Hiram Ulysses Grant never did like his given name, since the initials formed the distasteful acronym HUG. So when clerks at West Point entered him into the records as Ulysses S. Grant in 1839, he decided to say nothing, dropping the hated Hiram and adding Simpson, which had been his mother's maiden name.

Twenty-three years later, on February 16, 1862, the Northern public would put its own interpretation on the initials "U.S." After Grant's refusal to accept anything other than total capitulation from Confederate General Simon Bolivar Buckner at Fort Donelson, Tennesee, he was dubbed "Unconditional Surrender" Grant.

This song is for Jim Epperson.


"The Grant Pill"