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Yes yes, Grant's “Wife” owned the slaves. Kind of like John Kerry saying that I don't own any SUV’s my “family” does.

I don't know who took the greater financial hit in freeing slaves, I don't think that's relevant to the point, which is that Lee did free all of his slaves because he didn't want people to think he was motivated by the desire to preserve slavery. And while Grant may have freed a slave in 1959, there were still people of color calling him “Master” at war’s end.

I don't think that's relevant to the point, which is that Lee did free all of his slaves because he didn't want people to think he was motivated by the desire to preserve slavery.

Lee freed his slaves in 1862 because his father-in-law's will required it.

And while Grant may have freed a slave in 1959, there were still people of color calling him “Master” at war’s end.

No there were not.

1. It’s not known who owned the slaves Julia Grant had around. She stated they were freed “at the time of the Emancipation Proclamation,” not by it, as I stated in the earlier post. This was sometime between August, 1862 and January 1, 1863.

2. Lee freed the slaves he had control of on 29 Dec. 1862.

It is quite probable “Grant’s” slaves were freed before Lee’s. Or at much the same time, anyway.

You seem perfectly willing to make excuses for Lee delaying the freeing of more than 1000 slaves in his control, but cut no slack for Grant, whose control of four was at best marginal.

Nobody has ever claimed Grant was a fervent abolitionist. But then neither was Lee. It seems likely their attitude towards the institution was rather similar, although AFAIK Lee never made a great financial sacrifice to free a slave. Grant did.

Here’s a quote from a letter Lee wrote to his wife in 1856:

““ ... In this enlightened age, there are few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution, is a moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence.”

Sounds to me like Lee was not in any hury to get rid of the institution. Ready to put off abolition to the presumably distant future.