Friday, September 20, 2013

Major General Ulysses S. Grant to Mary Frances Grant, October 16, 1862

Jackson, Tenn.,
October 16th, 1862,

Dear Sister:

I received your letter by due course of mail and expected before this to have answered one of your questions in the shape of an official report; that is the one where you ask me the part I played at the battle of Iuka. When the reports of subalterns come in I will make my report which no doubt will be published and will be a full answer to your question. I had no more to do with troops under General Ord than I had with those under Rosecrans, but gave the orders to both. The plan was admirably laid for catching Price and his whole army, but owing to the nature of the ground, direction of the wind, and General Rosecrans having been so far behind where he was expected to be on the morning before the attack, it failed. In the late battles we have gained such a moral advantage over them however, with Van Dorn and Lovell added, that I do not know but it may have all been for the best.

I have written to Julia to come down here to spend a short time. It will probably be but a short time that she can stay, but so long as I remain here this will be a pleasant place for her. — If the children have not already been sent to Covington I told her to bring them with her. In the last letter I received she said she was about sending them to Covington.

I believe you have now got it all quiet on the Ohio. I hope it will soon be so every place else. It does look to me that we now have such an advantage over the rebels that there should be but little more hard fighting.

Give my love to all at home. Write often and without expecting either very prompt or very long replies.

ULYS.

SOURCE: Jesse Grant Cramer, Editor, Letters of Ulysses S. Grant to His Father and His Youngest Sister, 1857-78, p. 93-4

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