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Grant's descendant at home in the South A great-great-grandson of Ulysses S. Grant makes his home in Spotsylvania County--and re-enacts as a Confederate Date published: 5/3/2009
BY LAURA MOYER One hundred forty-five years after Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant fought to a draw at the Battle of the Wilderness, one of his great-great-grandsons lives quietly a few miles away in a suburban townhouse. John Grant Griffiths is a retired federal employee, a self-taught expert on military weapons, and an occasional Civil War re-enactor. More often than not, Griffiths dons the gray uniform of a Confederate private. What would his great-great-grandfather, victorious Union commander and 18th president of the United States, think of that? Griffiths has answered that question before. "All I can say is, he's not here." And Griffiths, 70, is. A bachelor, he has chosen to live for the past 22 years in Spotsylvania County, in the heart of Southern territory, and it suits him. Work drew him first. After many years as a draftsman for the federal government, he parlayed his extensive knowledge of military weapons into a career change and became curator of ordnance for the former Air-Ground Museum at Marine Corps Base Quantico. He filled that role from 1987 until his retirement in 1998. And then he just decided to stay. He's a member of the Rappahannock Valley Civil War Round Table and the Friends of the Wilderness Battlefield, and he re-enacts as either a Confederate or a Union soldier. He doesn't do battles much anymore because it's hard to get up after falling on the field, but he still enjoys the living-history side of things. "I turn out once in a while, stand around with my hands in my pockets, drink beer and have a very relaxing weekend," he said with a grin. He's content to be a private, with no desire for an officer's insignia. And he feels a lot of empathy and respect for the unsung Confederate and Union soldiers he channels in the 21st century. SELF-TAUGHT EXPERT Young John Griffiths was in fourth grade and flipping through a family photo album when he saw a picture of Ulysses S. Grant and asked his mother about it. "She said, 'That's your great-great-grandfather. He was President Grant.' I was thrilled." The president's oldest son, Frederick Dent Grant, was the father of several children, including Ulysses S. Grant III, who was the father of Griffiths' mother, Julia Grant Griffiths.
Date published: 5/3/2009
was badly taken advantage of by a crooked investment banker who cheated his customers and then left town leaving Grant pennyless. In those days former Presidents received no retirement pay and his military pay was nothing to write home about. He was actually acting as an innocent, trusting frontman for the crooked banker. He died of throat cancer...pennyless.
logistics line at Antietam and Gettysburg he too "squandered" many lives. When Lee asked Longstreet (who was a great friend of Grant's) what Grant was going to be like as overall field commander: "Sir, tomorrow we are going to be in battle formation, and we will be in battle formation every day until the end of the war." That's an ancestor to be proud of.
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