All language subtitles for Grant.S01E01.WEBRip.x264-ION10

[tense music]

♪

[birds chirping]

♪

[faint drumming]

[twigs snapping]

♪

[gunshot]

[man grunts]

[gunfire]

[gunshot]

- Rebs!

[gunshots]

[men grunt]

- Rebs!
Coming from the woods!

Rebs!
In the left!

[gunfire]
[all shouting]

♪

[gunfire]

[all shouting]

♪

Rebs!

♪

[horse hooves trotting]

♪

[distant gunfire]

♪

- Hurt bad, private?
- It's only a scratch, sir.

- So you can fight?

♪

Come on now, boys.

Pitch in.
I'm right behind you.

[indistinct shouting]

♪

Everyone has
his superstitions.

One of my superstitions
has always been

when I started to go anywhere
or do anything,

never to turn back or stop

until the thing intended
was accomplished.

- General Grant.
- Sherman.

- We've had the devil's
own day, haven't we?

♪

- Lick them tomorrow though.

♪

- Very few people really
know who Ulysses S. Grant was.

- Today there is this sense
that he's forgotten.

- He's been called
so many things over the years.

- The greatest general
of his time.

- A military genius.

- A bloody butcher.

- A corrupt President.

- A belligerent drunk
who got lucky.

He didn't get lucky.

- Ulysses S. Grant is
this perfectly average,

humble individual from a poor,
hardscrabble background...

- With a lot of hard times
and failures in his life.

- But he's got
this dogged determination

and this bulldog mentality.

- This guy comes
from nothing,

rises to the highest ranks
of the Union army.

- Form your lines!

- Fights bloody,
terrible battles--

- With indomitable will--

- To save the Union.

- To heal his country.

- To lead the nation
towards justice for everybody.

- He's the unheroic hero
of our greatest national epic,

the American Civil War.

- It's truly
an American story,

not only in patriotism
to the nation,

but for the values of who we
are and who we aspire to be.

♪

[dramatic music]

♪

- My family is American
and has been for generations.

♪

At the breaking out of the war
of the revolution,

my grandfather went to join
the Continental Army.

He was present
at the Battle of Bunker Hill.

♪

I was born on the 27th
of April, 1822, in Ohio.

While my father carried
on the manufacture of leather,

I detested the trade.

- Ulys, get in here.

About that colt, offer $20.That's what it's worth.

If old Ralston says no,then you offer 25.

Don't make a mess of it.

♪

- There was Mr. Ralston,

living within a few miles
of the village,

who owned a colt
which I very much wanted.

- [shushes]

[roosters crowing]

Well?

- Pop says I can offer you $20for the colt,

but if you won't take that,I can offer you 25.

♪

- 25 it is, son.

[boys laughing]

- That transaction caused me
much heartburn.

- Ulysses.
- Ulysses.

More like useless.
Useless Grant.

♪

- Grant as a kid showed
no promise for anything.

The local kids called him
Useless Grant

rather than Ulysses Grant.

- Grant doesn't have,
probably, the best childhood

in terms
of an overbearing father.

- Ulysses really
has nothing

in common with his father.

He does not want to follow
in the family business,

does not like the tannery.

He's repulsed by the smell.

He's repulsed
by the sight of blood.

He just doesn't like it,

but what he does like
is horses.

He becomes an avid horseman
at a very young age,

and that's going to be
very helpful down the road.

- I think his father thought,
"What am I gonna do

with Ulysses?"
and so his father is able

to get Grant
an appointment to West Point,

but he'd applied, apparently,
without Grant knowing,

and so when the notice
came of the appointment,

his father says
to Ulysses that,

"You've got the appointment,"

and Grant's response was,
"The appointment to what?"

He goes, "Well, to West Point.
You're going to West Point."

- And Grant said,
"I don't really think so,"

and his father says,
"Yes--yes, you are,"

and he ends up going,

but Grant emphatically
did not want to be a soldier.

- I would have been glad to
have had a railroad collision

or any other accident happen
by which I might have received

a temporary injury sufficient

to make me ineligible
to enter the academy.

Nothing of the kind occurred,
and I had to face the music.

- Sir, there's been a mistake.

See, this says
Ulysses S. Grant.

My name is Ulysses H. Grant.

- You've beenofficially accepted

as Ulysses S. Grant.

- Well, they got that wrong.

- This is the name
that's been submitted.

This is the nameyou shall have.

- Um, yes, sir.

- Let me see that.

Ulysses S. Grant.

Longstreet,this man's name is U.S. Grant.

- A fine appellation
if ever there was one.

- Uncle Sam Grant.

Well, Sam,I'm William Tecumseh Sherman.

This here is James Longstreetof South Carolina.

Call him Pete.

- Pleasure, sir.
- How do you do?

- Welcome to West Point.

- The initials U.S. Grant are
actually a complete accident.

When that name appears,

his fellow cadets immediately
start making nicknames.

United States Grant,
Uncle Sam Grant,

and it's Sam
that sticks with him.

- If you attended West Point,
you were a very, very prime

specimen in the United States
of America at that point.

- Almost all
of the senior generals

of the Civil War on both sides
graduated from West Point.

In the North you had Sherman.

You had McClellan.
You had Sheridan and Meade.

In the South you had
Stonewall Jackson.

You had Longstreet.
You had Jeb Stuart.

You had Robert E. Lee.

Lee was second in his class,
one of the very rare cadets

in history
to have no demerits.

- It was very important
at West Point that Grant

met many of the future generals
of the Civil War.

His intimate knowledge
of their personalities

would fill him with confidence

when he found them on the other
side of the battlefield.

- He was not a model cadet.

He has plenty of demerits.

- He was in the middle
of his class.

As he confessed later on,
he mostly read novels.

- But he was good in math.

He enjoyed the art classes.
He enjoyed mapmaking classes.

- And he excelled
at horsemanship.

He could tame
seemingly any horse.

- Now unfortunately for Grant,
when he graduates,

there were no spots
in the U.S. Cavalry,

and so the best equestrian

in that particular
graduating class

ended up in the infantry.

- I reported for duty at
Jefferson barracks, St. Louis.

