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General Grant and the Rewriting of History: How the Destruction of General William S. Rosecrans Influenced Our Understanding of the Civil War
“[A] marvelously bold new book . . . Grant was The Man Who Saved the Union. Varney’s invaluable book helps us understand why we remember him that way” (Emerging Civil War). In 1885, a former president of the United States published one of the most influential books ever written about the Civil War. The Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant may be superbly written, Frank P. Varney persuasively argues in General Grant and the Rewriting of History, but is so riddled with flaws as to be unreliable. Juxtaposing primary source documents (some of them published here for the first time) against Grant’s own pen and other sources, Professor Varney sheds new light on what really happened on some of the Civil War’s most important battlefields. He does so by focusing much of his work on Grant’s treatment of Maj. Gen. William S. Rosecrans, a capable army commander whose reputation Grant (and others working with him) conspired to destroy. Grant’s memoirs contain not only misstatements but outright inventions to manipulate the historical record. But Grant’s injustices go much deeper. He submitted decidedly biased reports, falsified official documents, and even perjured himself before an army court of inquiry. There is also strong evidence that his often-discussed drinking problem affected the outcome of at least one battle. The first of two volumes on this subject, General Grant and the Rewriting of History aptly demonstrates that blindly accepting historical “truths” without vigorous challenge is a perilous path to understanding real history. “An invaluable addition to Civil War Studies and reference shelves . . . and a sharp caution against putting too much blind faith in any one person’s testimony, memoir, or historical accounting. Highly Recommended.” —Midwest Book Review
313 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 19, 2012
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August 2, 2013
I’ve never liked the phrase ‘history buff’. A history buff, to me, is someone who has a hobby, like a guy who has model trains in his basement or goes to Star Trek conventions. A history buff reads history books, sure, but also likes to collect memorabilia or do re-enactments. History buffs are one step away from spending their vacation at a Medieval Faire. I prefer my toilets to flush, thank you very much. History buffs often get their history from the History Channel. And history buffs, often called Uncle Eddie for reasons that escape me, can have expertise and fully formed opinions about obscure battles or some forgotten cabinet member, the less likely to be challenged when they voice those opinions. And voice them they do, whether you ask or not. So I don’t see myself as a history buff. Don’t call me that.
No. I’m a history wonk.
That’s right. A history wonk. When I read history, I check sources, scroll my nose down to the footnotes. I remember once reading Stephen Ambrose’s history of Eisenhower’s presidency. He wrote that Eisenhower wore a new suit every day. Not that he got a suit laundered after each wearing. He wrote that he wore a new suit every day. I went immediately to the back of the book to see where he got that from. Nothing. Unattributed. I called my wonk friend who was reading the same book. He, like me, was beside himself. But there it was, maybe no more credible than the internet. I wondered would it be repeated in a subsequent biography, with a citation, perhaps, to Ambrose. Like that then makes it true.
I’m talking about accuracy, truth if you can get it. How do we write the history to try and get it right. Is that even possible? I write this from some personal context. You see, I have a job that causes newspaper and television stories to be written about what I do. There have been hundreds, maybe over a thousand such stories. Some are small, some are big. But one thing I can tell you with certainty: not one story has been 100% accurate. Usually it’s just some small thing. But imagine that: in 1,000 stories about stuff I’ve done, not a one has been totally factual. The errors haven’t been malicious, as far as I know. And they probably all haven’t been careless. Maybe sometimes it’s just impossible to get the complete truth. I’m not suggesting that there’s been some Tony Conspiracy where journalists have singled me out for inaccuracy. On the contrary. It’s just how it is. And, my point, really, is that if they can’t get the simple things I do right, what chance is there for topics like Global Warming, the War in Iraq, the Royal Baby? And once it’s written, well, it’s history.
So, yea, I’m a wonk. And I love reading books by writers who insist on looking to see if what we’ve been told is correct, to take each ‘truth’ back to its source.
This is such a book. This is a book about Union General William S. Rosecrans and how he was done dirty: first by U.S. Grant, Edwin Stanton, James Garfield and others; and, second, how historians simply took Grant at his word, never checked the original record, and caused a lie to be told, and re-told.
The chapters in this book concern Civil War battles that Grant and/or Rosecrans participated in. They are written as a lawyer’s brief. Prof. Varney gives the Context, the Controversies, Specific Charges, the Historiography and an Evaluation. So, we are told what each battle was about. We are told what accusations of misfeasance or nonfeasance were lodged by contemporaries and by historians. And then Prof. Varney goes to the original sources, such as these exist. He looks at the Official Record, contemporaneous letters and journals, and dispatches. He tries to answer the charges from these sources, sometimes more convincingly than other times. Then he looks at what the historians have said about these controversies, and he hits the big ones: McFeeley, Perret, Catton, Foote, Jean Edward Smith, and Cozzens and many lesser known ones, but specialists in this field. He takes their statements, mostly condemning Rosecrans for being tardy, emotional, egotistical, insubordinate and cowardly. In each instance, he goes back to the sources the historians cite. What he found, he writes, is that almost universally, these condemnations of Rosecrans have a single source: Grant’s Memoirs. Varney then pierces the Memoirs. He shows how Grant hated Rosecrans, probably because Grant blamed Rosecrans for spreading stories of his drinking to Ohio newspapers. He shows how Grant doctored the record or outright lied. And he shows the timing of changes Grant made to coincide with his ill-will toward Rosecrans.
