Tour Stop

Ulysses S. Grant Statue at the intersection of Market Street and Tucker Blvd in St. Louis

Directions: There is a stature of Ulysses S. Grant [ Waypoint = N38 37.643 W90 11.923 ] located in the southwest corner of the intersection of Market Street and Tucker Blvd in St. Louis, Missouri 63102.

Julia Dent Grant

Description: The iconic figure of Ulysses S. Grant has several ties to St. Louis and Missouri. He married Julia Boggs Dent on August 22, 1848. Julia lived at White Haven, her father's plantation, just west of St. Louis. Grant had met Julia while he was stationed at the Jefferson Barracks. Between 1854 and 1858, Grant tried to make a go of it farming at White Haven, but gave it up when he became seriously ill. Next Grant tried real estate in partnership with Julia's cousin, Harry Boggs. But the St. Louis business did not do well enough to support two families, so Grant moved back to Galena, Illinois to work in his father's store. In 1866, Grant would return to St. Louis after the war and purchase White Haven, at which he wanted to breed horses. [54]



Sketch of the building in St. Louis with sign for Boggs and Grant Real Estate Map showing Grant's Farm property location circa 1866

Grant wrote in his personal memoirs how he happened to be in St. Louis, Missouri at the time of the Camp Jackson Affair: [55]

The [Illinois] legislature authorized the governor to accept the services of ten additional regiments. I had charge of mustering these regiments into the State service. They were assembled at the most convenient railroad centres in their respective congressional districts. I detailed officers to muster in a portion of them, but mustered three in the southern part of the State myself. One of these was to assemble at Belleville, some eighteen miles south-east of St. Louis. When I got there I found that only one or two companies had arrived. There was no probability of the regiment coming together under five days. This gave me a few idle days which I concluded to spend in St. Louis.

Ulysses S. Grant, Brigadier General, Federal Volunteers

As a Brigadier-General of Federal Volunteers, Ulysses S. Grant would lead a force of about 3,000 Federal volunteers in the Battle of Belmont near Belmont, Missouri. Grant had set down the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois intending to attack the Confederates at Columbus, Kentucky. When Grant learned that the Confederate forces had crossed over to Missouri, he landed on the Missouri side and attacked them near Belmont, Missouri. Grant's volunteers overran the Confederate camps, but the enemy was able to counterattack and drive Grant's forces back to the river. Grant was able to successfully extricate most of his men to safety. After all of his men had gotten back on the transports, Grant later described how he was the last man aboard the transports: [56]

Our men, with the exception of details that had gone to the front after the wounded, were now either aboard the transports or very near them. Those who were not aboard soon got there, and the boats pushed off. I was the only man of the National army between the rebels and our transports. The captain of a boat that had just pushed out but had not started, recognized me and ordered the engineer not to start the engine; he then had a plank run out for me. My horse seemed to take in the situation. There was no path down the bank and every one acquainted with the Mississippi River knows that its banks, in a natural state, do not vary at any great angle from the perpendicular. My horse put his fore feet over the bank without hesitation or urging, and with his hind feet well under him, slid down the bank and trotted aboard the boat, twelve or fifteen feet away, over a single gang plank. I dismounted and went at once to the upper deck.

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