By Leslie Pratch
The selection of an executive for a difficult task is extremely difficult and has been so for many leaders throughout history. Consider Abraham Lincoln’s frustrating search for a capable army commander during the Civil War. He had the pick of generals with illustrious West Point backgrounds, and even generals who had shown great bravery and resourcefulness as juniors and officers in the Mexican-American war 15 years earlier. One of Lincoln’s generals, George B. McClellan, had a towering reputation going into the Civil War, but as did half a dozen others, proved a failure leading the Union Army in battle. Only when Ulysses S. Grant became overall army commander in 1864 did Lincoln find a man capable of rising to the occasion.
Grant had been a failure in every trade he ever tried—tanner, farmer, soldier (he resigned as a captain well before the Civil War began)—and would be ridiculed for his corrupt administration later as President. But there was one thing Grant could do better than any man of his time: He could lead an army to victory in war.
The differences between U.S. Grant and George McClellan as commander-in-chief are complex. Small in stature but commanding in presence, McClellan was known as “The Little Napoleon.” He proved to be a masterful raiser, organizer, and trainer of armies, and his men were fiercely loyal to him. But when the chips were down, he could not bring himself to lead that wonderful fighting machine he had created into battle. He was simply not a warrior.
Grant, conversely, had a mediocre career at West Point and left the Army in the 1850s in disgrace.[i] But the Army needed officers when the Civil War broke out, and Grant was given command of an infantry regiment. He never looked back. A creative and relentless fighter, he won battle after battle until he had worked his way to the top.
Grant won the Civil War.
Could his success, or McClellan’s failure, have been predicted? Tens of thousands of lives might have been saved, and the course of American history might have been changed for the better.
The ability to meet challenges and successfully resolve them, day after day, is crucial to the success of any leader. A successful leader must constantly adapt to the unforeseen—and must mobilize, coordinate, and direct the efforts of others. This ability, unfailingly demonstrated by Grant during warfare, is what I call instrumental coping, which I describe in great detail on lesliepratch.com. Although Grant may not have been an ideal active coper during other, peacetime circumstances or when separated from his family, he was the right leader for the particular situation pressing the Union. We will return to Grant with a view to understanding active and passive coping across levels of personality. Individuals like Grant, who may thrive under certain circumstances, collapse under others. Understanding the holes in the coping structure of leaders is important to predicting whether they will succeed in a particular situation.
[i] Grant resigned from the army in the 1850s having achieved the high rank of captain. He was not cashiered. The circumstances around his resignation had to do with accusations of drinking. He was a devoted family man but the circumstances of the war separated him from his family—he was in California while his wife and children were in the east. He was depressed, and his depression manifested as drinking too much. There is absolutely no evidence during his years of success (he was never more alive than on the battlefield) that he drank to excess. Grant’s depression owed to a combination of intolerable circumstances and crushing loneliness. In July of 1852, then-Lt. Grant was sent to California as quartermaster of the 4th Infantry Regiment. The trip west was a nightmare of difficulties and disease, with the troops crossing (pre-canal) Panama during one of the severest cholera epidemics in history. A third of Grant’s party, including 17 of the 20 children with the regiment, died; Grant’s efforts during this passage were regarded as not only competent, but heroic. One observer recalled, “He was like a ministering angel to us all.” On the last part of the voyage, from Panama to California aboard a cholera-ridden ship, Grant was playing cards with his close friend, Brevet Major John Gore, when “Gore suddenly put his cards down. ‘My God!’ said Gore, his face turning white. I’ve got cholera!’” Gore died before morning. In California, Grant’s health was bad, he had superiors who disliked him, and he was desperately lonely for his family. He didn’t dare ask them to join him and subject them to the same dangers he’d faced. His letters to his wife, Julia, then pregnant with their second child were full of longing. Simpson (see below) wrote, “Grant felt incomplete without Julia; friends did not compensate for her absence . . . He wanted so much to be the father who spent time with his boy, walking and riding about—the sort of father he never had.” He quotes letters from Grant to Julia. “I sometimes get so anxious to see you, and our two little boys, that I am tempted to resign and trust to Providence, and my own exertions, for a living where I can have you and them with me.” When Grant arrived at his last and unhappiest California post, Fort Humboldt, he was, according to Perrett (see below), “suffering from the flu, in agony from a rotten tooth, prone to migraine headaches, and suffering acutely from rheumatism in his legs.” His new commandant was Brevet Lt. Col. Robert C. Buchanan, whom Perrett calls “one of the most disagreeable men in the army,” a martinet who delighted in tormenting his junior officers. On April 11, 1854, Grant sent two letters to Washington—one receiving and accepting his commission as captain, and the other resigning from the United States Army. Grant was haunted for the rest of his career by rumors that he had resigned under pressure, a drunkard drummed out of the service by threat of court martial. Whether he resigned under pressure or not is impossible to tell. He did drink—he was drunk once when Brevet Capt. George McClellan was visiting Fort Humboldt, which cost him McClellan’s respect forever. McClellan was later major general in charge of the federal Army of the Potomac during the early years of the Civil War. He does not appear, however, to have been a heavy drinker. Rather, small amounts affected him greatly. “One glass would show on him and two or three would make him stupid,” said Robert McFeeley, an officer who served with him in California. There is no evidence that Grant drank more than most of his fellow officers. My sources for this, which agree on the above although they differ in details, are Geoffrey Perrett in “Ulysses S. Grant: Soldier and President” (Random House, New York, 1997) and Brooks D. Simpson in “Ulysses S. Grant: Triumph Over Adversity, 1822-1865” (Houghton Mifflin, New York, 2000).
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Leslie Pratch, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist from Northwestern University with an M.B.A. in Strategy and Finance and a B.A. in Religion from Williams College. She works with boards of directors and private equity investors to select and develop executives. She can be reached at (312) 464-7919 or email her at leslie@pratchco.com or visit www.pratchco.com. Please also refer, if you are so inclined, the entries on active coping and its crucial role in effective leadership, as leslieprath.com