It is largely a circumstantial case that Varney argues, but a very convincing one nonetheless. It made me re-evaluate the Civil War historians I’ve read. Perret, in particular, has no credibility left. Cozzens comes out the fairest, because, Varney says, he more than the others went beyond Grant’s own words to make a judgement.
If nothing else, this book demonstrates that there is an industry of historians who simply write books because that is what they do; they write history books. They do not immerse themselves in the original documents in order to find truth. I wasn’t totally surprised. In fact I have a list of historians I don’t read anymore because I don’t trust their research or because they have an agenda. But Varney here shows how shallow they can be.
I really liked this book. It spoke to my inner wonk. It made me uncomfortable about my previous views of Grant. Which, I suppose, is a good thing. Certainly I now view Rosecrans as a tragic figure.
Once, early in the book, Varney teases with an observation that Rosecrans was not short on idiosyncrasies. But he moves on to dissect the battles instead of painting a fuller, if anecdotal, picture of the man.
There are other faults with this book. By its structure, there is much redundancy. And Varney sometimes uses ironically when he merely means coincidentally. More fundamentally, while Varney is correct to chastize historians who made a case against Rosecrans by relying only on Grant’s Memoirs, I couldn’t help but notice a five-page defense of Rosecrans which Varney bases almost exclusively on the testimony and letters of Rosecrans. He hides Rosecrans’ penchant for writing confusing orders in one instance by explaining an officer’s actions being caused by “a poorly worded order,” never attributing it to Rosecrans. So, Varney can do it too.
But this was an important book for me. It’s recommended for other wonks.
No. I’m a history wonk.
That’s right. A history wonk. When I read history, I check sources, scroll my nose down to the footnotes. I remember once reading Stephen Ambrose’s history of Eisenhower’s presidency. He wrote that Eisenhower wore a new suit every day. Not that he got a suit laundered after each wearing. He wrote that he wore a new suit every day. I went immediately to the back of the book to see where he got that from. Nothing. Unattributed. I called my wonk friend who was reading the same book. He, like me, was beside himself. But there it was, maybe no more credible than the internet. I wondered would it be repeated in a subsequent biography, with a citation, perhaps, to Ambrose. Like that then makes it true.
I’m talking about accuracy, truth if you can get it. How do we write the history to try and get it right. Is that even possible? I write this from some personal context. You see, I have a job that causes newspaper and television stories to be written about what I do. There have been hundreds, maybe over a thousand such stories. Some are small, some are big. But one thing I can tell you with certainty: not one story has been 100% accurate. Usually it’s just some small thing. But imagine that: in 1,000 stories about stuff I’ve done, not a one has been totally factual. The errors haven’t been malicious, as far as I know. And they probably all haven’t been careless. Maybe sometimes it’s just impossible to get the complete truth. I’m not suggesting that there’s been some Tony Conspiracy where journalists have singled me out for inaccuracy. On the contrary. It’s just how it is. And, my point, really, is that if they can’t get the simple things I do right, what chance is there for topics like Global Warming, the War in Iraq, the Royal Baby? And once it’s written, well, it’s history.
So, yea, I’m a wonk. And I love reading books by writers who insist on looking to see if what we’ve been told is correct, to take each ‘truth’ back to its source.
This is such a book. This is a book about Union General William S. Rosecrans and how he was done dirty: first by U.S. Grant, Edwin Stanton, James Garfield and others; and, second, how historians simply took Grant at his word, never checked the original record, and caused a lie to be told, and re-told.
The chapters in this book concern Civil War battles that Grant and/or Rosecrans participated in. They are written as a lawyer’s brief. Prof. Varney gives the Context, the Controversies, Specific Charges, the Historiography and an Evaluation. So, we are told what each battle was about. We are told what accusations of misfeasance or nonfeasance were lodged by contemporaries and by historians. And then Prof. Varney goes to the original sources, such as these exist. He looks at the Official Record, contemporaneous letters and journals, and dispatches. He tries to answer the charges from these sources, sometimes more convincingly than other times. Then he looks at what the historians have said about these controversies, and he hits the big ones: McFeeley, Perret, Catton, Foote, Jean Edward Smith, and Cozzens and many lesser known ones, but specialists in this field. He takes their statements, mostly condemning Rosecrans for being tardy, emotional, egotistical, insubordinate and cowardly. In each instance, he goes back to the sources the historians cite. What he found, he writes, is that almost universally, these condemnations of Rosecrans have a single source: Grant’s Memoirs. Varney then pierces the Memoirs. He shows how Grant hated Rosecrans, probably because Grant blamed Rosecrans for spreading stories of his drinking to Ohio newspapers. He shows how Grant doctored the record or outright lied. And he shows the timing of changes Grant made to coincide with his ill-will toward Rosecrans.
