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Like Lincoln, Grant was from what was considered to be the West; Galena, Illinois. He graduated from West Point in 1843 only to be drummed out of the army eleven years later due to his propensity for alcohol. He made his way to St. Louis, Missouri and worked pedaling lumber and logs throughout the city. He was often faced with the humbling experience of encountering military officers and former colleagues while pushing carts of logs throughout the streets of St. Louis.<ref>Charles Bracelen Flood, ''Grant and Sherman: The Friendship That Won The Civil War'' (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005), 7-9.</ref> Grant met this challenge admirably and was unashamed of taking any necessary measure to support his family. By all accounts, he was considered a "regular guy" who did not blend into the social network shared by the West Point elite. Daniel Frost, a classmate of Grant’s from the Point, stated that Grant possessed a “total absence of elegance.”<ref>Flood, 10.</ref>Elegance did not win wars. Courage, foresight, and determination won wars, and that is what Lincoln found in Grant.

== A Vicious War==