HIS ANCESTRY
This hero of ours was of an excellent ancestry. Until lately, most
Americans have been careless of preserving their family records. That
they were Americans and of a respectable line, if not a distinguished
one, for two or three generations back, was as much of family history as
interested them, and all they really knew. This was especially true of
families which had emigrated from place to place as pioneers in the
settlement of the country. Family records were left behind, and in the
hard desperate work of life in a new country, where everything depended
on individual qualities, and forefathers counted for little in the
esteem of men as poor, as independent, and as aspiring as themselves,
memories faded and traditions were forgotten. It was esteemed a
condition of the equality which was the national boast that no one
should take credit to himself on account of distant ancestry. Not until
Abraham Lincoln had honored his name by his own nobility did anybody
think it worth while to inquire whether his blood was of the strain of
the New England Lincolns.
All that was known of the Grants in Ohio was that Jesse, the father of
Ulysses, came from Pennsylvania. Jesse himself knew that his father, who
died when he was a boy, was Noah Grant, Jr., who came into Pennsylvania
from Connecticut, and he had made some further exploration of his
genealogical line. But this was more than his neighbors knew or cared to
know about the family, until a son demonstrated possession of
extraordinary qualities, which set the believers in heredity upon making
investigation. The Grants are traced back through Pennsylvania to
Connecticut, and from Connecticut to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, where
Matthew Grant lived in 1630. He is believed to have come from Scotland,
where the Grant clan has been distinguished for centuries on account of
its sturdy indomitable traits and its prowess in war. The chiefs of the
clan had armorial crests of which the conspicuous emblem was commonly a
burning mountain, and the motto some expression of unyielding firmness.
In one case it was, "Stand Fast, Craig Ellarchie!" in another, simply
"Stand Fast;" in another, "Stand Sure." Sometimes Latin equivalents were
used, as "Stabit" and "Immobile." It is said that, as late as the Sepoy
rebellion in India, there was a squadron of British troops, composed
almost entirely of Scotch Grants, who carried a banner with the motto:
"Stand Fast, Craig Ellarchie!"
If it be true that our General Grant came from such stock, his most
notable characteristics are no mystery. It was in his blood to be what
he was. Ancestral traits reappeared in him with a vigor never excelled.
But they had not been quite dormant during the intermediate period. His
great-grandfather, Captain Noah Grant, of Windsor (now Tolland), Conn.,
commanded a company of colonial militia in the French and Indian war,
and was killed in the battle of White Plains in 1776. His grandfather
Noah was a lieutenant in a company of the Connecticut militia which
marched to the succor of Massachusetts in the beginning of the
Revolution. He served, off and on, through the war.
Regarding the circumstances of the removal to Pennsylvania little is
known. The home was in Westmoreland County, where Jesse R. Grant was
born. Soon afterwards the family went to Ohio. When Jesse was sixteen he
was sent to Maysville, Ky., and apprenticed to the tanner's trade, which
he learned thoroughly, and made the chief occupation of his life. Soon
after he reached his majority he started in business for himself in
Ravenna, Portage County, Ohio. In a short time he removed to Point
Pleasant, on the Ohio side of the Ohio River, about twenty miles above
Cincinnati. Here he lived and prospered for many years, marrying, in
1821, Hannah Simpson, daughter of a farmer of the place in good
circumstances. The Simpsons were also of Scotch ancestry, and of stout,
self-reliant, industrious, respectable character, like the Grants. Thus
in the parents of General Grant were united strains of one of the strong
races of the world,--sound in body, mind, and soul, and having in a
remarkable degree vital energy, the spirit of independence, and the
staying power which enables its possessors to work without tiring, to
endure hardships with fortitude, and to accumulate a competence by
patient thrift. This last ability General Grant lacked.
These parents, like those of the majority of Americans of the old stock,
thought it no dishonor to toil for livelihood, cultivating their souls'
health by performance of daily duty in fidelity to God, their country,
and their home. Jesse R. Grant had slight opportunities of schooling,
but he had no contempt for knowledge. Throughout his life he was a
diligent reader of books and newspapers, and was rated a man of uncommon
intelligence and of sound judgment in business. He was an entertaining
talker, and a newspaper writer and public speaker of local celebrity.
Through his early manhood, while he lived in Ohio, he was a farmer, a
trader, a contractor for buildings and roads, as well as a tanner. When
he reached the age of sixty, having secured a comfortable competence, he
retired from active business. In his declining years he removed to
Covington, Ky., near Cincinnati. Mrs. Grant was a true helpmate, a woman
of refinement of nature, of controlling religious faith, being from her
youth an active member of the Methodist Church, of strong wifely and
maternal instincts. Her life was centred in her home and family. Both
these parents lived to rejoice in the high achievement and station of
their son Ulysses.