It is largely a circumstantial case that Varney argues, but a very convincing one nonetheless. It made me re-evaluate the Civil War historians I’ve read. Perret, in particular, has no credibility left. Cozzens comes out the fairest, because, Varney says, he more than the others went beyond Grant’s own words to make a judgement.
If nothing else, this book demonstrates that there is an industry of historians who simply write books because that is what they do; they write history books. They do not immerse themselves in the original documents in order to find truth. I wasn’t totally surprised. In fact I have a list of historians I don’t read anymore because I don’t trust their research or because they have an agenda. But Varney here shows how shallow they can be.
I really liked this book. It spoke to my inner wonk. It made me uncomfortable about my previous views of Grant. Which, I suppose, is a good thing. Certainly I now view Rosecrans as a tragic figure.
Once, early in the book, Varney teases with an observation that Rosecrans was not short on idiosyncrasies. But he moves on to dissect the battles instead of painting a fuller, if anecdotal, picture of the man.
There are other faults with this book. By its structure, there is much redundancy. And Varney sometimes uses ironically when he merely means coincidentally. More fundamentally, while Varney is correct to chastize historians who made a case against Rosecrans by relying only on Grant’s Memoirs, I couldn’t help but notice a five-page defense of Rosecrans which Varney bases almost exclusively on the testimony and letters of Rosecrans. He hides Rosecrans’ penchant for writing confusing orders in one instance by explaining an officer’s actions being caused by “a poorly worded order,” never attributing it to Rosecrans. So, Varney can do it too.
But this was an important book for me. It’s recommended for other wonks.
December 24, 2025
It has long been part of Grant's legend that he got along well with his subordinates. This is true unless you were George Thomas. Or Lew Wallace. Or Benjamin Prentiss. Or John McClernand. Or Gouverneur Warren. Or George Meade. Or Joe Hooker. Or William Starke Rosecrans.
By now, it's plain this was not true except for a few of Grant's favorites. That Grant was at odds with many of his subordinates is not a new revelation. All the way back in 1887, author Carswell McClellan published The Personal Memoirs and Military History of U.S. Grant versus the Record of the Army of the Potomac. In this work, McClellan noted that Grant flat-out slandered George Meade in a backhanded way and cast doubt on Meade's competence by making up incidents which cast Meade in a bad light.
When McClellan looked for documented evidence of these incidents, he found nothing that proved they even existed. If anything, he discovered that Meade was a better general than Grant gave him credit for in the Memoirs. This made McClellan conclude that Grant had to be deliberately lying. Meade, who had died in 1872, was no longer alive to defend himself from Grant's charges. Unfortunately, Carswell McClellan's book is rather stodgy reading, which is one reason why it has rarely been read or cited, and the knowledge that it even exists has sort of dropped out of Civil War Studies.
However, in the last couple of decades there has been a reexamination of Grant's tendency to backstab his subordinates, and Frank Varney's book is one of the best of these studies. Varney, like McClellan, went through the historical records and compared them to Grant's Memoirs, and came to the conclusion Grant lied his head off.
Varney focuses on the quarrel Grant had with Rosecrans, which was very one-sided, being all hostility on Grant's part and patient soldierly cooperation on the part of Rosecrans (at least until after the war). Indeed, it seems that Grant's long history of pre-war failures had made him jealous, bitter, and suspicious of almost anyone winning accolades who was not himself. During his researches, Varney says he was astonished at the degree of duplicity he found on the part of Grant, and he discovered four instances in which Grant falsified War Department records.
There is some evidence that the quarrel between Grant and Rosecrans started when Rosecrans, early on in the war, was tasked with investigation of some illegal cotton sales in the west. Grant's father Jesse may have been implicated in this, and maybe even Grant himself. Anyone familiar with the widespread corruption of Grant's presidential administration should not be surprised that someone associated with Grant may have been involved in corruption during the war. Varney tried to locate Rosecrans' report, but found it had utterly vanished. Its last known location was in the hands of one of Grant's aides.
Varney says Grant's Memoirs have often been used as the only source of events--and the only source of opinion about Rosecrans--by many historians writing about the Civil War, so that Grant's point of view has completely overwhelmed Civil War scholarship. It's worth noting that Sheridan, who actually fought under Rosecrans, never agreed with Grant about the man and had a better opinion of his former commander.
Delving deeper, Varney claims that the battle of Corinth was all Rosecrans' work, yet Grant went to the trouble to shade his report of the battle to make it look like his own victory, though he actually had almost nothing to do with it. Grant called Rosecrans' fight at Stone's River a loss, only to be told by Lincoln, "We have to disagree about that." Upon hearing Grant's opinion, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles said that Grant was plainly envious. As for Rosecrans, by Corinth, he had acquired a very low view of Grant's generalship.
Regarding Chickamauga, Varney says much of the record has been distorted by Grant's own distorted Memoirs, and Rosecrans' competence and behavior were not as bad as it has been made out to be. He did not panic or lose his head. But by Chickamauga, Rosecrans had been tactless enough to make an enemy out of the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton. Rosecrans told Stanton that the latter had a screw loose about not paying the soldiers on time. After this, the angry Stanton joined Grant in trying to oust Rosecrans. When Grant demanded Rosecrans' head after Chickamauga, he got it.
