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In the spring of 1861, as the still youthful nation careened ever closer to what would become the Civil War, both Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant were faced with life-altering decisions. Both men were governed by personal codes of honor and a steadfast allegiance to what each viewed as his homeland. In the end, their choices would be representative of those made by many of their countrymen. For Lee, his successful career in the United States Army and his allegiance to the United States government could be trumped by only one set of relationships, those to his family and his home state of Virginia. For Grant, one had to choose between being a traitor or a patriot.

A year would pass before the principal Confederate command was awarded to the general whom Abraham Lincoln and his advisers had ranked the best soldier in the nation. Confederate president Jefferson Davis first wanted Lee nearby to advise him. He then sent Lee in a futile effort to save northwestern Virginia (now West Virginia) from falling into Union hands. Lee was soon ordered back to Richmond, then told to bolster defenses on the Atlantic seaboard. It would not be until June 1862, when he was appointed to succeed the wounded General Joseph Johnston, that Lee became involved in a major campaign—the effort to halt George McClellan's march up the Peninsula to take Richmond. Lee assumed the offensive, repelling McClellan in the Seven Days battles. Then, by moving the theater of action to Manassas Junction in northern Virginia, he turned the table on McClellan by threatening Washington, D.C. Lee continued his offensive into Maryland, where he could feed his army off the land, free Virginia from the presence of enemy forces, attempt to influence the peace movement in the North, and perhaps win a decisive battle that might end the conflict. He did not find the victory that he sought at Antietam, but he did halt the advance of Ambrose Burnside, McClellan’s replacement, at Fredericksburg. In the spring of 1863 Lee wrote to his wife, "If we can baffle [our enemies] in their various designs this year…, next fall there will be a great change in public opinion at the North." After his great victory at Chancellorsville, which cost the Confederacy the life of General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, Lee proceeded into Pennsylvania with the same objectives that had carried him to Maryland the year before. When he failed to achieve victory at Gettysburg, he retreated with his army to Virginia. •

Grant was awarded command of a regiment of Illinois volunteers in June 1861. Like President Lincoln, he had no interest at that point in ending slavery, only in preserving the Union. Grant commented to Julia about what was at stake, both for the nation and for him personally: "the safety of the country, to some extent, and my reputation and that of our children greatly depends upon my acts." In early 1862, Grant captured Fort Donelson in northern Tennessee. His demand for "unconditional surrender," with which his initials would from this point be associated, was accepted by Confederate general Simon Bolivar Buckner, Grant's close friend at West Point. This was the first major Union victory of the war; it brought about the capture of an entire Confederate army of 12–15,000 soldiers. Grant pushed forward. Six weeks later at Shiloh, in the bloodiest battle ever fought on the North American continent to that point, his skill and determination snatched victory from what seemed like inevitable defeat. In 1863, Grant turned toward Vicksburg, Mississippi, a town vital to both the geographical unity of the Confederacy and the regulation of traffic on the Mississippi River. When this fortress fell, Grant had captured his second Confederate army, this time a force of 30,000. He was promoted to major general, Congress awarded a victory medal, and the president stated, "Grant is my man, and I am his the rest of the war." Lincoln then sent him to Chattanooga, where Grant again turned impending defeat into victory. The president promoted him to lieutenant general and gave him the command of all Union forces as general-in-chief. Grant would soon be compelled to move to the eastern theater to confront Lee. •

In the spring of 1864, Grant arrived in Virginia to test himself against the man who would become his greatest antagonist. Having defeated many Union generals, Lee was once again looking for a single resounding victory that might end all hostilities. Grant, however, was unlike anyone Lee had met before. His goal was not Richmond. Grant was determined to destroy Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, whatever the cost in lives and materials. He made clear his plan to General George Meade, "all the Armies are to move together and towards one common center … Sherman will move … [against] Jo Johnston … Lee's Army will be your objective point. Wherever Lee goes there you will go also."
Grant stayed in the field, at Meade's side, to make sure that his orders were carried out. Lee recognized that he was outmanned, but he had seen in Mexico how even a small force would fight desperately to defend its homeland against invaders. He prepared to give his army its best chance to succeed. From the Wilderness, to Spotsylvania, to Cold Harbor, Lee's army consistently held its own against the massive Union fighting machine. It was not until Grant managed to cross the James River and attack Petersburg, south of Richmond, that Lee realized that all was lost. Still, the siege of Petersburg would continue into the spring of 1865.

Early that year, anticipating the collapse of the Confederacy, Abraham Lincoln preached a doctrine of "malice towards none [and] charity for all" as the means "to bind up the nation's wounds." The president's sentiments aligned precisely with those of Grant, as became clear in the generous terms of surrender offered at Appomattox. For his part, Lee restrained his soldiers from initiating guerrilla warfare. The two generals, who had so opposed disunion and war, contributed significantly to the process of healing.

"The cause of the great War of the Rebellion against the United States will have to be attributed to slavery." So Grant concluded when he wrote his Memoirs. Grant saw that the nation could not survive with slavery. Lee acknowledged that a higher power—the law of the land—had ended an institution that he had always disliked. However, neither general believed that the abolition of slavery would lead to racial equality in American society.

Long before the war, Lee had stated that slavery was more trouble than it was worth. He called the institution "a moral & political evil," but at the same time he saw what he believed to be its positive side, stating that blacks, even in subjugation, were better off in America than in Africa. After 1861, however, and if only mildly, Lee pushed for emancipation "to remove a weakness at home and to get sympathy abroad, and to divide our enemies." In late 1862, he freed the 170 slaves owned by his late father-in-law as directed by the Custis will. Toward the end of the war, he argued for the freeing of slaves who could then be mustered into the Confederate armies. In the years after Appomattox Lee accepted emancipation with minimal flinching and encouraged southern support of the new order.

Grant said little about slavery before the war. In 1859 he freed the only slave he ever owned; the domestic servants that his wife had inherited were beyond his control. Grant reenlisted in the U.S. Army not to free slaves, but to oppose secession. "I never was an Abolitionist," Grant wrote, "not even what could be called Anti slavery." But as he moved his army into Confederate territory and encountered thousands of black refugees, he concluded that "the North & South could never live at peace with each other except as one nation, and that without Slavery." Once elected to the presidency, Grant worked persistently to protect the hard-won rights of the freedmen.