Shortly before noon, May 6, 1884, Ulysses S. Grant entered the office of his Wall Street brokerage firm, a wealthy man. A few hours later, he came out of a poor man.
Thanks to a pyramid scheme operated by his unscrupulous partner, Ferdinand Ward, Grant’s investment company immediately collapsed, wiping out his savings. “When I went downtown this morning, I thought I was worth a lot of money, now I don’t know I have a dollar,” lamented the defeated civil war hero to a former classmate. from West Point. In fact, Grant had everything from $ 80 to his name. His wife, Julia, still had $ 130. Kindhearted strangers responded by sending grant checks. Desperate to pay his bills, the former American president cashed them.
Still struggling with the bitter sting of bankruptcy, Grant that summer also suffered from an excruciating prick in the throat. When he finally visited a doctor in October, Grant learned that he had incurable throat and tongue cancer, probably a product of his habit of 20 cigars a day.
Grant, a three-night miniseries event. Soon in HISTORY.
Grant was no stranger to financial woes. Having failed as a farmer and rent collector before the Civil War, he lived in a log cabin he nicknamed “Hardscrabble” and sold firewood in the streets of Saint-Louis to make ends meet. After leaving the White House, Grant mismanaged his spending on a two-year world trip so badly that his son had to send him $ 60,000 to continue. However, now that he was faced with the terrifying prospect of leaving Julia a penniless widow, the graying general who fought to save the Union undertook a final mission to save her family from impoverishment.
Mark Twain paid Grant to publish his memoirs
Former Civil War General and President Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885) (seated, center) sits for a family portrait with his wife, Julia Dent Grant, and their children and grandchildren in his last home, in New York, around 1883.
Oscar White / Corbis / VCG / Getty Images
Stripped of his possessions and possessions, Grant still retained something of great value – his memories of past glories. Behind the silent facade was a friendly storyteller who entertained friends like Mark Twain with sons of war and politics. “While we think Grant is quiet and reserved, he was a captivating storyteller with a dry mind and a background of stories ready,” said Ron Chernow, award-winning author of the Pulitzer Prize for Grant.
For years, Twain had suggested that Grant write his memoirs. Now destitute, the former president finally agreed to take advantage of his celebrity. In need to save himself financially after a series of failed investments, Twain, in debt, signed a contract with Grant with his new publishing house and gave him a check for $ 1,000 to cover his living expenses.
Engaged in a furious race against time as cancer attacked his body, Grant dug into his writing with military efficiency, producing up to 10,000 words in a single day. “Grant approached his memories with the same courage and determination that he tackled his battles in the Civil War,” said Chernow, who is also executive producer of the HISTORY documentary series.Grant. “” As in these meetings, he was meticulous and systematic, a true follower of precision and truth. At home, he collected large piles of orders and cards which helped him to recreate “his most famous battles with minute fidelity. In wartime and in writing, Grant had the most amazing ability to mobilize all of his energy in pursuit of a single goal.”
Grant amazed Twain with not only the quantity, but the quality of his prose. “Grant was proud of his writing skills,” says Chernow. “His wartime orders were known for their economy and accuracy, and he wanted to write all of his own speeches as president – something unthinkable today.”
READ MORE: 10 things you may not know about Ulysses S. Grant
With only a few weeks to live, Grant made one last effort
Ulysses S. Grant reading on a porch of the house, considered to be the last photograph taken before his death, 1890.
African American Newspapers / Gado / Getty Images
Grant wrote his manuscript until his hand became too weak in the spring of 1885, forcing him to use a stenographer. However, even speaking became laborious as his condition deteriorated. Following the advice of doctors who vouched for the healthy power of the clean mountain air, Grant decamped in early summer from his Manhattan brownstone at a station in the Adirondacks north of Saratoga Springs. In a chalet on the slopes of Mount McGregor, Grant launched his latest campaign to finish his volume.
With excruciating pain accompanying each swallowing, Grant was unable to eat solid food. Her body withered during the day. The voice that once commanded armies could barely give a whisper. “He endured great pain with incredible stoicism,” said Ben Kemp, director of operations at Grant Cottage US State Historic Site. While Grant’s doctors gave him morphine sparingly to keep his mind clear for writing, they swabbed his throat with cocaine to relieve topical pain and used hypodermic needles to inject him with cognac during the worst of his coughing fits.
Through it all, Grant persisted in sharpening his manuscript – editing, adding new pages, and examining the proofs of his first volume – while sitting on the front porch of the cottage even on the hottest days wrapped in blankets, a woolen hat and scarf covering his neck tumor, which was now “as big as a man’s two fists together” according to New York Sun. When his voice finally left him, Grant scribbled his thoughts in pencil on small pieces of paper.
When Twain visited Grant at the cottage, he brought the good news that he had already pre-sold 100,000 copies of the autobiography. A relieved Grant knew he had managed to give Julia and her children financial security. “Taking care of your family was all that mattered at the time,” says Kemp. “Grant knew at the time that it was going to be a success. As in a battle, it was at this moment that he knew that the tide had turned. “
With his mission accomplished, Grant finally laid down his pen on July 16 after having fabricated 366,000 Herculean words in less than a year. “There is nothing more that I should do there now, and therefore I am not likely to be more ready to leave than at this time”, he wrote. Seven days later, Grant’s pulse faltered and finally gave way.
Grant’s autobiography was a commercial and literary success
The personal memories of Ulysses S. Grant.
MPI / Getty Images
Employing an army of door-to-door salespeople, Twain sold more than 300,000 copies of the Personal memories of Ulysse S. Grant. The two-volume set even went beyond Twain’s last work, Adventures of Huckleberry Finnand allowed Julia Grant to collect $ 450,000 in royalties (equivalent to $ 12 million today).
Grant’s memoirs were not only successful commercially, but also literally. Although Grant failed to discuss his presidency or sensitive personal issues such as his drinking, many researchers consider his autobiography to be the most beautiful memoir ever written by an American president and perhaps the first military memoir in English language. “The emotion of the situation probably gave energy and eloquence to his work,” says Chernow. “In all likelihood, he had told many of these stories in the years following the war, and they had acquired a certain finesse and a certain polite in the narrative.”
“There was no doubt among his family and friends that Grant decided to stay alive to finish the book,” said Chernow. “He may have originally undertaken memories to support his wife after his death, but it must also have appeased and comforted him at the end of his life to recount his glorious victories in the civil war. “
