Hello, this is Carl Raymond, host of the Gilded Gentleman History Podcast where every two weeks we journey into corners

light and dark of America's

Gilded Age, Francis Bellepuck

and England's late Victorian

and Edwardian eras.

Throughout most of the 1870s,

Ulysses S. Grant, the 18th president of the United States, was in office.

Ulysses S. Grant surpassed his modest origins in the farmlands of rural Ohio, left to attend West Point, and after a short period in the Army, returned to civilian life. In 1861, shortly after

the beginning of the Civil War, he joined the Union Army and rose to prominence, notably directing

the campaign at Vicksburg in 1863 that gave the Union forces control of the Mississippi River.

Further victories resulted in President Abraham Lincoln honoring Grant with the role of

Commander of the Union Army, which culminated with his showdown with Confederate Commander

Robert E. Lee at Appomattox.

Ulysses S. Grant had led the Union to victory and won the Civil War.

Now a national war hero, he was embraced by the Republican Party and was elected and became

president of the United States in 1869. Grant's story as president at the dawn of the

Gilded Age brings together many influences that combine his humble roots

with his new role, even after the presidency as a player in the dining rooms and the drawing

rooms of New York's Fifth Avenue.

At his side was his wife, Julia, and it was their story together that forms much of the

focus of this episode today.

I could not be more honored to have as my guest today returning guest Ulysses Deats.

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