At West Point
I had a roommate,

Fred Dent,

whose family resided some five
miles west of the barracks.

I soon found my way out to
White Haven, the Dent estate.

As I found
the family congenial,

my visits became frequent.

[dramatic music]

- The Dents were
a slave-owning family.

They had
approximately 30 slaves.

There's no evidence
that Grant felt discomfort

with the Dents' slaves
at that point.

By his own later admission,
he was not an abolitionist.

Marcia: During Grant's time
in Missouri,

the entire nation found itself

divided over the issue
of slavery.

The United States was engaged
in I would say

kind of a fiction that you
could maintain national unity

if you created a balance
of slave and free states.

- Enslaved black people were
the largest asset of wealth

that we had in this country,
and so many Americans

wanted to maintain
the right of enslavement,

and when I say enslavement,

I'm talking about for the right
to break up families,

for the right to sell
somebody's mother,

somebody's kid away,

for the right
to torture people.

- So the question of slavery

and the atrocities
of the system

was about the direction
that the nation would take

economically but also morally.

- Grant's dad, Jesse, is
a huge anti-slavery advocate.

He's very vocal about
his opinions and his beliefs.

- So Grant would have
been well aware

of the long-simmering
tensions

between slaveholding
and non-slaveholding states.

At West Point he was friends
with slaveholding men,

many who become
some of his closest friends.

Grant certainly was
part of that tension.

[tense music]

♪

- Grant, you haven't yetmet my sister Julia.

Julia, this is Sam,
that is, Ulysses Grant.

♪

- You haven't spoken,
Lieutenant Grant.

- That's our Grant.

You'll find that he canbe silent in several languages.

- Grant, far from looking
for a girlfriend

or looking for a wife
at the time,

was as surprised as anyone
that he had fallen in love.

♪

- However, Julia Dent is
the daughter of a slave owner.

It's gonna create
some dilemmas for Grant.

It's gonna cause
a lot of friction

because Jesse Grant,
anti-slavery.

Frederick Dent,
slave owner.

The families
are very much opposed.

- So Grant has a secret
engagement with Julia,

and they were going
to approach

Colonel Dent about it,

but it's put on hold
indefinitely

as he's called
to the Mexican-American War.

♪

- The thing that led
to the Mexican War

was the westward expansion
of the United States

into Mexican territory

with an incredibly
aggressive foreign policy

to unify the country
all the way to California,

which was the crown jewel
on the west coast.

Mexico stood in the way,
so the army marches in.

Ulysses S. Grant is assigned
as a quartermaster--

that is, a supply officer.

Grant is a spectacular
quartermaster,

incredibly hands-on,

but he is itching
to get into combat.

He is a 25-year-old
West Point graduate

who has an opportunity
to make a name for himself.

[gunfire]

[tense music]

[all shouting at once]

[gunfire]

- To Colonel Garland,

I respectfully protest
against being assigned

the duties of quartermaster...

Boys, load those boxes.

Which removes me
from sharing in the dangers

and honors of service
with my company at the front.

- I need ammunition!
- Yes, sir!

- Come on, guys, mount!
Rush in!

[all shouting]
[gunfire]

♪

[shouting]

- Ammunition!
Ammunition!

Ammo, now!

- Volunteer!
Volunteer!

[booming]

- I volunteer.

- Grant, you'rethe quartermaster.

You don't need to do this.
- You asked for a volunteer.

- I need ammunition!Come on!

- I volunteer.

- We're gonna losethis position

unless we get ammunitionup here now.

♪

[gunfire]

♪

[tense music]

[gunfire]

[all shouting]

♪

- God save you, Grant!

♪

- In the Mexican War,

there's a very
dramatic incident

where Grant rides
on the side of a horse

using the horse as a shield

as he rides
a gauntlet of bullets

to keep these men supplied
in the middle of a battle.

- In the Mexican War Grant
learns a very important lesson

about his own
emotional makeup.

In moments of extreme danger,

when other people
are panicking,

Grant becomes very cool
in a crisis.

He discovers nothing ever
rattled him in battle.

- You want to know

what my feelings
were on the field of battle?

I do not know that I felt
any peculiar sensation.

War seems much less horrible
to persons engaged in it

than to those
who read of the battle.

♪

- Grant watches people die
horrible deaths in battle.

He loses many of his friends,
one after the other,

and so I think
he has a very clear sense

of the costs of war
from the start.

- Many West Point-trained
officers

served together during
the U.S. war with Mexico.

That's where Grant met
Robert E. Lee

for the first time,
Grant as a lower-level officer

but Lee as a major
staff officer.

Lee is a hero during the war.

♪

- The Mexican War ends
in 1848.

We have gotten exactly
what we want,

most of the American
Southwest,

roughly 500,000 square miles
of territory,

all the way
to the Pacific Ocean,

and the question of whether
that land would be

slave or free,
of course,

would raise its ugly head
pretty much every year

after that right up to 1861.

In many ways, the completion
of the United States

from sea to shining sea
leads directly

to the American Civil War.

♪

[horse whinnying]

[dramatic music]

♪

- By the time Grant came
back from the Mexican War,

he had matured,
and Julia was waiting for him,

but Julia's father,
Colonel Dent,

thought she could do better.

He thought that
the military life

would be
very difficult for her.

- Grant eventually won
over Dent

and asked to marry Julia.

- But Grant came from
a strongly abolitionist family

that was horrified
that he was marrying into

this Missouri
slave-owning family,

and when Ulysses and Julia
get married in 1848,

not a single member
of the Grant family is there.

♪

- The first years

of that marriage
are actually quite difficult.

Grant is posted to the
west coast, to Fort Humboldt.

Julia is expecting a child
and is thus unable

to go with him
to the Pacific Northwest.

- When he was separated
from his family,

he missed them terribly,
especially Julia,

and Fort Humboldt
was an isolated,

desolate place to be,

so he really started to suffer
significant melancholy.

♪

- Dear Julia, the mail came

but brought me nothing
from you.

I have only had one letter
from you in three months.

My dear wife, how very anxious
I am to get home once again.