Many historians have been puzzled about why there was friction between George Thomas--as loyal and honorable a soldier as the army could produce--and Grant. However, if you consider that Thomas, being Rosecrans' second-in-command, was well aware of Grant's scheming against Rosecrans, it makes sense. When Grant arrived after Chickamauga to take over the army after ousting Rosecrans, he and Thomas had a notorious meeting. Grant was drenched with rain, and Thomas greeted him with a cold stare and just let him stand and drip. Later in the war, Grant argued against giving Thomas an independent command and even tried to oust him, only to see Thomas fight a spectacular battle against Hood, virtually annihilating Hood's forces at Nashville.
After Chickamauga, Rosecrans was transferred to Missouri, a state on fire with guerilla warfare. Yet Grant continually transferred troops away from him while Rosecrans struggled to guard a wide range of vulnerable spots, even taking troops away when Rosecrans was engaged in active battle against Price's army. Meanwhile, Grant kept calling for Rosecrans' complete ouster from the army.
Grant eventually became president, ran one the most corrupt administrations ever, and went broke after leaving office. While Congress debated giving Grant a pension, (something retired presidents were not routinely given back then), Rosecrans, now a congressman from California, protested that Grant did not deserve one because Grant's administration had robbed the American people. This was the only revenge Rosecrans took against the man who had ruined his army career.
Ron Chernow has recently published a hagiography of Grant that is likely to stick like gum to the public's consciousness and color all our notions about Grant for a long time. However, as someone who has read a great deal about Civil War battles, I don't put men like Grant, Lincoln, Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Longstreet up on pedestals. I am far too aware of their flaws. Varney's book is recommended to those who want to read history instead of its distorted doppelganger, hagiography.
Available at Hoopla:
https://www.hoopladigital.com/title/1...
By now, it's plain this was not true except for a few of Grant's favorites. That Grant was at odds with many of his subordinates is not a new revelation. All the way back in 1887, author Carswell McClellan published The Personal Memoirs and Military History of U.S. Grant versus the Record of the Army of the Potomac. In this work, McClellan noted that Grant flat-out slandered George Meade in a backhanded way and cast doubt on Meade's competence by making up incidents which cast Meade in a bad light.
When McClellan looked for documented evidence of these incidents, he found nothing that proved they even existed. If anything, he discovered that Meade was a better general than Grant gave him credit for in the Memoirs. This made McClellan conclude that Grant had to be deliberately lying. Meade, who had died in 1872, was no longer alive to defend himself from Grant's charges. Unfortunately, Carswell McClellan's book is rather stodgy reading, which is one reason why it has rarely been read or cited, and the knowledge that it even exists has sort of dropped out of Civil War Studies.
However, in the last couple of decades there has been a reexamination of Grant's tendency to backstab his subordinates, and Frank Varney's book is one of the best of these studies. Varney, like McClellan, went through the historical records and compared them to Grant's Memoirs, and came to the conclusion Grant lied his head off.
Varney focuses on the quarrel Grant had with Rosecrans, which was very one-sided, being all hostility on Grant's part and patient soldierly cooperation on the part of Rosecrans (at least until after the war). Indeed, it seems that Grant's long history of pre-war failures had made him jealous, bitter, and suspicious of almost anyone winning accolades who was not himself. During his researches, Varney says he was astonished at the degree of duplicity he found on the part of Grant, and he discovered four instances in which Grant falsified War Department records.
There is some evidence that the quarrel between Grant and Rosecrans started when Rosecrans, early on in the war, was tasked with investigation of some illegal cotton sales in the west. Grant's father Jesse may have been implicated in this, and maybe even Grant himself. Anyone familiar with the widespread corruption of Grant's presidential administration should not be surprised that someone associated with Grant may have been involved in corruption during the war. Varney tried to locate Rosecrans' report, but found it had utterly vanished. Its last known location was in the hands of one of Grant's aides.
Varney says Grant's Memoirs have often been used as the only source of events--and the only source of opinion about Rosecrans--by many historians writing about the Civil War, so that Grant's point of view has completely overwhelmed Civil War scholarship. It's worth noting that Sheridan, who actually fought under Rosecrans, never agreed with Grant about the man and had a better opinion of his former commander.
Delving deeper, Varney claims that the battle of Corinth was all Rosecrans' work, yet Grant went to the trouble to shade his report of the battle to make it look like his own victory, though he actually had almost nothing to do with it. Grant called Rosecrans' fight at Stone's River a loss, only to be told by Lincoln, "We have to disagree about that." Upon hearing Grant's opinion, Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles said that Grant was plainly envious. As for Rosecrans, by Corinth, he had acquired a very low view of Grant's generalship.
Regarding Chickamauga, Varney says much of the record has been distorted by Grant's own distorted Memoirs, and Rosecrans' competence and behavior were not as bad as it has been made out to be. He did not panic or lose his head. But by Chickamauga, Rosecrans had been tactless enough to make an enemy out of the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton. Rosecrans told Stanton that the latter had a screw loose about not paying the soldiers on time. After this, the angry Stanton joined Grant in trying to oust Rosecrans. When Grant demanded Rosecrans' head after Chickamauga, he got it.
