read Victors in Blue, and it takes a positive view of Grant--nothing like what you've been trying to sell.

Those interested in understanding how Grant was actually viewed can consult Joan Waugh's U.S. Grant: American Hero, American Myth.
 
Skarps was interested in military influences on Grant. I wonder what he will come up with.
Certainly George Washington is the first influence. Napoleon would be the negative influence. Beyond that it is a question mark.
But the Duke of Wellington wrote a few papers in response to von Clausewitz. During the war Grant was repeatedly in communication with Porter and borrowed terms from Farragut.
Grant may have pretended to not be interested in military theory, but John Russell Young asserted that Grant could discuss the entire history of warfare in detail.
 
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The author of Victors raises questions about Grant vs other generals specifically Rosecrans. He states his desire for a historian to write a biography of Rosecrans which tells me questions were raised in his mind about the accepted story. He had already come to a somewhat negative assessment of Sherman’s military career. Most interestingly Castel calls for a courageous historian. He knew to write the story would invite scorn.
 
Best way to avoid cherry picking is to read as much as possible. I’ve striven to do that. I’m fortunate in that I live near many open stack research libraries so I was able to peruse the volumes in card catalogue order. Archive grid a good resource for finding manuscript collections.
 
The author of Victors raises questions about Grant vs other generals specifically Rosecrans. He states his desire for a historian to write a biography of Rosecrans which tells me questions were raised in his mind about the accepted story. He had already come to a somewhat negative assessment of Sherman’s military career. Most interestingly Castel calls for a courageous historian. He knew to write the story would invite scorn.

Castel doesn't raise questions about Grant's abilities. Here's one of the things Castel brings up regarding Grant vs. other generals, specifically Rosecrans: "Grant's seizure of Forts Henry and Donelson, while putting out of action, either as casualties or captives, at least 18,000 Rebel troops at the cost of less than 3,000 of his own men provided the North with its first major victory of the war. In fact, it constituted by far the greatest triumph gained by either side so far. Rosecrans's success in establishing Union dominance in West Virginia was, to repeat, paramountly a psychological one, with geography making that region a strategical dead end; and although the rout of McDowell's army at Bull Run humiliated Northerners and exalted Southerners, it left the basic military situation in the East unchanged, the Confederates lacking the means to follow it up with an offensive of their own and so remaining on the defensive. Grant's conquests, in contrast, not only thrilled the North and shocked the South, they also had an enormous impact on the course of the war both in the West and as a whole. They left Sidney Johnston with no rational choice, if he were to avoid total disaster, other than to do what he started doing as soon as Henry fell--withdraw the main part of his army from Bowling Green in central Kentucky to Nashville: now he had to abandon that as well because he could not hold the Tennessee capital with his available force. In sum, thanks to Grant, by mid-February 1862 the Federals controlled all of Kentucky and stood poised to occupy western Tennessee, invade the upper part of the Lower South, and advance by land and water down the Mississippi, thereby bisecting, symbolically if not physically, the Confederacy. Even should McClellan somehow fail to take Richmond in the East, it now had become possible for the Union to defeat the Confederacy in the West." [p. 50]
 
For those still interested in the original topic, this book review by David W Blight is interesting in that it offers a good overview of US Grant historiography. A couple of minor errors pointed out by Nick Sacco: Grant was not arrested in NY & it would be up for debate characterize his family as one of abolitionists. Whilst the article is primarily a review of Chernow's book, it's greater value is that of an overview of Grant scholarship:


https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2018/05/24/ulysses-grant-silent-type/
 
I hope you read past page 50 (Talk about cherry picking). Castel sides with Rosecrans in the Corinth dispute. But the bigger point is that Castel -who changed his assement of Sherman- was beginning to look into the Rosecrans-Grant dispute more deeply. Time caught up with him before he could study it further. His desire was for a young talented and courageous (his words) historian to investigate the Rosecrans story. The best way to honor that request is to encourage people to read outside the 20th century consensus not to disuade people from doing that.
 
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