Here, my son, is an exact portrait of the general who fought the great battle of Gettysburg.  When he had rested his army a sufficient time he began moving in pursuit of the enemy.  The rebel general fell back into old Virginia, taking his time as he went along, and being in no temper to hasten his steps.  In short, we followed him back timidly to Orange Court House, where he made a settlement for the winter.  There was a good deal of small fighting done during the autumn and winter, but neither side seemed to gain any advantage.  The fate of war hung in the balance.  If we gained an advantage one day, the enemy would do something to offset it on the next.  This state of things was a source of great grief to the nation.  The people wanted something more positive for the great amount of life and treasure they were wasting.  They called for more earnestness and more resolution on the part of our generals, and a better system of carrying on the war on the part of the authorities at Washington.  So, my son, the people’s impatience was at length heeded, and when spring came (I mean the spring of 1864), and the people were weary of the war, and demanded a change in the policy of conducting it, so that an end be put to it as speedily as possible, the government began to wake up to its duty.  We had fought battles for two years and hung the nation in mourning, and still Washington was as often in danger as Richmond.  Indeed, the fortune of war seemed in favor of Richmond.  Then the government began to see that if we would gain victories our armies must be commanded by soldiers, not politicians.

Yes, my son, the people were excited to joy when the government changed its military policy, and the great General Grant was brought to Washington and placed in command of all our armies.  The sun of our hopes brightened then, for the people had confidence in that general.  He had whipped the rebels so well for us in the West, and he had gained for us so many glorious victories.

And now, my son, we come to this remarkable siege of Washington.  I say remarkable, for it is destined to stand on the pages of military history without anything to compare with it.  Not that it was as bloody, or that the city was as obstinately attacked and defended as heroically, as some other cities that have been besieged, in ancient as well as modern times.  But you must know that sieges, like battles, derive their great importance and all that makes them remembered hereafter, not so much from the amount of blood that has been shed during them, not so much from the impetuosity of the attacks made or the heroic defences, as from the manner in which they affect the fate of nations.  Some sieges are remarkable for one thing, some another.  The siege of Washington was more remarkable for the manner in which the city was defended than the manner in which it was attacked.  No fields were fertilized with carnage, nor banners bathed in blood.

You, remember, my son, the tale of storied Troy, with all its “pomp and circumstance of glorious war.”  But, my son, it has never seemed to me more interesting than the passage of Thermopyl‘.  Nor will Agamemnon live in history after Leonidas is forgotten.  And yet these events in ancient war were small compared with the battles our Grant fought.  His deeds will brighten as you read of them in history, and become greater than them all.