Many historians have been puzzled about why there was friction between George Thomas--as loyal and honorable a soldier as the army could produce--and Grant. However, if you consider that Thomas, being Rosecrans' second-in-command, was well aware of Grant's scheming against Rosecrans, it makes sense. When Grant arrived after Chickamauga to take over the army after ousting Rosecrans, he and Thomas had a notorious meeting. Grant was drenched with rain, and Thomas greeted him with a cold stare and just let him stand and drip. Later in the war, Grant argued against giving Thomas an independent command and even tried to oust him, only to see Thomas fight a spectacular battle against Hood, virtually annihilating Hood's forces at Nashville.
After Chickamauga, Rosecrans was transferred to Missouri, a state on fire with guerilla warfare. Yet Grant continually transferred troops away from him while Rosecrans struggled to guard a wide range of vulnerable spots, even taking troops away when Rosecrans was engaged in active battle against Price's army. Meanwhile, Grant kept calling for Rosecrans' complete ouster from the army.
Grant eventually became president, ran one the most corrupt administrations ever, and went broke after leaving office. While Congress debated giving Grant a pension, (something retired presidents were not routinely given back then), Rosecrans, now a congressman from California, protested that Grant did not deserve one because Grant's administration had robbed the American people. This was the only revenge Rosecrans took against the man who had ruined his army career.
Ron Chernow has recently published a hagiography of Grant that is likely to stick like gum to the public's consciousness and color all our notions about Grant for a long time. However, as someone who has read a great deal about Civil War battles, I don't put men like Grant, Lincoln, Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Longstreet up on pedestals. I am far too aware of their flaws. Varney's book is recommended to those who want to read history instead of its distorted doppelganger, hagiography.
Available at Hoopla:
https://www.hoopladigital.com/title/1...
July 31, 2013
Professor Varney's premise is that the standard (negative)history of the war record of Civil War general William Rosecrans, who was fired by U.S. Grant and, later, highly criticized by Grant in his famous memoir, was adopted by historians' uncritical acceptance of Grant's views. Varney says that Grant's version was self-serving, motivated by animus against Rosecrans and factually wrong, even deceitful. Using the various battles in which Grant was Rosecran's superior Professor Varney provides highly detailed analysis of the lack of veracity in Grant's accounts. He relies strongly on sources like the Official Record of the War of the Rebellion containing Grant's written reports and personal letters of the participants. (Note: the book is densely detailed and a basic familiarity with the campaigns is helpful to the reader.)
This book is more than just an effort to present a different view of Rosecrans. It poses important questions about how history is written. Varney holds that historians have relied greatly too much on Grant's account, many completely on Grant's memoirs. By implication Grant was not, and should not be seen to be, an objective reporter not because he wasn't present at the events, but because he was. There were personal interactions between Grant and Rosecrans that came to bear and Grant's interpretation of events were naturally influenced by these. In other words, his recollections, whether influenced by benign subjectivity or overtly distorted to protect his reputation, are bound to be slanted. The over reliance of historians on Grant for the true story is also influenced by other factors: 1)Grant is regarded as the hero (among many incompetents) whose leadership traits won the war and 2) his memoirs are considered a masterpiece of expository writing.
While I might argue that characterizing Grant as deliberately deceitful is a bit too strong, there is merit to Varney's assertion that historians must look deeply critically beyond the conclusions of history as told by participants. Accepting Grant's views, without more analysis and synthesis from other sources, would seem to shortcut the responsibility that historians bear.
This book is especially interesting to me because of some work I did on Henry Halleck. Halleck was a native of the upstate New York village where I live and I wrote a paper on him for the local historical society. As I did my research I found an amazingly consistent view of Halleck -- to paraphrase Varney a "standard" repeated by most historians. These views were overwhelmingly critical and, often like those about Rosecrans, told in negative judgements of a few sentences. I wondered that there must be much more to this man. He served throughout the war in positions of increasing responsibility; he was valued enough by Lincoln to use him as a chief of staff and Grant retained him to good effect when he took over as general in chief. What I found was Halleck had many traits that made him valuable. He was highly effective as an administrator as opposed to as a field general or strategist, but he was in an exceedingly difficult position viz. the Washington political atmosphere, and he had personality aspects that did not endear. When you take the perspective that he was good, but flawed, demonstrably helpful but not utterly essential you have, I think, a fuller, fairer view of him. It seemed to me that historians have adopted a perspective on Civil War generals (the federal ones at least) that if you weren't a hero you were a failure. Moreover, in the popular histories Halleck is a minor character; he doesn't generate more than a superficial and reductive view of his contributions. Perhaps my bias was toward the "hometown" boy, but I do think I made a fairer, more balanced interpretation of Halleck's record. I look forward to Professor Varney's next book when he'll take on Grant's relationships with others including Halleck.