I sometimes get so anxious

to see you
and our little boys,

I'm almost tempted to resign.

Dear Julia,
I do not feel

as if it is possible to endure
this separation much longer.

♪

- Grant gets bored easily
when there's nothing going on.

He gets lonely, and that
is when you start seeing

maybe some problems
with the drinking.

- Thank you, sir.

♪

- When I have nothing to do,

I get blue,

and I have
a natural craving for a drink.

♪

- Captain Grant.

Grant, you know
the rules about drink.

- This is where
all the stories

of Grant's drinking start.

I think there were some times
when he did drink.

It was a story that circulated
among army officers,

and then later it became
an easy thing

for those who vilified him
or wished to to seize on.

It became one of the running
themes of his life.

♪

- Grant, I'm sorry
it's come to this.

You have a choice:

resign or court martial.

♪

[country music]

[horse braying]

[donkey hawing]

♪

- Hey, mister,
you a soldier?

- Uh, n-no, I'm--

- Then why are you wearing
that old soldier's coat?

- It's a good coat,but I'm not a soldier anymore.

- So what are you?

♪

- May I ask who you are?

- Grant, Fred Grant.

- Ulys!

♪

Ulys!

♪

[laughing]

- When Grant arrives back
at White Haven,

it must have been an
absolutely surreal experience.

He hadn't seen his wife,
Julia, in two years.

He hadn't seen his young son,
Fred, in two years,

and he had never even met
his youngest son,

Ulysses Jr.--
his namesake.

- Grant is now very much

lorded over by
his father-in-law,

Colonel Dent,
who is convinced

that his daughter
has married beneath her.

So there's a slow burn
going on in Ulysses Grant.

- Grant wants
to be independent.

He wants to get out
of the main house,

to get away from Colonel Dent,
and so he builds Hardscrabble

on the 60 acres given
by Colonel Dent to Julia.

He's got to clear the land,
clear the wood.

He wants to have his family
in their own home.

That is the independent
streak in him.

[wood splitting]

Julia had absolute trust
in her husband.

He wasn't looking
for fame, fortune.

His ambitions centered
on his family.

He would say,
"You know my weaknesses,

my horses and my children."

- [groans]
- [laughs]

- Grant is now faced

with the challenge
of making a living.

He tried farming.
That doesn't work out so well.

He tries a real estate
business in St. Louis,

but he's not really very good
at collecting rent.

He tries to get a job
as a surveyor,

and he isn't able to get that.

He doesn't really know
what to do.

What's staring him
in the face is poverty.

- I did not want to fly
from one thing to another,

but I was compelled to make
a living for my family.

If nothing else could be done,
I would load a cord of wood

and take it to the city
for sale.

♪

[horse brays]

- Captain Grant?
- Whoa, whoa.

- I served under you in Mexico,
Molino del Rey.

- Oh.

- Hell of a day, sir.
- Yes.

- May I ask
what you're doing, sir?

- Solving the problem
of poverty.

- Sir.

- Many people think that
Grant selling firewood

was beneath him,

but the reality was he was
willing to do whatever it took

to provide for his family.

I think that's the core
of Ulysses S. Grant.

You will encounter hardships.

You will encounter failures,

but you've got
to keep pushing.

You've gotta keep persevering.

[tense music]

- He also, however,
was living

in a kind
of divided household.

He's living with
the Dent slaves,

and Grant grew up in a home
where his own father

was very vocal
in his anti-slavery attitudes.

He is not an abolitionist.

In fact, Grant acquires
from Colonel Dent

a slave,
William Jones,

but he's criticized
by the Dents

and by their neighbors

for working alongside
the slaves in the fields.

- He actually got ridiculed
by some of his neighbors

for being too nice
to his wife's slaves,

that he was not
whipping them enough.

- I don't know why
a black skin

may not cover a true heart
as well as a white one.

- In the late 1850s,
Grant obviously

was already wrestling
with this slavery issue.

- And then this new
political party surfaces,

the Republicans,

and they have
as their platform

not the abolition of slavery

but to stop slavery
from spreading

to new territories
of the United States.

- Slaveholders
don't see it that way,

and they believe that all
Republicans want to end slavery

even in the slaveholding South.

Neither side is happy,
and things start amping up.

- Grant found himself caught
in the crossfire

between the abolitionist Grants
and the slave-owning Dents,

but he had enough reservations
about slavery

that in March 1859

Grant goes to the circuit
court in St. Louis.

- Name, age?
- Jones, William, 34.

- Prices are up.

I've got a friendthat'll get you $1,000 for him.

Are you sure you wantto let him free

when you can make some money?

- Yes.

[dramatic music]

♪

God protect you, William.

♪

- You also, sir.

♪

- Grant sets him free.

When you imagine Grant
restoring freedom

to an enslaved human,

you have to imagine, like,
walking away from your house.

I hate to be
that callous about it,

but you have to imagine
walking away

from the greatest asset

you could possibly have
at a time when you're poor.

You're not gonna
sell the house.

You're gonna walk
away from it.

Uh, it's a tremendous act
of courage.

♪

- So finally in 1860, one year
before the Civil War,

Grant, in what must have felt
like the ultimate humiliation,

goes to his overbearing father
and begs his father for a job

as a clerk in his father's
leather goods store

in Bologna, Illinois.

He is bored and restless.

He seems destined for a life
of complete obscurity.

- During that time
there's an idealistic visionary

from the west
beginning to emerge

with a special kind
of speaking ability,

who could translate
a sort of folksy,

homespun understanding
of American affairs

to the wider public,

and he becomes
the Republican Party's

standard bearer
in the election of 1860,

and that man
was Abraham Lincoln.

♪

- I wanted to see
Mr. Lincoln elected.

Excitement ran high,

and torch-led processions
enlivened the street.

- As the secession
movement gained traction,

Grant was like
many northerners

and a sizeable number
of southerners

who wondered what we could do
to keep the Union together.

He didn't want the Union
to break up.

He thought that
would be a disaster.

- I still had hopes for the
extreme pro-slavery sentiment

to cool down,

but I was mistaken.

- The election
of Abraham Lincoln in 1860

is a direct--
direct assault on the South.

