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he prospect of a Ulysses S. Grant middle-aged adult civilian charcoal portrait could only have been made between August 1, 1854 and May 1861 when Grant was out of U. S. Army uniform.
The 7-year civilian time window can be further reduced to about 1 year when Grant moved to Galena, Illinois in the Spring of 1860 and before he went off to the Civil War in May 1861.
There was no obvious report of such a Ulysses S. Grant artifact’s creation in the 1 year window and consequently no one was hot on its trail.
The Author and his mother unknowingly purchased the 100-year-old antique Victorian frame hiding Ulysses S. Grant's charcoal portrait on August 15, 1965, at an antique barn in the Town of Cambria, New York.
The unidentified portrait was discovered by the author the next day August 16th supporting the flimsy currently modern flowered paper print and the author's mother Audrey nicknamed the anonymous southern gentleman Uncle George for the next 57 years.
It was not until March 2022 that Uncle George was finally identified as Ulysses S. Grant. The immediate challenge became; why and where did Grant's portrait originate, who was the artist, and how did it end up a century after its creation in Molyneux Corners, New York?
The author's resulting research led to the spontaneous lifelong friendship between Ulysses S. Grant and a Seneca Indian brave Ha-Sa-No-An-Da born on the Tonawanda Indian Reservation at Tonawanda Falls along the same geographic escarpment as Niagara Falls.
Native American Indian Ha-Sa-No-An-Da was born in 1828 on the Seneca Nation Tonawanda Reservation in Indian Falls, New York. The remarkably talented, well educated, and accomplished Indian brave’s English name was Ely Samuel Parker who became the Seneca Nation’s spiritual leader Sachem at the age of twenty-three. Parker’s five-year engineering career on the Erie Barge Canal in Lockport, New York parlayed into a U.S. State Department assignment in 1857 as the construction superintendent on a Mississippi River U.S. Customs House in Galena, Illinois.
Citizen Ulysses S. Grant resigned from the U.S. Army in 1854 and n the spring of 1860 seeking stable employment in his father Jesse Grant’s leather goods store he moved his wife Julia and their four children to Galena, Illinois. Shortly thereafter Ely met Ulysses at the Grant-Perkins Leather Goods store and soon sketched Grant’s remarkable charcoal portrait that blossomed into their intensive 25-year lasting friendship. Ulysses and Ely’s idyllic lives were interrupted in April 1861 when Grant and seven other prominent Galena citizens responded to U.S. President Abraham Lincoln’s call to arms. All eight Galena citizens quickly rose to the rank of U.S. Union Army General.
Grant and Parker would not be reunited until 1863 when Grant asked U.S. President Abraham Lincoln to intervene and dispense with native Indian bigotry allowing Ely to become General Grant’s strategic military engineer. Ely S. Parker prepared three elegant hand-written copies of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s surrender ending the Civil War at Appomattox on April 9, 1865.
After U.S. President Lincoln’s horrific assassination Ely Parker and General Grant continued to remain close during Washington DC’s struggle to unify the USA and Ely worked vigorously during Ulysses’ 1868 presidential campaign. U.S. President Grant named Ely Parker Head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Ulysses returned his portrait to Ely for a display of authority in his government office.
Union Generals Ulysses S. Grant and Ely S. Parker would never part ways again and together they made significant associated careers in the U.S. Military and U.S. Federal Government Politics.
This is the story of Ulysses S. Grant and Ely S. Parker's unlikely however remarkable friendship and how their joint historical achievements moved Grant's portrait throughout the country!
Ely's wife Minnie was not keen about Grant's portrait in their posh Washington home. Ely passed Grant’s portrait to his brother Nicholson Parker at the Seneca reservation in Cattaraugus, New York. Nicholson passed the portrait to his son Frederick who passed it on to his son Arthur Caswell Parker (Ely's grandnephew) who died on January 1, 1955, in Geneva New York.
Ten years later in 1965, the now disguised unknown portrait was for sale at Dorothy Urtel's antique store in Cambria, New York for a mere $15. It was then uncovered and remained “Uncle George” until 2022 when its identity as Ulysses S. Grant was finally realized. The portrait’s 164-year journey tells a unique story of United States history before, during, and after the “War between the States.".
General Ely S. Parker was honored by the U.S. Mint in 2022 when his image with quill in hand became the U.S. Sacajawea One Dollar obverse.
12 Point Durable High-Gloss Front & Rear Cover
High Quality #60 Gloss Paper
227 Pages with 62 Color Pages
143 Illustrations
Over 51,000 Words
ISBN: 978-0-9998697-8-9
Retail List Price $34.95
Proudly Printed & Bound in the U.S.A.
Buyer will receive one Brand New Copy of the Book Cover
Named and Shown
Your Book will be signed and dated by the author; Kenneth W.
Kayser
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Additional KEY SEARCH WORDS; Appomattox, Six-Nations, Native American Indians, Reservation, Grand Island, Tonawanda, Erie Canal, Lockport