This book is more than just an effort to present a different view of Rosecrans. It poses important questions about how history is written. Varney holds that historians have relied greatly too much on Grant's account, many completely on Grant's memoirs. By implication Grant was not, and should not be seen to be, an objective reporter not because he wasn't present at the events, but because he was. There were personal interactions between Grant and Rosecrans that came to bear and Grant's interpretation of events were naturally influenced by these. In other words, his recollections, whether influenced by benign subjectivity or overtly distorted to protect his reputation, are bound to be slanted. The over reliance of historians on Grant for the true story is also influenced by other factors: 1)Grant is regarded as the hero (among many incompetents) whose leadership traits won the war and 2) his memoirs are considered a masterpiece of expository writing.
While I might argue that characterizing Grant as deliberately deceitful is a bit too strong, there is merit to Varney's assertion that historians must look deeply critically beyond the conclusions of history as told by participants. Accepting Grant's views, without more analysis and synthesis from other sources, would seem to shortcut the responsibility that historians bear.
This book is especially interesting to me because of some work I did on Henry Halleck. Halleck was a native of the upstate New York village where I live and I wrote a paper on him for the local historical society. As I did my research I found an amazingly consistent view of Halleck -- to paraphrase Varney a "standard" repeated by most historians. These views were overwhelmingly critical and, often like those about Rosecrans, told in negative judgements of a few sentences. I wondered that there must be much more to this man. He served throughout the war in positions of increasing responsibility; he was valued enough by Lincoln to use him as a chief of staff and Grant retained him to good effect when he took over as general in chief. What I found was Halleck had many traits that made him valuable. He was highly effective as an administrator as opposed to as a field general or strategist, but he was in an exceedingly difficult position viz. the Washington political atmosphere, and he had personality aspects that did not endear. When you take the perspective that he was good, but flawed, demonstrably helpful but not utterly essential you have, I think, a fuller, fairer view of him. It seemed to me that historians have adopted a perspective on Civil War generals (the federal ones at least) that if you weren't a hero you were a failure. Moreover, in the popular histories Halleck is a minor character; he doesn't generate more than a superficial and reductive view of his contributions. Perhaps my bias was toward the "hometown" boy, but I do think I made a fairer, more balanced interpretation of Halleck's record. I look forward to Professor Varney's next book when he'll take on Grant's relationships with others including Halleck.
October 19, 2018
When I bought this book I was very open to seeing Rosecran’s reputation rehabilitated. I’ve long felt that Civil War historians tend to play favorites. Accounts of the war from the Union side tend to be highly Lincolncentric and Grantcentric; they were the two heroes of the war and they were great men but that doesn’t mean that all their opinions and statements concerning other people were necessarily correct. Nor am I surprised that Varney finds inaccuracies in Grant’s memoirs. Memoirs are notoriously self-serving. I recently finished “Masters and Commanders,” Andrew Roberts’ account of American and British strategy deliberations during World War II. Roberts oftens finds discrepancies between memoirs, including Churchill’s and the contemporaneous record. However in the one instance I was able to check Varney’s research I found he was guilty of the same kinds of distortion he accuses Grant of. The thing in the book that shocked me was his claim that Grant had been ordered by Halleck to come to Rosecran’s aid before the Battle of Chickamauga but culpably failed to do so. Since he relies mainly on the Official Records (OR) and those are now available online I was able to check his references.
I can’t imagine that anyone reading this book would be totally ignorant of the Chickamauga campaign but for clarity’s sake I’ll summarize the background. The battle was fought on September 18-20, 1863. Rosecrans suffered a disastrous defeat at the hands of Bragg’s army. For once a Union army was outnumbered because Bragg had been reinforced by Longstreet’s corp from Lee’s army and it was Longstreet’s attack that shattered Rosecran’s army and led to his dismissal. So any claim that Grant, still in command of the Army of the Tennessee, failed to send aid when ordered to is serious indeed.
On page 182 Varney writes: “As it became apparent that something was stirring in Bragg’s army, Halleck began hastening orders to Grant at Vicksburg, Stephen Hurlbut at Memphis, John Schofield at St. Louis, and Ambrose Burnside at Knoxville, urging each of them to send troops to assist Rosecrans. However, none of the commanders Halleck contacted did a single thing to help.” Here there’s a footnote reference: OR 30, pt. 3, 644. It refers to a dispatch from Halleck to Rosecran warning him that Bragg was probably going to be reinforced by three divisions from Lee’s army and that Sherman and Hurlbut were bringing reinforcements. But it’s dated Sept 15, 1863, three days before the battle. Varney also writes, on page 183, that “By September 14, Halleck was aware that all was not well” and writes to Burnside urging him to reinforce Rosecrans. Varney next goes on for several pages criticising Burnside for not moving for several weeks, although by then the battle was long over. Burnside probably deserves the criticism but it has nothing to do with either Grant or Chickamauga.
Then on page 186 Varney writes: “Nor did Grant provide any more help. On August 25, Halleck had issued orders for Hurlbut, commanding elements of Grant’s Army of the Mississippi, to cover the right flank of the army of the Cumberland. Twenty-six days later, however, nothing had been done. The battle of Chicamauga had been fought and Hurlbut had not budged.”