The South is feeling
completely under attack,

that the new government
is going to come in,

and they're gonna take away
all their slaves,

and we're not gonna be
a part of a country

that isn't going to help
preserve our way of life.

Now we've gone and elected
this guy

from out
in the middle of Illinois,

this little know-nothing
lawyer...

♪

And it's on.

- A few days after
Lincoln's election,

South Caroline calls
for a secession convention,

and on December the 20th, 1860,

they pull themselves
out of the Union.

Mississippi and Florida
are the second

and third states to follow.

By February 1861,
seven deep Southern states

have left the union to form
the Confederate States.

Four additional states
will leave after the firing

on Fort Sumter.

- When Southern coastal
states seceded,

they considered all
of the forts property

of the Confederacy.

Obviously
the federal government

didn't see it that way,

and Lincoln said
he would possess,

hold, and occupy
federal property.

The Confederates wanted
the Union soldiers to leave.

They would not, and the South
opened fire to bombard

Fort Sumter into submission.

[explosions]

- The war breaks out,

and the United States
government is desperate

for anyone who's had any kind
of military experience.

- Lincoln calls for
75,000 volunteers

to suppress the rebellion.

- Most people in the North

thought this would be
a short event.

The Union would
win this war quickly

with its military might,

with its railroads,
with its brave soldiers.

- Back in Galena, Illinois,
Grant has a friend,

John Rawlins,
who has received a commission

from the governor
to organize a regiment.

[door closes]

- It's damn suicide,
don't you think?

- I'd give them 90 days,

but then again,
the South can claim

more than half the officers
at West Point,

and I've seen them in Mexico.

Quick on counterattacks,

know the terrain.

Can't underestimate them.

[tense music]

- I'm speaking at
the courthouse later,

hoping to raise
a regiment here.

I'm sure the young menwould respect a soldier

with your experience.
- Mm.

I'm no speaker.

- Oh, hell,

I'm not asking you to speak.

♪

I'm asking you to lead.

♪

[door opens and shuts]

♪

[distant shouting]

- The call of the
President for 75,000 men

was heard throughout
the northern states.

[tense music]

♪

There were
but two parties now,

traitors and patriots.

♪

- We don't see a lot
of expressions of emotion

from Grant until we talk
about the South seceding,

rebelling against
the United States of America.

This--this grinds
at Ulysses S. Grant.

He grows up listening
about his relatives

fighting in the revolution,

and so he is very emotional
about this idea of traitors.

- Dear Father,
my inclination is to whip

the rebellion into submission.

- When Jefferson Davis
is sworn in

as Confederate president,

Grant is so upset by it that
he shakes his fist in the air

and says, "Davis and the whole
gang of them ought to be hung."

♪

- Many people
in the United States

thought that this experiment

that the founding fathers
had put in place

was in fact still
an experiment

and was in jeopardy,

and this notion of fighting
for the Union was tied up

in believing that what
the founders had created

was in fact worth fighting for
and worth saving,

and that's why so many men
were willing

to risk their lives
to fight for the Union.

- Beginning of the war,

we have about
31 million people

in the United States.

About 21 million
live in the North.

About 10 million of them
live in the South,

but in the South about four
million of them are slaves,

so it's really 6 million
against 21 million.

The South is 80% agricultural,
but what do they grow?

Tobacco, cotton,
indigo, rice, corn.

Well, you can only eat
two of those.

From people to manufacturing
to technology,

the North has all
the advantages over the South,

but that doesn't make it
a foregone conclusion

about who will win

because ultimately,
war is a clash of wills,

and in this clash of wills,

maybe, just maybe
the South would win.

♪

- After southern secession,

the federal government

was looking for a commander,

this new Union army

that was going to try
to restore the republic.

The first name
that comes to mind

is Robert E. Lee,
a Virginian.

- Lee was offered
the command of the Union army

and, of course,
did some deep thinking

and then decided
that his allegiance

was to the South and Virginia.

[dramatic music]

- Ulysses S. Grant,
however,

starts the Civil War
as a nobody,

but he gets a big break
when the governor of Illinois

appoints him as commander of
one of the Illinois regiments,

and that will start
his military career again.

- And so having come
from the tannery

and now having this window
of opportunity with this war

to get back in the army,
to take command,

he recognizes that
"I must seize it," and he does.

- Grant comes out
of a series of failures

in his civilian life.

At one point, he has
to literally sell his watch

to buy Christmas presents
for his wife and children,

and now all of a sudden
he's back in uniform.

- Grant comes in
with a firm hand.

He whips this regiment
into shape,

and people start realizing
maybe we've got something here.

- In the military,
he was home again.

There was something
about the way

he unsheathed his sword,
the way he gave orders

that people suddenly
listened to and obeyed.

- Very soon after
the war began,

Grant gets orders to take
his men into Kentucky,

as much for political reasons
as for military reasons.

- Kentucky is one of
four slaveholding states

that will remain
precariously tethered

to the Union
throughout the war.

We called those
the border states.

- Abraham Lincoln
was very concerned

about keeping Kentucky
in the Union.

He said, "To lose Kentucky
is nearly the same

as to lose the whole game."

He thought the other
border states

might follow suit as well.

And then a Confederate army
marched into Kentucky,

so Grant moves as fast as he
can to Paducah, Kentucky.

[tense music]

♪

- Dear Julia,

secession flags
were flying through Paducah

in anticipation
of Southern troops.

Our arrival, therefore, put
quite a damper on their hopes.

♪

- [whispering]
Come away from the window.

Those are Yankees.

♪

- General, it's time.Troops are moving in.

♪

- Citizens of Paducah,
I have come among you

not as your enemy
but as your friend

and fellow citizen,
not to injure or annoy you

but to respect the rights
and to defend

and enforce the rights
of all loyal citizens.

- Grant issues a proclamation
to try to quell civilian fear,

and Abraham Lincoln
takes note.

Lincoln right away saw that
proclamation and recognized,

"Here's a man who understands
people and is plain-spoken,

just like me."

