A Large Regular

"The caricature of Lee as elegant and faultless whereas Grant was a clumsy butcher misses the point that Grant had the much harder task: he had to whittle down the Confederate army and smash it irrevocably, whereas Lee needed only to inflict massive pain on the northern army and stay in the fight for another day."

"The major victories of Sherman, Sheridan, and Thomas in 1864-65 would occur under Grant's direct supervision, yet he is frequently denied credit for his overall effort of the Union war effort. His epic confrontation with Lee in 1864-65 was just one facet of his farsighted leadership. 'Grant's strategy embraced a continent: Lee's a small state,' wrote Sherman. 'Grant's logistics were to supply and transport armies thousands of miles, where Lee was limited to hundreds.'"

"The South understood the portentous meaning of Grant's promotion to lieutenant general: the North would have a fearless, aggressive commander who would ferociously exploit the North's full resources in manpower and material...

Still his failure to pursue [Robert E.] Lee after Gettysburg revealed that [George] Meade was not a bold, enterprising leader in the mold of either Grant or Lee." - Grant by Ron Chernow

Ulysses S. Grant was the first person to hold that rank since George Washington. It wasn't lightly given.

Who knew? Currently reading the book Grant by Ron Chernow and learned a new bit of history about Ulysses S, Grant:

The imperishable story of Grant's presidency was his campaign to crush the Ku Klux Klan. Though the Klan, white supremacists tried to overturn the Civil War's outcome and restore the status quo ante. No southern sheriff would arrest the hooded night riders who terrorized black citizens and no southern jury would convict them. Grant had to cope with a complete collapse of evenhanded law enforcement in the erstwhile Confederate states. In 1870 he oversaw creation of the Justice Department, its first duty to bring thousands of anti-Klan indictments.

Ulysses S. Grant staunch enemy of the Ku Klux Klan and founder of the Justice Department. Who knew?