Publishers Weekly
11/13/2023
Historian Reeves (A Fire in the Wilderness) takes a fresh look at Ulysses S. Grant’s conflicted early relationship with slavery, secession, and alcohol in this less than laudatory study. Focused solely on Grant’s life in the West—particularly in St. Louis from 1854 to 1860—Reeves charts Grant’s tense relationships with his antislavery father, Jesse, and his slave-owning father-in-law, Colonel Dent, as well as his emotional dependence upon his wife, Julia. Having retired from the army after the Mexican American War, Grant took over Dent’s plantation property in Missouri. Reeves traces the arc of Grant’s thinking on slavery during this time, as it evolved from a tacit acceptance in the 1850s to his belief that its demise was necessary to win the war. Transitioning into a study of Grant’s early military campaigns against the Confederates in the West (where he credits Grant’s pugnacious, confident spirit for both victories and losses), Reeves continues to highlight Grant’s attitudes toward slavery, particularly regarding the enslaved woman Jule who traveled with his family to care for the children during the war and was a “familiar presence” in Union camps. Throughout, Reeves dredges up old shibboleths about Grant (including that he was a drunkard, a complete failure at business, a butcher general) and breathes new life into a few of them. Grant’s contradictions and complexities are on full display in this candid and unusually critical biography. (Dec.)
Civil War Book Review
"Reeves’s book provides a well-written and accessible approach to this crucial decade in Grant’s life. The work focuses on many intriguing yet understudied aspects of Grant’s life, including his family relationships and antebellum career in Missouri. Few Grant biographers contend with Grant’s problematic relationship with slavery to the extent that Reeves does...readers interested in Grant’s family relationships, views on slavery, and Civil War career would do well to read Reeves’s intelligent book."
Associated Press
"An enlightening look at how Ulysses S. Grant benefited from slavery years before he helped end the institution. Reeves manages to stitch Grant’s flaws and virtues into a thought-provoking portrait of a key historical figure who never lost faith in himself or his country."
James M. McPherson James M. McPherson
"Reeves has done a superb job of tracing the evolution of Grant's attitude toward slavery under the influence first of his antislavery father and then of his slaveholding wife and proslavery father-in-law. But it was the impact of his experience as a Civil War commander that shaped his ultimate conviction that slavery must go if the Union was to be preserved and given a new birth of freedom. An added bonus of Reeves' lucid portrayal of this process is the most sensible and even-handed treatment of the issue of Grant's drinking that I have encountered."
New York Journal of Books
"Soldier of Destiny appears to be a straightforward biography, but this concise, simple narrative has deeper currents. Reeves' book is more than an intimate study of Grant and his family in a critical period of the future president’s life; it is a study of a white middle-class America in which economics, politics, and technology rapidly changed their society at the terrible cost of the American Civil War.
HistoryNet
"This thoroughly researched and detailed book offers keen insight into Grant as an evolving soul attempting to navigate the trials and tribulations of life. It also dispels some of the myths of the future Union general as a wholly unsuited businessman and unstable drunk...Soldier of Destiny is a masterful account of the decisive Grant and how he remained resilient while 'lost in the wilderness,' only to emerge as a sword of deliverance at the moment his country needed him most."
The Wall Street Journal
"In a tightly focused narrative animated by vivid battle depictions, Mr. Reeves connects Grant’s personal and professional redemption to the country’s. Absorbing."
The New York Sun
Mr. Reeves wants us to share that intimacy to drive home how this person — not just the historical figure—began to behave in new ways.”
Emerging Civil War
"Reeves has a clear, gentle writing style, which makes for an easy read...If you have not read much about Grant the man before, this book is a good place to start."
James M. McPherson
"Reeves has done a superb job of tracing the evolution of Grant's attitude toward slavery under the influence first of his antislavery father and then of his slaveholding wife and proslavery father-in-law. But it was the impact of his experience as a Civil War commander that shaped his ultimate conviction that slavery must go if the Union was to be preserved and given a new birth of freedom. An added bonus of Reeves' lucid portrayal of this process is the most sensible and even-handed treatment of the issue of Grant's drinking that I have encountered."
Ty Seidule
"A brilliant, riveting book on the finest officer to ever wear a US Army uniform—Ulysses S. Grant—and his relationship to the most important subject in American history—slavery. How did a tanner from Galena Illinois save the United States and destroy slavery? Reeves, a master storyteller, provides the answer."
Christian B. Keller
In this timely character study of the Union’s greatest general, John Reeves once again offers us a fascinating, well-written narrative, this time spotlighting Grant’s checkered connection with the 'peculiar institution.' He meshes personal biography with military, social, and economic history in crisp, well-written prose that keeps the pages turning.”
The Virginia Gazette
"Through the years, my various readings of the Civil War never showed the horror that John Reeves lays bare in his new volume."
American Civil War Round Table
Reeves focuses on the personal experiences of the participants, both high and low, their thoughts, hardships, heroics, and personal experiences. It is unlike any book I have seen on the battle.
Brian Matthew Jordan
With an absorbing narrative style, John Reeves hauntingly evokes the human drama of one of the Civil War's most horrific battles... Relating the story of this first clash between Lee and Grant from the perspective of both generals and foot soldiers, this is popular military history at its best.
Stephen Cushman
John Reeves illuminates the Battle of the Wilderness from fresh perspectives. His story personalizes the controversial and much-resented substitution policy in an especially compelling way.
Kirkus Reviews
2023-09-09
A fine account of the formative years of Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885).
Historian Reeves, author of The Lost Indictment of Robert E. Lee, clearly displays his knowledge of the inner life of the Civil War general. Son of a prosperous Ohio tanner, Grant showed no interest in entering the family business. Getting an education appealed to him, so his father used his influence to get him into West Point, where the education was free. He was a middling student who distinguished himself in the Mexican War, married the daughter of a wealthy Missouri slave-owner in 1848, abruptly resigned his commission in 1854, and spent the following five years working on her father’s farm. He returned north in 1860; a year later, he was quickly appointed a general as the only man in his community with military experience. He was a success because he knew how wars were won: resources and persistence. Lesser generals (such as Lee) believed that wars were won by battlefield victories. Readers surprised at the book’s sudden end in 1864, when Grant was appointed commander of all Union armies, should reference the subtitle. Reeves maintains that he never intended to write a definitive biography; rather, he focuses on Grant’s rise to the pinnacle of his profession, with an emphasis on his connection to slavery. Never a deep thinker, the young Grant had no objection to slavery, but his father-in-law owned 30 slaves, and Grant made use of them during his years on the farm. Like most northerners, he fought to preserve the Union, but as the war dragged on, he concluded that slavery had to be eliminated. By the time he became a national figure, he approved recruiting Black soldiers into the Union army—a sign of advanced thinking even then.
A capable portrait of Grant's critical period, with more than the usual attention to his racial views.