- Grant successfully
occupied Paducah, Kentucky

without a shot being fired,

and so he gets orders
to attack

a Confederate supply link
on the Mississippi River

at the small village
of Belmont.

Belmont is very important.

It's Grant's first real test
of combat in the Civil War.

- My dear Julia,

what you are to look out for
I cannot tell you,

but your husband will never
disgrace you

nor leave a defeated field.

♪

- Captain, flush
these rebels out now.

Go on.
Go.

- Yes, sir.

- Whoo, let them taste this steel!

- Form up!
On me!

[all shouting]

[gunfire]

[all shouting]

- Find the ammunition, boys!

[tense music]

- The Confederates abandoned
their camp,

and these Union forces,
these are guys who just fought

their first battle,
very light casualties,

and so they are euphoric
at this point.

- Grant has won, seemingly,
a significant victory here,

but his troops
lose all discipline.

[horse whinnies]
- Don't mind if I do!

- Show me that blood
on your hands!

[all shouting]

- Hey, boys,
look what I found.

- Captain, control your men!
- Yes, sir!

- Now I can hit them Yankees.

[gunshot]

- Run!

[horse whinnying]

[all shouting]

- Captain,control your men!

- Yes, sir!

- At Grant's first
engagement at Belmont,

the Confederates
counterattacked.

[gunfire]

[all shouting]

- Into the trees!

We cut our way in.
We cut our way out.

- Keep your head down!
- Into the trees!

- They organized
a fighting retreat

north to the riverboats

that were going to give them
their means of escape.

Grant was the last man
to get on board ship.

The boat had already untied

and was starting to drift
out into the river,

and Grant actually
rode his horse

across the gangplank
onto the riverboat.

It was an amazing feat
of horsemanship,

and Grant, in his typical
self-deprecating style,

he gave all the credit
to the horse.

He made some serious mistakes.

He lost control of his men,
but he is learning,

and coming out
of the Battle of Belmont,

he's looking
for the next fight.

[tense music]

- In the early years
of the war

there are really
two distinct theaters.

You have the eastern theater,

where a series of different
Union commanders prove

incapable of really putting
the pressure on the South

that President Lincoln
wants to see,

and then you have
the western theater,

which is where Grant is.

- In that western theater,
the Union's strategy

is going to be

to occupy key transportation
facilities in the west,

open up the entire Mississippi
if they can,

and it was rather simple
to look on a map

where the Confederate
strong points were

and see where
the dominoes might fall.

Grant could plainly see
that the most obvious ones--

the northernmost ones--

were clearly
Forts Henry and Donelson.

They commanded key rivers,

and he could use
those key rivers

to advance directly
into the Confederacy.

- Grant wants to get
this war moving.

He doesn't believe sitting in
garrison is gonna win anything,

so he makes a proposal
to his commander,

General Henry Halleck.

♪

- General Halleck,it's an honor.

- State briefly
the nature of your business.

- My division is stationed
here in Carroll

on the Cumberland River,

where we've been sizing upa naval assault

on two enemy forts,Fort Henry and Fort Donelson.

- Continue.

- Fort Henry is badly sited

and vulnerable from the water.

Fort Donelson is stronger

but commandedby General John Floyd,

and he's no soldier.

I believe if I cantake both forts,

we can advance as faras Nashville and Alabama.

- A combined naval assault?

- The victories wouldbe yours, sir.

- Thank you.

But when I wish
to consult you on a subject,

I will notify you.

[dramatic music]

- Yes, sir.

♪

[door opening and shutting]

♪

- They called Halleck
"Old Brains."

They don't call him
that for nothing.

He wants everything done
absolutely by the book,

and Grant is not
a by-the-book kind of guy.

No limelight, no fanfare,

and forget the pomp
and circumstance.

We're just gonna get it done,
and so the two clash.

Grant,
with his bulldog mentality,

immediately turns to what
I call his naval soul mate,

Andrew H. Foote,

the naval commander
of the western flotilla

with ironclad gunboats.

- So the two of them
jointly made a proposal

to General Halleck
to move against Fort Henry.

- They're begging Halleck,
prodding Halleck.

"Please, turn us loose.
Let us go,"

and it's only by
the slimmest margins

that Halleck allows
Grant to attack.

- It's very different
to be in charge.

Command is
an extraordinary privilege

and the weight
of responsibility

is very much on your shoulders,

and Grant experiences this
as he approaches Fort Henry.

[tense music]

- So February the 6th,

Foote's gunboats begin
to shell Fort Henry.

- The infantry's gonna get
behind each fort,

seal in
the Confederate defenders

while the navy just pummels
Fort Henry into submission.

- Most of the Confederates
had already evacuated.

Fort Henry surrenders
before Grant's men

even get close to the fort.

The capture of Fort Henry
was significant,

but Grant is not gonna sit
and rest on his laurels.

Fort Donelson was only
about 12 miles to the east.

He keeps the ball moving.

- Grant's thinking,
"All I have to do is say boo,

and they'll--
they'll surrender,"

and, um, it doesn't
really happen that way.

[booming]

- Fort Donelson was in
a much better position,

much better engineered
than Fort Henry.

An artillery duel began between
the fort and his gunboats,

and in short,
the fort won.

- The Confederates came out
of the fort to counterattack...

[all shouting]

And the first thing
Grant does is not panic.

That's a pattern with Grant.

No matter what happens,

no matter how bad it gets,
Grant doesn't panic.

- In the midst of the battle,

which is truly chaotic,

Grant keeps his wits
about him.

He actually thinks.

He can take input.
He can change his mind.

- At Fort Donelson,
Grant will figure out

these Confederates are moving
with their knapsacks.

They're not intending
on going back.

They're getting out of here.

[booming]

[all shouting]

[gunfire]

[booming]

- Bring me that prisoner.
Show me his bag.

This looks like
two days' rations...

No, three.

- Looks likethey're settling in

to hold their position.

- Looks like that,
but it's a retreat.

Three days of rations is just
enough to get to Nashville.

- Sir, we should reinforce theright and wait till nightfall.

- If we wait,
they'll have time to escape.

We got to attack now,
and we can take this victory.

Form your lines.

- Sir.

Form your lines!

