Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant Effectuates a Plan Approved by President Lincoln, to Have a Noted Alabamian Ferry Ammunition to Alabama Unionists and to Report on Rebel Activities Behind the Lines

Giers, said Grant, wanted “to bring back to the Union all he can of his southern brethren and especially those of his own state.”

The most significant war date pass issued by any Civil War general we have ever carried

From 1855 until the outbreak of the Civil War, Jean Joseph Giers, born in Germany, owned the Cedar Hotel in the Alabama resort of Valhermoso Springs. It was patronized by the wealthy and prominent people of the day, and Giers was a well-known host in his state. He was a scholar who spoke nine languages, wrote poetry, and composed music. Giers lived in Washington in the winter and returned to the hotel in the summer, so he was acquainted with men on both sides of the coming conflict. Like many German-Americans, he did not believe in slavery, nor did he accept the legitimacy of the Confederacy.

In 1864 Giers determined to take a direct hand in stifling the rebellion. First he went to fellow Southern unionist, the military governor of Tennessee and future president, Andrew Johnson. On September 28, 1864, Johnson wrote President Lincoln, as the “Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln” states, “introducing Jean Joseph Giers, a refugee from Morgan County, Alabama.” Armed with this recommendation, Giers went in November to meet Abraham Lincoln in the Executive mansion, and explained to him a plan to arm unionists in his home state, and stated he was willing to travel from North to South, back and forth, to do so. The President was impressed, and on November 16, 1864, wrote Secretary of War Edwin M Stanton: “Hon. Sec. of War please see Mr. Gear, on the question of furnishing some small arm ammunition to loyal people in Northern Alabama. A. Lincoln.”

In late November 1864, with Sherman’s Army of the Tennessee in Georgia marching to the sea, the Army of the Cumberland was the chief Union army in the Western Theater. Commanded by a loyal Virginian, General George Thomas, it participated in the Atlanta Campaign, and the Battles of Chattanooga, Franklin, and Nashville, among many others. Thomas proved to be one of the great Union generals of the Civil War. Alabama was within the Army of the Cumberland’s theater of action, so to put Giers scheme into effect, Thomas’s assistance was crucial.

Giers, armed with the approvals of Lincoln, Johnson, and Stanton, next went to see Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant, overall Union commander, who was then in Washington. Grant wrote Thomas on Giers’s behalf. This is that very letter, designed to put into effect a plan approved at the highest levels of government.

Autograph Letter Signed, two pages, Washington, D.C., November 23, 1864, to General Thomas. “The bearer of this, Mr. Gier, is a Union citizen of Ala. to whom I have furnished a pass to come and go at pleasure over our roads and rivers within your command. Mr. G is very earnest in his desire to bring back to the Union all he can of his southern brethren and especially those of his own state. The principle object he has in view in traveling back and forth is to furnish this object. I would be pleased if you would extend to him a pass to travel back and forth on our Army Gunboats plying below Bridgeport [in northern Alabama], and give him all the facilities you can consistently for carrying out the object of his mission. U.S. Grant, Lt. Gen.” The accompanying envelope reads “Maj. Gen. G. H. Thomas / Comdr. Dept. of the Cumd.” It is interesting to note how Grant worded the letter, delicately mentioning “his desire to bring back to the Union all he can of his southern brethren”, but not the actual plan to ferry ammunition. Giers would also aid Union armed forces, and report on matters in the South and Southern troop movements.

Giers’s efforts bore fruit, as seen in the following correspondence. On January 26 and February 6, 1865, Giers wrote Grant at length from Decatur, Alabama, and then Nashville, Tennessee, discussing his efforts to restore loyalty in northern Alabama. With his first letter, Giers enclosed a letter of February 1 from Governor Johnson to Grant praising Giers. After the war, Giers wrote to Johnson and others about his continuing efforts to serve the U.S. in Alabama. On November 14, 1865, Giers wrote a similar letter to Grant. Grant was very pleased with Giers’s efforts, and on June 25, 1866, Grant endorsed an application of Giers for appointment as tax commissioner for Alabama, writing “Mr. Giers is a man of undoubted loyalty and ability, and rendered our army without recompense valuable services during the war.”