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losapala 's review for:
The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant
by Ulysses S. Grant
I have such mixed feelings about this book, which is why I’m giving it three stars.
On one hand, I was deeply disappointed. I have been interested in the Civil War for years, and particularly curious about Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant. The title of this book—The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses Grant—led me to believe that he would cover his entire life, or at least all of the important parts of it, in the telling. However, after hearing about his childhood and service in the Mexican War, and then going through an extremely protracted description of every battle of the Civil War in which he was involved, the book abruptly ends after peace is made between North and South. Grant’s experience during his term as President of the United States was something I was really looking forward to reading about so I was surprised and a bit bummed to find it omitted altogether.
The other aspect that disappointed me was that “protracted description” I mentioned above. Now, I have been known to read and enjoy some dry books. I love history and I understand that sometimes history is just dry, there’s no way around it. But dry does not begin to convey what I went through reading hundreds and hundreds of pages on battles, skirmishes, troop movements, and details of captures, supplies, and correspondence. Grant might have been a great general, but he was not a great memoir writer. A lot of this description was mind-numbingly boring.
However, there were gems sprinkled throughout the book. I very much enjoyed hearing about Grant’s boyhood, his time in the Mexican War, and his observations and brief character sketches and studies of the other generals he worked alongside in the Civil War, and especially President Lincoln and Secretary of War Stanton. His analysis of the causes and effects of the war, and the advantages and disadvantages of both sides was also very interesting.
If you are actually a military scholar and literally want every little detail of each battle, you might find this book useful. If you’re someone like me, however, and you just want to read a good history of the Civil War, I’d skip this one.
On one hand, I was deeply disappointed. I have been interested in the Civil War for years, and particularly curious about Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant. The title of this book—The Complete Personal Memoirs of Ulysses Grant—led me to believe that he would cover his entire life, or at least all of the important parts of it, in the telling. However, after hearing about his childhood and service in the Mexican War, and then going through an extremely protracted description of every battle of the Civil War in which he was involved, the book abruptly ends after peace is made between North and South. Grant’s experience during his term as President of the United States was something I was really looking forward to reading about so I was surprised and a bit bummed to find it omitted altogether.
The other aspect that disappointed me was that “protracted description” I mentioned above. Now, I have been known to read and enjoy some dry books. I love history and I understand that sometimes history is just dry, there’s no way around it. But dry does not begin to convey what I went through reading hundreds and hundreds of pages on battles, skirmishes, troop movements, and details of captures, supplies, and correspondence. Grant might have been a great general, but he was not a great memoir writer. A lot of this description was mind-numbingly boring.
However, there were gems sprinkled throughout the book. I very much enjoyed hearing about Grant’s boyhood, his time in the Mexican War, and his observations and brief character sketches and studies of the other generals he worked alongside in the Civil War, and especially President Lincoln and Secretary of War Stanton. His analysis of the causes and effects of the war, and the advantages and disadvantages of both sides was also very interesting.
If you are actually a military scholar and literally want every little detail of each battle, you might find this book useful. If you’re someone like me, however, and you just want to read a good history of the Civil War, I’d skip this one.