Form your lines!

[booming]

- Prepare to advance!

[dramatic music]

♪

[booming]
[horse whinnying]

[all laughing]

[booming]

- They want an armisticeand terms for surrender.

We've broken their defenses,
surrounded the fort,

and outnumber themalmost two to one.

It's checkmate.

- Who signed the note?
- General Buckner.

- Oh, Buckner.

I know him
from West Point.

He paid off one of my debts
back in New York.

Saved me, really.

Helped me get back
to my family.

- Then what are your terms?

- Immediate
and unconditional surrender,

or we fire on their works.

[tense music]

- At Fort Donelson, Grant
had organized a counterattack.

The Confederates withdrew back
into the fort,

and they're trapped.

- When Grant
got the message,

"Hey, I want to talk
about surrender,"

the Confederate command
situation at Fort Donelson

had been an absolute
comedy of errors.

There had been three general
officers inside Fort Donelson,

John Floyd,
Gideon Pillow,

and Grant's old friend,
Simon Bolivar Buckner.

But when the idea comes
to surrender, Floyd says,

"There is nobody
in the Confederacy

that they want worse than me,"

and so he says,
"I'm not surrendering,"

and he'll get out of Dodge.

The second in command
is Gideon Pillow.

He thinks he's the greatest
military commander ever,

and Pillow says,

"They want me as well,
so I'm not surrendering,"

so he gets out as well,
turning the command over

to the third in command,
Simon Buckner.

- Surrender
was the proper thing.

I rode to Buckner's
headquarters.

[door opening]

[door closing]

General Buckner.

- You would not have
taken the fort so easily

if I'd been in command.

- You're right.

I would havedone it differently.

I assume Floydand Pillow got away.

- Last night,
yellow bastards.

Pillow feared
you'd want him prisoner.

- In my humblest opinion,he's more valuable to me

as a Southern general.

- Well, here we are,
old friend.

- Here we are.

- About the terms you sent.

- No terms.

Immediate andunconditional surrender...

Old friend.

[tense music]

♪

- The first real victory
for the United States

occurred at Fort Donelson
in February of 1862

courtesy of Ulysses S. Grant.

U.S. Grant.

Useless Grant became
Unconditional Surrender Grant,

and that thrilled
the northern population.

It was big news
because nothing good

had been happening
for the Union in the war.

- In the eastern theater
of the war,

Lincoln is dealing
with one whining,

procrastinating general
after another,

but here's
this Ulysses S. Grant

out west who's
winning battle after battle,

and Lincoln is thrilled.

He rushes to sign the order
promoting Grant

to major general.

- The first significant
Northern victory

of the Civil War will launch
Grant to national prominence.

During the aftermath of
the Battle at Fort Donelson,

a war correspondent
painted a picture of Grant

mounted on horseback,

and in his mouth
is the stub of a cigar.

As this was the first great
Northern victory

of the Civil War, fans--

admirers--
sent him 5,000 cigars,

and so he started
smoking these things,

and Grant would smoke
upwards of 20 of these a day.

- For Grant,
the first year goes good.

If there's a rookie
of the year for the Union side,

it's Ulysses S. Grant.

Nobody's wining
the victories like he is.

- He realized again that
he had a gift for this.

He was very, very good
at battlefield command,

and then beyond that,

at battlefield strategy
and tactics.

- Grant has captured the first
of three armies

that he will capture
over the course of the war,

and he has now opened
the Cumberland River

so Union naval forces
and land forces

can make their way south deep
into the Confederacy.

- Dear Julia,

soon I hope
to move from here,

and when I do,
there will probably

be the greatest battle
fought of the war.

I have no doubt of the result.

- Yah, yah!
Ha!

- The enemy was
in force in Corinth,

the junction of the two
most important railroads

in the Mississippi Valley.

If we obtained possession
of Corinth,

the enemy would have
no railroad

for the transportation
of armies or supplies.

- Grant is thinking,
"How do I stay two steps ahead?

"How do I retain
the initiative?

How do I keep the enemy
reacting to me?"

The war in the east
is going badly,

so everything
is under a microscope,

but in the west,
with the first big victories

at Forts Henry and Donelson,

now all of a sudden
the Tennessee

and Cumberland Rivers are open
to invade the South,

and this is what
Grant seizes upon.

- Knowing that the enemy's
fortifying Corinth

and collecting an army there,

I at once put all
the troops in motion

for Pittsburg Landing.

[tense music]

- Pittsburg Landing
is a staging area

to attack at Corinth.

General Halleck warns Grant,

"Don't bring on an engagement.
Don't start anything.

Don't pick a fight
until everything is ready."

- The army had arrived
with one of Grant's

core commanders,
William Tecumseh Sherman.

Sherman was a friend
of Grant's at West Point,

but they had not worked
together before,

and many of Grant's men
were absolutely green.

Some had just received their
weapons a few days earlier.

So Grant's intention is to get
his men some training

and wait there
for another Union army

under the command
of Don Carlos Buell

to get there
and then set out to Corinth.

- So the idea
of fighting a battle

never enters Grant's mind

at Pittsburg Landing,
and the scene is set

for what would become
this bloodbath of Shiloh.

♪

[indistinct chatter]

- Sir, do you wantthe new men digging trenches?

- I don't intend
to be here long enough.

The men are raw.

They need practice with guns,
not with shovels.

Sherman.

- Sam.
- Activity?

- The Rebsstick their noses out,

and we keep slapping them.

Whipped themin a skirmish yesterday.

- And General Buell's men?
- They're three days out.

- We'll move on Corinth
when he gets here.

- If we go down here--

- Yeah.
- The whole way down--

- To General Halleck,
the temper of the rebel troops

is such that there
is little doubt that Corinth

will fall much more easily
than Fort Donelson did.

- Grant's major fault early
in the war

is this overconfidence.

He thinks,
"If anything happens,

I'm gonna start it,"
and it comes back to bite him.

- Their commander at Corinth,

General Albert
Sidney Johnston,

has been doing nothing
but retreat.

If he cannot regain the
initiative and defeat Grant,

it likely will mean

the Confederacy will lose
the Mississippi River.

