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would not have had to acquire so much himself at the cost of thousands of lives.
Sherman's own letter to Grant, March 10, 1864, hints this, but with the indulgent voice of friendship: “My only points of doubt were as to your knowledge of grand strategy and of books of science and history; but I confess your common sense seems to have supplied all this.”
There seems no doubt that Grant possessed grand strategy — and none that his tactics remained weak to the end.
Common sense, indeed, was his great weapon; and with this finally came the power of grasping a vast conflict of simultaneous facts, and instantly forming the right judgment of what he must do. Those who saw him for the first time must have been amazed to learn the story of the thirteen torpid years.
He supervised the rations, the equipment, the transportation.
There was not a material need or detail that he did not thoroughly foresee and attend to. An
Boston. Small, Maynard and Company. 1901.
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