Stephanie Perez Prof. Futterman October 16, 2008 Grant v. Lee The years between 1861 and 1865 are historically known as the years of Civil War in the United States. A time in which our united nation was divided between the North better known as the Union and the South also known as the Confederates. These divisions were well known throughout history and they were lead by two generals Ulysses S. Grant in the North while Robert E. Lee in the South. In Bruce Catton’s “Grant and Lee: a Study in Contrasts,” he describes their many different characteristics. In fact although Grant and Lee had similar goals they were known for their very different beliefs. Ulysses S. Grant was general of the Union Statesthroughout the Civil War. He was a man of loyalty and determination to the people of the North. In fact he was known to be son of a hard working tanner, in the Western frontier. Grant according to Catton is a man that came up the hard way. He was not born into success he made himself successful. “…and embodied nothing in particular except the eternal toughness and sinewy fiber of the men who grew up beyond the mountains.” This quote shows that Grant was a tough man who worked hard for what he wanted and gets it when he wants it. He never let people get in the way of the success he knows he can greatly achieve and Catton greatly exemplifies this in this quote. Where on the other hand Robert E. Lee was a man born into aristocracy. Lee was a man who was used to a sense of class system, where there are people up top holding power while those at the bottom helped keep wealth stable. A quote that best portrays Lee’s aristocratic lifestyle would be, “…Lee stood for the feeling that it was somehow of advantage to human society to have a pronounced inequality in the social structure. There should be a leisure class, backed by ownership of land; in turn, society itself should be keyed to the land as the chief source of wealth and influence.” Grant did not work as hard to get...