Johnston really believes that
the war itself

may be at stake,

so Johnston decides to organize
a counterattack against Grant.

- Johnston knows that Grant's
army's tucked up

into Pittsburg Landing,

which is a cul-de-sac
along the Tennessee River

in between two major creeks.

It seems like a good place
to camp the army.

There are good springs here.

There are creeks.
We can get water.

It's good,
level camping ground,

but the Confederate plan
is to trap the Union army

in this cul-de-sac

and to destroy the Union army
with one massive attack.

[tense music]

And so Johnston gambles,
and he says,

"We must roll
the iron dice of battle.

We must conquer or perish."

[thunder cracking]

[rain pattering]

- Grant's camp
at Pittsburg Landing

was right near
a small wooden church.

[dramatic music]

It's one of the only landmarks
in the entire vicinity.

♪

It was called Shiloh Church.

Shiloh is translated
as "place of peace."

♪

[tense music]

♪

[gunshot]

[man grunts]

♪

[gunshot]
- Rebs!

- Fire!
[gunfire]

- Rebs!

We got them from the woods!
Rebs!

[gunfire]

- In the woods!

[all shouting]
- Rebs in the woods!

[gunfire]

- Rebs!

They're coming from the woods!

- Rebs in the woods!
- Rebs!

[all shouting]

- Wait, wait, what?

- Move, move!

- [breathing heavily]

[all shouting]

[gunfire]

♪

- Report.

- Skirmishes, sir.That's all.

[gunfire]

- These are not
damn skirmishes.

My God, we are attacked.
Form a line and hold it.

[booming]

[all shouting]

[gunfire]

- Ammunition!

- Grant is not at Shiloh.

Grant is actually
having breakfast 9 miles north

in his quarters
at the Cherry Mansion.

♪

[booming]

- Gentlemen...

the ball is in motion.

[tense music]

- Fire!
[booming]

[indistinct chatter]

- Let's get
these boys moving.

Form them into regiments.

I don't care what regiments
they used to be in.

Make new ones.

- Yes, sir.

- Come on, boys,
form up!

On me!
- Form up, regiment two.

Fall in!

- Buell won't get here
till nightfall,

and Wallace is still
six miles north.

- Order Wallace to come hereat once with his men.

Sherman?
- No news.

♪

- On the first day
of the Battle of Shiloh,

about 40,000
Confederate soldiers

surprise the Union army
and begin pushing forward.

It is the largest attack
in American history

up to that time.

- When Grant finally got
to Pittsburg Landing,

officers didn't know
where their men were.

Their men didn't know
where the units were.

- Grant immediately begins
to assess the situation,

and it's almost as
if battle clarified his mind,

and he could see the central
thing he needed to do,

to remain calm,

to collect soldiers who have
straggled back into the area,

and begin to plug
this defensive line.

[hooves clopping]

[tense music]

♪

[horses whinnying]

- Hurt bad, Private?

- It's only a scratch, sir.

- So you can fight?

♪

Come on now, boys.

Pitch in.
I'm right behind you.

[booming]

- Grant makes his way
around the battlefield,

not caught up in the chaos,

thinking,
"Where are my commanders?

What's their assessment of
the fight and how it's going,

and what can I do
to assist them?"

- If Pittsburg Landing falls,
Grant knows his army is gone.

- If the Confederate plan
is to trap the Union army

in this cul-de-sac
along the Tennessee River,

then Grant will utilize
this trap perfectly

to fight a delaying action
to hold out

until Don Carlos Buell's
reinforcements arrive.

He has a whole division
under Lew Wallace much nearer,

and as he goes around

and he talks to the different
division commanders

throughout the day,
he will tell them,

"Hey, Lew Wallace
is on the way.

Should be here any moment now."

♪

- There's confusion

and incoherence
on the battlefield,

but Grant had enormous
control of his emotions,

so his physical courage,
this quiet competence,

and he was a great horseman
in a day and age

when that was
a very important skill

to have on the battlefield.

- A number of attempts
were made by the enemy

to turn our right flank
where Sherman was posted.

General Sherman, situation?

- General.

The boys bounced,
but they didn't break.

I need reinforcements now.
Where's Buell?

- No Buell.

I've sent for Wallace.Can you hold your position?

- Yes, sir, but it'll cost.

- At the Battle of Shiloh
Sherman and Grant,

while they had never been what
you would call good friends,

they will first
come into their own

as this wonderful duo
who will turn out to be

one of the great working
partnerships of the war.

While so many other fragments
of that Union army

dissolve in panicked retreat,

Sherman slows
the Confederate onslaught.

- Nevertheless,
Grant knew that he may need

that division of Lew Wallace's
to survive this fight,

but there's great confusion
with Wallace's division

on how they should get
to the battlefield,

and Wallace does not show up.

As the Confederates
move forward,

the fighting became more
and more constricted.

It becomes a very chaotic,
brutal fight,

and Grant recognizes
that at points of chaos

when everything
is going wrong,

you just simply have to do
something to regain control.

- Grant is not gonna give up.
He's gonna stick and fight.

[booming]

♪

- Lieutenant.
- General Grant, sir.

- Move your men to the left,Lieutenant.

Do it now.
- Yes, sir.

[booming]

♪

- Take cover!
There's too many of them!

[gunfire]

[all shouting]

[tense music]

♪

[gunfire]

♪

- [sentinel grunts]

♪

[gunshot]

♪

[screaming]

- Contrary to all my
experience up to that time,

we were on the defensive.

The endeavor of the enemy

was simply to hurl
their men against ours

with a disregard of losses
on their own side.

- Grant realized
he needed to buy time,

or his army was about
to be overwhelmed.

- Shiloh,
the first day doesn't go well,

but in the chaos, noise,
the friction that we know

is inherent in a battlefield,

nobody gets it right initially.
Nobody.

Grant is able to learn
through hard experience,

and he has this vision
of how it's gonna turn out

in spite of all
that's going bad around him.

- Grant is already thinking
to fall back gradually,

holding successive lines
of defense,

basically trading space
for time to hold out

until our reinforcements
arrive.