So now it was August 25, not September 14 when Halleck became alarmed? Here there’s a reference to OR 30, pt. 3, 644. I found nothing relevant on that page so I searched the entire volume for “Hurlbut.” I did find something on page 594, so maybe 694 was a misprint. It was indeed a dispatch from Halleck to Hurlbut ordering him to send all available forces to Corinth and Tuscumbia to operate against Bragg should he attempt to turn Rosecran’s right and further to send to Sherman at Vicksburg for reinforcements. Only the dispatch is dated September 13, not August 25. The dispatch ends with this: “General Grant, it is understood, is sick in New Orleans.” This would have been after his riding accident, which occurred on September 4. He didn’t return to Vicksburg until September 17. This is no doubt why Halleck wrote to Hurlbut rather than Grant. Hurlbut was Grant’s subordinate.
Next I looked for that August 25 dispatch. I found two from Halleck on that date; one was to Burnside directing him to move forward rapidly, the other to Rosecrans, then at Stevenson, Alabama, in response to a telegram in which Rosecrans had asked if Grant could do something to distract Johnston, referring to Joseph E. Johnston, who was in overall command of Confederate forces in the West. To that Halleck replied “Grant’s movements at present have no connection with yours.”
So Varney’s shocking charge that Grant was ordered to send help to Rosecrans when his army was in a perilous situation but did nothing for nearly a month vanishes upon examination. The reference to Halleck’s supposed August 25 order to Hurlbut seems to be a deliberate attempt at obfuscation. It appears that it was no earlier than September 13 that Halleck became aware of Bragg being reinforced and that Rosecrans might need more troops. But on that date Grant was still laid up in New Orleans and Halleck was communicating with Hurlbut instead.
Varney accuses Grant of manipulating the historical record, destroying evidence and even perjury. But he’s not above massaging the facts himself. There may be nuggets of truth in his book but after that exercise I wouldn’t rely on anything he says.
November 11, 2018
As my Civil War readings wind down, I found this book's premise to be intriguing: how our view of history can be and often is determined by singular and biased sources. Most who study history have an awareness of biases and prejudices that potentially exist, particularly in first-hand accounts. In this book, the author uses primary source documents to reveal how this played out with iconic figure Ulysses Grant. This first volume explores how Grant and others let their personal grievances against General William Rosecrans shade how future students view both Rosecrans and Grant militarily and personally. Meticulously researched, the book shows a willful intent by Grant to distort the public record of events both at the time and later when he wrote his memoirs. In fact, the author analyzes several other author/historian accounts and finds that Grant's "Memoirs", written twenty years after the war, is the only source for many of their negative attitudes and assertions against Grant's enemies and that those same authors never bothered to check that source (Grant) against official records or primary source documents. They simply took him at his work two decades after the fact. To be clear, this isn't a Monday morning quarterbacking of decision-making or character study. Instead, it's a well-researched and logically-argued position that Grant was intentionally misleading in his official war correspondence and later memoirs in order to both make himself look better in hindsight and to denigrate a subordinate with whom he had a personal grievance. It's a great example of the well-known axiom "history is written by the winners". There seems to be ample evidence that Grant engaged in this deliberate smear campaign, and the author organizes each chapter thoughtfully in presenting the evidence. Even for someone who routinely questions the motives, biases, and truthfulness of authors and historic figures as I do in order to get the most unbiased views, this book still provides additional avenues for critique and examination in dealing with the historical record. Highly recommended.
April 6, 2023
The author has done an incredible job of bringing the truth of history to light. Even for the well-read historian, it is hard to comprehend how wrong, what we think we know can be. The author lays out in the simplest manner, with irresistible argument, that what we think we know of U.S. Grant is not history, but propaganda pushed and promoted by Grant himself, as well as his sycophants. Grant's corruption while president is well known, though usually it is glossed over as a lack of oversight, rather than seeing it for what it is... the actions of a deeply flawed man.
After reading this, you will never see Grant in the same light.
I could not put it down. I read it in less than 24 hours, and have begun Mr. Varney's second volume.
After reading this, you will never see Grant in the same light.
I could not put it down. I read it in less than 24 hours, and have begun Mr. Varney's second volume.
December 19, 2019
This dense little book advances an essential consideration when confronting the legacy of U.S. Grant - his gross propensity for softening, altering, and fabricating the historical record to meet his ends. In this expansive study, Frank Varney utilizes the case of Grant's smearing of William Rosecrans to illustrate how willing Grant was to obfuscate and lie to advance his own agenda.
May 12, 2023
Ponderous and detailed, but well written. I enjoyed the perspective of how the author thoroughly researched the relationship and war actions of Rosecrans and Grant. I felt at times that I was in a courtroom or defending a thesis. It is a new perspective and it lends credence that not every hero is squeaky clean.
November 21, 2022
a perfect example of how to do historical research.
April 11, 2016
This is a book about complicated men. Grant was a solid general who ended up leading the Union armies to victory. Along the way he propped up his favorites (normal stuff) but eviscerated his enemies. Grant played favorites and punished enemies, but there was no one in all the world he hated more than Rosecrans. It was because Rosecrans had an independent streak, and Grant valued subordination. It is why he ranked Johnston highly. He did what he was supposed to do. Lee on the other hand actually beat Grant many times. So Grant insulted his abilities. Don't believe me? Grant was going to sack Meade but on their first meeting Meade subordinated himself. Grant wrote that he was more impressed by this than the victory at Gettysburg. That's right ladies and gentlemen, he thought Meade's greatest hour was not winning the biggest and bloodiest battle ever fought in the western hemisphere.
