After graduating from West Point and serving in the Mexican War, Ulysses S. Grant he retired from the army and spent several years as a civilian with little success in business ventures. With the beginning of the Civil War he joined the Union Army. Step by step and victory after victory, like those of Vicksburg or Chattanooga , was ascending until in 1864, Abraham Lincoln he appointed him General in command of all Union forces.
This appointment was not to the liking of other more veteran generals and, despite having proven himself on the battlefield, rumors of his problems with alcohol began to spread. I don't know to what extent he had problems with alcohol – in fact, only specific episodes of drunkenness are known – but in moments of anguish, loneliness and, above all, in the midst of a fratricidal war, it shouldn't be something so surprising either. The fact is that a general decided to denounce Ulysses before President Lincoln...
The President asked him what he drank.
Whisky – answered the general.
Then he questioned him about the brand he drank.
Well, send a box of that whiskey to all the generals, let's see if they win battles like General Grant.
He was chosen as the Republican candidate for the 1868 presidential election, in which he won and was named President of the United States at the age of 46, the youngest up to that point. In 1872 he was re-elected again but his second term was marked by corruption scandals. Faced with those drunken accusations, Grant said:
Drunks don't win wars and alcoholics don't get elected President of the United States