What made Ulysses S. Grant so successful for defeating Robert E. Lee?

Answer 1

By defeating Lee, he pretty much ended the Civil War. But he lost several times to Lee in the last year of the war, but had unlimited resources that Lee could not match.

NEW RESPONDENT

The matter is worth being explained from the point of view of

Union grand strategy of 1864.

After his appointment to General in Chief, he reorganized the Union Army and its chain of command and, in full accordance with Lincoln he made up a general plan of operations.

Based upon what that plan foresaw, all Union armies, fighting on the various war fronts had to act in a coordinated way, as per the orders given them by the General Staff.

The main objectives were:

1- of maintain all Confederate fronts under the greatest pressure possible in order to make impossible or, extremely difficult, the displacement of reserves and supplies between the Western and Eastern Front and vice verse,

2 - of destroy the adversary armies.

Grant, who had elected his Headquarters by the Army of Potomac, applying those concepts and using the strategic intimidation by menacing Richmond succeeded in making Lee pinned down to his initiative, his endless pressure and deprived of his freedom of movement, until the Confederate general was forced to fight within about thirty kilometers from the Capital of the Confederacy.

Sherman's March to the Sea and the definitive conquest of the Shenandoah Valley signed the ultimate fate of Lee's army: the surrender of Appomattox.

Of course Grant was able to carry out successfully his campaign also thanks to the great resources at his disposal. Anyhow it's worth remembering that those resources existed also when McClellan was General in Chief and was supported by the whole Union, but he was not up to the task and the Union top military leaders of those years either.