But enough of this, why praise this book? It is after all only for adepts. Its arguments are at times pedantic, detailed, and it is sometimes too quick to praise Rosecrans. Yet, what can we say for a man who only lost one battle, and that battle ended up being one of the most barren victories in human history? Rosecrans was not a genius, but he was one of the best generals of the war. He was brave, popular, and a master of logistics, maneuver, and strategy. Grant, by contrast, had all these attributes save popularity. Sure he had friends, but his men never loved him. Both men did share similar weaknesses: poor tactics, arrogance, ambition. Perhaps the last two are merely the hallmarks of command. I think Varney might have benefited in discussing something along these lines.
Varney has done yeoman's service here. He has shown Grant at his worst and how he, aided by Stanton, ruined a good man. In the process Civil War history has been written not just by the winners but by the biggest winners among those winners. Complicating the matter is that Grant's most voracious critics were Southern Lost Cause types. They called Grant a butcher, which is equally as false as Grant's denunciation of Rosecrans. It also makes any critique of Grant suspect in the eyes of many.
Yet, the tide might be turning, if ever so slowly. We may come to know Grant closer to what he was, not the idiotic drunken butcher of Lost Cause mythology, but hardly the virtuous military genius of recent hagiography. I doubt it though. Men are rarely attuned to nuance, and we prefer our heroes to be unblemished, or at worst their sins to be secret strengths. We always hope our leaders are competent, or at least good, despite much historical evidence to the contrary. Regardless of my doubts, may the fight continue.
But enough of this, why praise this book? It is after all only for adepts. Its arguments are at times pedantic, detailed, and it is sometimes too quick to praise Rosecrans. Yet, what can we say for a man who only lost one battle, and that battle ended up being one of the most barren victories in human history? Rosecrans was not a genius, but he was one of the best generals of the war. He was brave, popular, and a master of logistics, maneuver, and strategy. Grant, by contrast, had all these attributes save popularity. Sure he had friends, but his men never loved him. Both men did share similar weaknesses: poor tactics, arrogance, ambition. Perhaps the last two are merely the hallmarks of command. I think Varney might have benefited in discussing something along these lines.
Varney has done yeoman's service here. He has shown Grant at his worst and how he, aided by Stanton, ruined a good man. In the process Civil War history has been written not just by the winners but by the biggest winners among those winners. Complicating the matter is that Grant's most voracious critics were Southern Lost Cause types. They called Grant a butcher, which is equally as false as Grant's denunciation of Rosecrans. It also makes any critique of Grant suspect in the eyes of many.
Yet, the tide might be turning, if ever so slowly. We may come to know Grant closer to what he was, not the idiotic drunken butcher of Lost Cause mythology, but hardly the virtuous military genius of recent hagiography. I doubt it though. Men are rarely attuned to nuance, and we prefer our heroes to be unblemished, or at worst their sins to be secret strengths. We always hope our leaders are competent, or at least good, despite much historical evidence to the contrary. Regardless of my doubts, may the fight continue.
October 22, 2025
This book knocked my socks off. I always admired the Army of the Cumberland, and appreciated Rosecran’s leadership from Rich Mountain to Stones River to Tullahoma to Chickamaugua Day One. An underrated Civil War General for sure. And I also have very much admired Grant (see Bonekemper on Grant). But I never stopped to think how Grant (among others) created a less-than-honest record about Rosecrans, starting with Iuka and especially after Chickamaugua Day Two. The authors dives DEEP and comes up with pearls. In the end, though, Rosecrans just had bad luck regarding the mixed orders on Day Two. This is a massive “what if” that I hadn’t fully appreciated before this book. If those orders weren’t mixed up, and Day Two went a lot like Day One, with Rosecrans holding the line in Chickamaugua, then EVERYTHING CHANGES. Grant doesn’t come East to rescue Chattanooga, Sherman doesn’t lead the Atlanta campaign and March to the Sea. If instead Rosecrans then weaves his way to Atlanta — which he might have done better than Sherman — then he moves upstairs and leads the whole Army as Lt General. He takes Richmond in a different way. And probably becomes President. I hadn’t really thought of Grant in Machiavellian terms, but the author gets me there. Grant buried Rosecrans for Grant’s own ambitious purposes. That just makes him as human as the other Union Generals who were each and all vying for approval and promotion. And Grant’s Memoirs, the most highly acclaimed memoirs of them all, contain, the author here reveals, biases, mistakes, and flaws. Not even first-person accounts by the chief actors on the stage are fully reliable. In the end, though, this book doesn’t decrease my admiration for Grant. And some of the book is quite picky as the author gets a little too obsessed with his thesis, thus the 4 not 5 stars. I am very glad I read this book, which I found sitting on an out of the way table at Fort Monroe. This is great reading for the advanced Civil War buff.
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