Recollections of the Civil War

Early in 1863 General Grant was under a cloud, blamed for heavy Union losses at Shiloh, called an undependable drunkard by his detractors. As Grant moved toward Vicksburg, the Lincoln administration needed to know more about what was happening in the remote western theater. Secretary of War Edwin Stanton dispatched a respected newspaperman, Charles A. Dana, ostensibly to straighten out payroll matters but actually to observe Grant and the situation in the army and report back daily. Dana be...