What was Ulysses S. Grant's strength?

Grant had two great strengths, one of which would also be his weakness. Grant was a very determined general. When other generals endured heavy losses, they retreated back to Washington and let Lee's army escape. Grant took heavy losses in the Battle of the Wilderness and at Cold Harbor. Grant endured a lot of public criticism in the Northern press as the death tolls continued to mount—he was called "The Butcher" in both the Northern and Southern presses. Grant knew that his president supported him in his war of attrition against the Confederacy, so Grant continued on despite the criticism. Grant was also a very determined man in general—he wrote his memoirs while dying of throat cancer; the proceeds from this book would go to support his family upon his death.
Grant was also a very loyal general. When Grant became the commander of the Union armies in 1864, he put William Sherman in charge of the armies in the West. Sherman took a massive gamble by cutting his supply lines on his March to the Sea, but Grant stood by him. Grant's loyalty would prove to be the downfall of his presidency as many of the people implicated in the Gold Ring and other scandals were some of Grant's closest confidants. This would lead to historians ranking Grant as one of the worst presidents in history.