The year was 1862, America was in the depths of the Civil War.

Looking back, it's easy to believe that a Union victory was inevitable.

The North had more money, more population, more industry, but no one thought that at the time.

In the first year of the war, it looked as if the South would win.

A series of high-profile victories in the East convinced many that Confederates were better fighters

under better leaders. Where would President Lincoln find a battlefield general who could do for

the Union what Robert E. Lee was doing for the Confederacy? Lead it to victory.

The man he found, the man who saved the Union, was Ulysses S. Grant. He wasn't Lincoln's first

choice, or second, or third. In fact, when the war started in 1861, Lincoln had no idea who Ulysses

S. Grant was. Hardly surprising, since at the time Grant was selling hats to farmers' wives in

a small town in Illinois. His rise to glory is one of the most amazing stories in American history.

Born in Ohio on April 27, 1822, Grant had no ambition to be a soldier. His father pushed him into it,

thinking he wasn't suited for much else. Grant's Westpoint career wasn't especially

distinguished either, but during the Mexican-American War, 1846 to 1848, Grant proved himself to be

an officer of unusual ability. He was cool under fire, daring, but rarely reckless. Even more

important, the men under his command trusted him. After that war, Grant returned to St. Louis to

marry his fiance, Julia Dent, the daughter of a slave-owning Missouri farmer. Grant was never

happier than when he was with Julia, and he was never unhappier than when he was not.

Unfortunately, in this period, Army life forced them to be separated, sometimes for many months.

To assuage his loneliness, Grant started to drink, while in a distant posting in Northern

California a thousand miles from Julia, his drinking got the better of him. He resigned his Army

commission to avoid an embarrassing court martial. It was downhill from there, one business venture

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