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50 free Ulysses S. Grant trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Ulysses S. Grant was not born with that name: a congressman's clerical error enrolled Hiram Ulysses Grant at West Point as 'U. S. Grant', and his classmates promptly nicknamed him Sam after Uncle Sam. He left the army broke, sold firewood in St. Louis, clerked in his father's Galena leather shop, and within four years was the first lieutenant general since George Washington, accepting Lee's surrender with terms that let the Confederates keep their horses. These 50 questions follow him from Point Pleasant, Ohio, through Forts Henry and Donelson, Shiloh, the Vicksburg siege that ended on July 4, Chattanooga, the Overland Campaign and Appomattox, then into a presidency that created the Justice Department and the first Civil Service Commission, prosecuted the Klan, settled the Alabama Claims and drowned in the Whiskey Ring and Black Friday. The later years cover the first presidential trip around the world, the failed third-term bid, the Wall Street swindle that left him penniless and the memoirs Mark Twain published on a 70% royalty as he died of throat cancer. Easy questions stick to the presidency number, the surrender and the tomb; the hard tier asks about cabinet secretaries, Korean expeditions and the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. Every answer is cited to a page we checked, with a short explanation so you pick up something even when you miss.
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Q 01Grant was which number president of the United States?
18th
He served two terms, from 1869 to 1877.
Q 02What was Grant's name at birth?
Hiram Ulysses
His father always called him Ulysses; the 'S.' came later by accident.
Q 03In which state was Grant born?
Ohio
His family moved to Georgetown, Ohio, in 1823, where five siblings were born.
Q 04How did Grant end up with the name 'U. S. Grant'?
A congressman altered it on his West Point nomination
Representative Thomas L. Hamer, unfamiliar with him, changed the name; colleagues then called him 'Sam'.
Q 05What nickname did Grant's army colleagues give him because of his initials?
Sam
'U.S.' was read as Uncle Sam.
Q 06Where did Grant rank in his 1843 West Point class of 39?
21st
He was the academy's 'most proficient' horseman but was assigned to the infantry, not the cavalry.
Q 07Grant's father made his living in what trade?
Leather goods
Grant later worked in the family's leather goods shop, Grant & Perkins, in Galena, Illinois.
Q 08What was Grant's wife's maiden name?
Julia Dent
Grant's abolitionist parents skipped the wedding because the Dents owned slaves.
Q 09What did Grant name the cabin he built on his father-in-law's farm in 1856?
Hardscrabble
Julia called it an 'unattractive cabin'; the family had little money but always enough food.
Q 10In which Illinois town was Grant living when the Civil War began?
Galena
He had moved there in April 1860 to work for his father's leather goods business.
Q 11Grant demanded 'unconditional surrender' at which 1862 stronghold?
Fort Donelson
Simon Bolivar Buckner submitted, handing Grant the Union's first major victory and 12,000 prisoners.
Q 12Which April 1862 battle was the costliest in American history to that point?
Shiloh
Its 23,746 casualties stunned the nation and brought accusations that Grant had been drunk.
Q 13Grant's 1863 capture of Vicksburg gave the Union control of which river?
The Mississippi
The siege lasted seven weeks and split the Confederacy in two.
Grant's 1862 General Order No. 11, later a campaign issue, expelled whom from his district?
Q 21Which Grant phrase became the Republican slogan in 1868?
Let us have peace
He played no overt role in the campaign, touring the West with Sherman and Sheridan instead.
Q 22Who was Grant's first-term vice president?
Schuyler Colfax
The 1868 convention nominated Grant unanimously on the first ballot and Colfax on the fifth.
Q 23Which chief justice swore Grant in on March 4, 1869?
Salmon P. Chase
In his inaugural address Grant urged ratification of the Fifteenth Amendment.
Jews
As president he appointed more than fifty Jewish people to federal office to make amends.
Q 15When Lincoln made Grant lieutenant general in 1864, who was the only previous holder of that rank?
George Washington
The promotion gave Grant command of all Union armies.
Q 16The brutal series of 1864 Virginia battles Grant fought against Lee is called what?
The Overland Campaign
It ran through the Wilderness, Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor in May and June.
Q 17Where did Lee surrender to Grant on April 9, 1865?
Appomattox Court House
Grant let the Confederates keep their horses and ordered his men to stop celebrating.
Q 18What did Grant allow Lee's troops to keep after the surrender?
Their horses
He told his men 'the rebels are our countrymen again'.
Q 19Why did the Grants decline Lincoln's invitation to Ford's Theatre on April 14, 1865?
They planned to travel home to Burlington
The conspiracy that killed Lincoln also targeted top cabinet members.
Q 20Which president promoted Grant to General of the Army in 1866?
Andrew Johnson
The two later broke over Reconstruction policy.
Q 24Which constitutional amendment, on voting rights, did Grant champion?
Fifteenth
He also prosecuted the Ku Klux Klan and signed the bill creating the Justice Department.
Q 25Which federal agency was created in 1870 under Grant to enforce Reconstruction?
The Justice Department
It let the Attorney General and a new Solicitor General prosecute the Klan.
Q 26In 1871 Grant created the first what?
Civil Service Commission
Civil service reform was one of the few bright spots in a scandal-plagued administration.
Q 27Who served as Grant's long-running and widely praised Secretary of State?
Hamilton Fish
Fish shaped the Treaty of Washington that settled the Alabama Claims.
Q 28The Alabama Claims, settled under Grant, concerned a Confederate warship built where?
Britain
The CSS Alabama's raids on Union merchant ships were resolved by the 1871 Treaty of Washington.
Q 29Which Caribbean territory did Grant try and fail to annex?
Santo Domingo
Senator Charles Sumner blocked the treaty for the modern Dominican Republic.
Q 30Which senator led opposition to Grant's annexation plan?
Charles Sumner
Grant retaliated by sacking Sumner's friend John Lothrop Motley as minister to Britain.