- And so orders went out
to all his division commanders

to hold their positions,
as Grant put it,

"at all hazards."

- What is it?

- General Prentiss
surrendered.

2,000 soldiers.

[tense music]

♪

- Move the artilleryto the high ground.

Start the barrage at nightfall.

Have the navy chipin from the river.

- I'll telegraph Porter.

♪

- Grant on the battlefield
does not appear

to let the demons
of failure enter.

He's already been there.
He's a fighter.

That's one of the things
he brought to any army

he was in command of,
was that sense of endurance,

the sense that this isn't
going to be easy.

"I'm not looking
to win it in a day."

[booming]

- Grant has been falling back
throughout the day,

and the Confederate commander,
Albert Sidney Johnston,

wades into the battle himself

because he's gotta conquer
or perish,

and all of a sudden Johnston
is hit in the back of the leg,

and he bleeds to death.

He doesn't conquer.
He perishes.

- Johnston's second
in command,

Pierre Gustave
Toutant Beauregard,

took over,
and Beauregard believed

they had the Union army right
where they wanted them,

but Grant used the terrain
extraordinarily well.

His men constructed
this defensive line

along this deep ravine.

The Confederates have to go
down into this ravine.

They make one charge
up out of the ravine

into this whirlwind of Union
artillery and musket fire.

They are driven back
by this intense fire.

Orders start to echo down
the Confederate line

that we're done.
Stop the attack.

♪

Beauregard stopped the fight.

"We'll finish this up
in the morning."

Grant,
sitting on horseback

watching as the Confederates
fell back into the ravine,

said, "Not beaten yet
by a damn sight."

- Grant, with
this dogged determination,

he thinks that nobody
can beat him.

- By the time
darkness falls, yes,

it's been a bad day
for the Union army,

but they haven't been
pushed off Pittsburg Landing.

They're still holding on
to that strip of ground,

and what's more,
across the river

Don Carlos Buell
is finally starting to arrive

and there are federal gunboats
out on the river whose shells

are keeping the Confederates
at bay in the darkness.

- But there were a number of
Union officers coming to Grant

that night saying,
"Let's get out of here."

- Grant is almost
defeated on the first day,

almost driven back
into the river,

and this is where you see Grant
at his most indomitable,

in a sense--most determined,
most imperturbable.

He is under a tree.

He can hear
the cries of the wounded,

and Sherman comes
out of the dark.

♪

- General Grant.
- Sherman.

♪

- Well, Sam, we've had
the devil's own day,

haven't we?

♪

- Lick them tomorrow though.

- When Wallace
and Buell turn up?

♪

- They asked memy plan to retreat.

♪

I'll fire the first gunin the morning.

[tense music]

- On the second day
of battle,

I gathered out parts

of regiments
from troops nearby

and marched them forward.

♪

- Grant knew his army
was disorganized.

They had spent a full day

carrying out
this brutal fight,

but he also suspected
the Confederates

were in the same condition,

and so he believed
whoever seizes the initiative

in the morning
will indeed be the victor.

So orders went out to all
his division commanders

at first light,
"begin the attack.

Wherever you are with whoever
you have, begin the attack."

- Find another commander
at Shiloh

that's gonna attack on day two.

Everybody else is thinking,

"Oh, my goodness,
there's no way."

I think that Grant
looks at this equation

differently than
everyone else.

Grant, who's failed and had
to look at the dark side

of how to be resilient,

I think it gives him
an extra source of strength

that most other commanders

don't have the ability
to tap into.

- He had the gift
of being able

to take in a landscape,
a map,

and know almost at once
what needed to be defended,

what couldn't be defended,

and what Grant
had seen at Shiloh

was that the Confederates

had exhausted
their last energy

just in getting as far
as they had.

Grant had seen that
if in the night Buell's troops

could be ferried over

and Grant's army
could be rallied

and somehow reorganized
and put back into position

for a counterattack
the next morning,

then the Confederate army
itself would collapse.

- Grant was determined
to stay and fight.

Everything he's learned
came into play

in making that decision.

That's the point
where Grant becomes Grant.

[dramatic music]

- This day everything is
favorable for the Union side.

We have now become
the attacking party.

- Move along!

[tense music]

♪

- Advance along!

[all shouting]

[gunfire]

[booming]

[all shouting]

[tense music]

♪

[all shouting]

[distant gunfire]

- The enemy was driven
back all day,

as we had been the day before.

- It was another brutal day

of fighting over much
of the same ground,

but by 2:00 in the afternoon

Confederate commander
Beauregard

ordered a withdrawal
back to Corinth.

♪

- The battle is over,
and it is,

technically speaking,
a victory for the Union army.

It's a victory which has been
won at terrible prices.

- Huge casualties.

25,000 killed,
wounded, and missing.

This was the first time
in American history

that we've seen this.

The armies in the revolution
and the War of 1812

are smaller than
the casualty count at Shiloh.

- I saw an open field
on the second day

so covered with the dead

that it would have
been possible

to walk across the clearing
stepping on dead bodies

without a foot
touching the ground.

♪

[thunder rumbling]

- Shiloh itself means
"place of peace."

Shiloh, for two days,

was anything
but a place of peace.

Shiloh is incredibly important
as the place where our country

woke up to the reality
of what it had signed up for.

It was as if
from the battlefield

a metaphorical postcard
went home to America,

and it said,
with a picture of the dead,

"This is what
you've signed up for."

It forced us to wake up.

It forced us to grow up.

It forced us to realize
that this was going

to be much harder
than anybody had imagined.

♪

- Up to the Battle of Shiloh,
I believed that the rebellion

would collapse
suddenly and soon...

♪

But after Shiloh I gave up
all idea of saving the Union

except by complete conquest.

[flies buzzing]

♪

After Shiloh,
I was no longer boss.

Lincoln was right.Vicksburg is the key.

The art of war
is simple enough.

Find out where
your enemy is...

[all shouting]
[booming]

Strike him as hard as you can,
and keep moving on.

- You'll go after Lee.

You'll go after him
until he's finished.

- [man breathing heavily]
[gunshot]

- It all depends on you.

- [man screaming]