Grant And Lee A Study In Contrasts Summary

Bruce Catton focuses on both the differences and similarities between Civil War Generals in "Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts". He looks at the fact that both Grant and Lee grew up in America. Lee was from Tidewater, Virginia in the South, and Grant from the Western frontier. He noted that both military leaders had different values. Lee was an aristocratic family man that believed that landowners were part of the leisure class. So Lee embraced the inequality of the system. And Grant was coming from new technology familiar to a frontier man and a value that hard work determined one's outcome in life. Grant believed that individual merit was something each human should earn. Catton also looks at the similarities between the men in that they