Carpe Blue Highways II and Gen. Grant

Yesterday I took you on a short trip up a blue highway in Tennessee.  Though we were on a road less traveled and stopping at every Eiffel Tower replica we found along the way, we were heading to a specific location:  Ft. Donelson in Dover, Tennessee – site of the Union’s first major victory of the Civil War.  One of the key players in that battle was none other than Brig. General Ulysses S. Grant. Grant, unlike most Union commanders at the time, was NOT afraid to take action!

Forts Henry, Heiman, and Donelson were devised to protect western Tennessee from Union forces using the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers as approach avenues.  It was Grant’s plan to take them.  After Henry and Heiman fell quickly to Union gunboats, Grant set his sites on the larger Donelson. 

Now, I don’t pretend to be a Civil War historian, so any facts I present would admittedly be a copy-and-paste version. I do encourage you to look it up as it is a fantastic story.  It includes ironclads, the army, some bad luck, one of the worst military blunders of the war, and finally Brig. General Ulysses S. Grant riding in with his Carpe Diem Life Map to save the day (okay, I made that last one up).  But Grant did ride in as things were looking pretty bleak for the Union Army — some historians even say disastrous.

The battles for Forts Henry, Heiman, and Donelson were not the bloodiest battles of the Civil War, but they were some of the most important.  With victory, Grant and the Union Army took control of the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers which led to the fall of Nashville. 

Grant’s leadership skills included an unshakable resolve to win the battle, the ability to evaluate his environment and his resources, adapt and change direction, create an action plan and take persistent action to achieve the goal at hand.  I don’t know if he enjoyed the process, but he did have an uncanny ability to remain calm in the heat of battle. 

Grant’s philosophy:

“The art of war is simple enough. Find out where your enemy is. Get to him as soon as you can.  Strike as hard as you can, and keep moving on.”

Have a goal you’d like to achieve?   Choose your goal.  Make a battle plan. Utilize all your resources. Get to it as soon as you can. Strike it as hard as you can, and keep moving on.

Carpe Diem Life