Free Grant and Sherman: The Friendship that Won the Civil War by Charles Bracelen Flood Page A

in the June weather, tied to a post with a gag in his mouth in the middle of camp where everyone could see him, he took off the gag and the ropes himself, and stood back waiting to see what Mexico would do next. The man saluted and silently walked away. A sentry greeted Grant by saying, “Howdy, Colonel?” while standing with his musket at his side. Grant asked the man to hand him his musket, which Grant then snapped up to the saluting position of present arms. Handing it back, he said, “That is the way to say ‘how do you do’ to your Colonel.” When the different companies all held morning roll call an hour late, with the men getting up whenever they pleased, they found no breakfast waiting for them.
    Within forty-eight hours Grant had set up a simple daily schedule, understood by all: the men would drill in small groups as squads from six to seven in the morning and as companies from ten to eleven, and again as companies from five to six in the afternoon. Other than these times, the men could go into Springfield during the daylight hours, as they wished. Grant’s words regarding their conduct were set forth in his Orders No. 8: “All men when out of Camp should reflect that they are gentlemen—in camp soldiers; and the Commanding Officer hopes that all of his command, will sustain these two characters with fidelity.”
    The men began to feel that Grant considered them responsible individuals. The regiment’s chaplain spoke of Grant’s “unostentatious vigor and vigilance,” saying that he “would correct every infraction on the spot,” and do it in a “cool and unruffled manner.” Each day, there were fewer disciplinary cases. Some soldiers who thought that they were still back in Mattoon, with a colonel who would go out drinking with them when they slipped away from guard duty, left their sentry posts and found themselves under arrest, with Grant’s Orders No. 14 stating that they could be fined ten dollars apiece and face “corporal punishment such as confinement for thirty days with ball and chain at hard labor.” Bearing in mind the recent history of this regiment and its deficient commander, Grant let the offenders off lightly but reminded them that if they left a sentry post in the face of the enemy, “the punishment of this is death.”
    As Grant took his regiment out on a short route march, someone told him that many of the men’s canteens were “loaded,” filled not with water but whiskey. He halted the column, ordered everyone to pour out the contents of his canteen, and resumed the march. A lieutenant wrote his wife that the guardhouse was packed with miscreants for the first few “nights and days but yesterday there was but two or three in and to day none.” The colonels of the other new regiments began coming around to see what Colonel Grant was doing with the Twenty-first.
    Grant made a swift trip home to Galena and returned wearing a new uniform, riding a newly bought horse named Rondy, and accompanied by his oldest son, eleven-year-old Fred, who Julia felt should see what his father was doing. Julia had always believed that her Ulys would eventually do splendid things, and she wanted their son to see him commanding his regiment. Likening her husband to Philip of Macedon and their son to Alexander the Great, going off to conquer in ancient campaigns, she wrote Grant, “Alexander was not older when he accompanied Philip. Do keep him with you.” For his part, Grant was thinking not of Julia’s romanticized view of history but of his daily work with one steadily improving regiment of recruits in Illinois. In a letter to Julia that he signed, “Your Dodo,” Grant said, “The men I believe are pleased with the change that has taken place in their commander,” and added that the greatest change was “the order in camp.”
    On June 28, 1861, after patriotic speeches by two Democratic congressmen, the soldiers of the Twenty-first Illinois had their opportunity to go home or to sign